Herb garden is really looking nice. After losing so many plants over the hard winter 2 yrs ago the replacement plants are filling out and looking plentiful. Good bounty of tansy, artesmia, sage, santolina, yarrow, gomphrena, calendula, feverfew, and calendula. Lavender bushes still small but got enough flower stems for accents and small bunches. From my "secret source" I retrieved some beautiful bittersweet for wreaths, swags and berry bunches. Got a good crop of tomatoes and peppers but the rabbits got all my zuccihini.
This morning I glanced out the front window and saw a large bird on the wooden birdfeeder. I did not recognize it. It was a bit bigger thna a bluejay, dark in color with white. It's head was unusual with a feather plume in top much like a bluejay. Then I realized it must be a juvenile Pliated Woodpecker What a suprise, I was so excited at seeing him. We do have Pliated around here. Here there loud pecking from a long way off but seldom see them.
I called the U of M and spoke with a horniculturist at the Bell Museum about my caterpillar and it was identified as a Cecropia Moth. It is either the 2nd or 3rd largest moth in the whole U.S.
I was sweeping leaves off the pavers in front of my garden sheed when I spied a huge green catterpillar just on the edge of the pavers under the door. I couldn't believe my eyes, it was so big I wasn't sure it was real. I barely touched it and it was alive. I put a ruler down beside it and Jim took a picture. It was light green in color with 4 orange spots on raised pinacles and these orange spots were colored like tiny ladybugs. Behind these 4 orange ones were 2 rows of yellow spots on pinacles running all the way to the tail end. Along both sides of the caterpillar were 2 rows of blue colored spots on pinacles the entire length of it. I kept on eye on it for a long time and it slowly made its way to the wooded area on the SW side of my yard. It was 4 1/2 inches long. I've never seen anything like it. I thought perhaps it was going to be a Lunar Moth.
Jim prunned and topped off the old apple tree in the front garden for me and I pained it purple. It stands out like a nice focal point or sculpture.
Really a hot, humid, windy day today but I finished painting the basement windows. Hooray, just the front big window to go. I picked a few branches of bittersweet and set them out to mature and open up.