Category: Uncategorized

Brunch.

Arizona mantis (Stagmomantis limbata) devouring a live, unidentified cicada, Sierra Vista, Arizona. This was taken during my morning walk today.

The annual cicadas are at the peak of this year’s emergence. Last night I measured their pulsating song at levels between 90 and 110 decibels, which is in the range of chain saws and low-flying jet planes. During the day only a few cicadas sing at once, but in the last hours before nightfall everyone wants to join in. It doesn’t last long, only an hour of so each evening, but while it lasts it is the sound of insanity.  

I got to closely observe—but not photograph—a trio of lazuli buntings (Passerina amoena) as I moved around the Ash Canyon sanctuary filling feeders this morning. My little group consisted of a brightly colored adult male, a female, and a juvenile just getting his grown-up feathers. They have been absent all summer, which makes me think that the season has really turned. It’s not quite migration, but birds that have been in their breeding ranges all summer are showing up here in southeastern Arizona, as though they are staging themselves for the journey ahead. I’m glad to see them. 

The illustration and text are from American Ornithology; or The Natural History of Birds Inhabiting the United States, Not Given by Wilson With Figures Drawn, Engraved, and Coloured, from Nature

(whew!)

by Charles Lucien Bonaparte. I’ve included the entry for the “lazuli finch,” because I love the flowery 19th Century language, and his description of the bird as “one of the most beautiful of its tribe.” I have often struggled reading the abstruse jargon in scientific papers, but I like the precision in this description—especially of the color words used here. The book was published in 1825.

The image and text are adapted from the Biodiversity Heritage Library flickr stream, and are in the public domain.