Like this Tiger Swallowtail, butterflies are drawn to Turk’s Cap lilies. Photo by Bruce Stambaugh
I visit Shenandoah National Park whenever I can. Being retired has its advantages. I usually go to the park with a purpose in mind.
Recently, I drove the 45 miles from my home in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley to the Big Meadows area of the popular national park for several reasons. I like to capture butterflies on the impressive Turk’s Cap lilies. Secondly, the temperature in the Blue Ridge Mountains, where the park is located, is usually cooler than the oppressive heat the valley has experienced lately.
July is when the impressive summer flowers are in full bloom. Butterflies, bees, and other flying insects can’t resist their lure, and alert humans can’t miss the spotted, bright reddish-orange blossoms either.
These photos were all taken along Skyline Drive south of Big Meadows.
It didn’t take me long to spot a few butterflies flitting around. I usually find a group of flowers and wait for the butterflies to arrive. There was a problem with being a stationary human, however. I forgot to take my bug spray along, and between the gnats and the mosquitoes, I spent as much time swatting as I did taking photos. It was a minor sacrifice just to observe nature’s glorious beauty.
At Big Meadows, a ranger guided a small group of tourists on a nature walk. I moved around the sweeping, prairie-type basin. Due to the ongoing severe drought that Virginia is experiencing, the usual array of wildflowers is not as abundant as in previous years. However, as did the Monarchs and other butterflies, I found a few bright Orange Butterfly Weeds and the aromatic Common Milkweed blooming.
Please click on the photos to enlarge them.
I was also impressed with the thousands of honey bees and bumblebees that buzzed and hummed around the area. The Sweet White Clover got most of their attention.
Of course, I can’t go to Shenandoah National Park without taking my binoculars. Songbirds were everywhere, but the dense foliage of the trees made them hard to spot. Did I mention that mosquitoes and gnats were ubiquitous?
By noontime, the heat and humidity sent me back into the valley to the comfort of my air-conditioned home. Still, I felt mentally refreshed and renewed, ready for the rest of the day.
A Great Spangled Fritillary basked in the morning sunlight on a Rattlesnake Fern.
My older brother and I hauled in the walleye. Photo by Bruce Stambaugh
I fondly remember my family vacations in the 1950s and ’60s. I vividly recall them because we didn’t take many. We were a lower-middle-class family from a blue-collar city in northeast Ohio. My folks didn’t have the money to travel around the country too often, especially with five active and vocal children.
My most memorable trip as a youngster was a week on Pelee Island, Ontario, Canada, in Lake Erie. It was the middle of summer, sunny, hot, and humid.
As a 10-year-old, I was excited about our trip for multiple reasons. First, we had to take a ferry from Sandusky, Ohio, to the island. In those days, no passports or IDs were needed. You just paid the ferry fee and boarded the ship. I remember leaning over the side of the boat that foggy morning to watch crew members load cars and trucks onto the ferry.
Our dear mother couldn’t bear to watch because the drivers had to ease the vehicles from the dock to the ship over two unattached, thick wooden planks. I paid particular attention when our 1947 cream-colored, two-door Chevy coupe slipped across the void. Even as a kid, I saw that the car wasn’t centered on the planks. Still, it made it.
Our cousins and their parents accompanied us on the trip, along with our mother’s mother. Their three juveniles were nearly the same age as our three oldest. It was a guaranteed good time.
We enjoyed the voyage around other islands and through Lake Erie’s whitecaps. When we sighted Pelee, our excitement multiplied. From a distance, all I could make out were trees. A little cluster of attractive buildings appeared when the ferry drew closer to the dock. We disembarked and waited for our vehicles. I noted a general store with toys in its nine-pane front window during the downtime.
We piled in the car and headed south and then east on dirt roads, swirling dust clouds into the cerulean sky. As he drove, our outdoorsman father spotted pheasants in fields on the way to our little cottage without slowing down. How we all managed to fit into that two-bedroom, one-bath lake house, I don’t know. As a kid, it wasn’t my problem.
That week’s weather was sunny, hot, and humid, perfect for eight children ages four to 14 to play on the beach that served as our front yard. We enjoyed wading in the warm Lake Erie water when the tide went out. We built sand castles and took turns burying one another in the sand.
We spent hours scouring the beach for sea glass. My young mind couldn’t comprehend how the combination of water and sand could smooth sharp, jagged broken glass. I held the evidence in my hand, nevertheless.
A trio of fishermen rented the cottage south of ours. They used a beautiful wooden Lyman boat with an inboard motor to come and go. One afternoon, the fish must not have been biting because the boat came charging in at low tide.
Even as a kid, I could see by the men’s actions that they were drunk. One guy even fell overboard into the shallow water. Of course, the high-speed approach mired the boat into the wet sand. No matter how hard they tried, the boat wouldn’t budge until the tide came in.
Later, with the boat freed, I moseyed down the beach and found a silver cigarette lighter reflecting the afternoon sun in the clear, shallow water. A cigar lay nearby on the beach. Its paper wrapper with a bright red band still secured the stoggy. My uncle confiscated both when I revealed my treasures at the cottage.
Our father and uncle frequently went fishing for crappies and walleye. When the schools of fish moved a few hundred yards directly offshore of our cabin, my dad and uncle caught enough to feed the entire crew. The delicate white meat of the pan-fried fish filled our hungry bellies.
While our fathers fished, our mothers and grandmother watched us play hour after hour on the sandy beach. Those were the days before sunblock, and apparently, no one remembered to bring along suntan lotion. Before the week was over, the four oldest boys, including me, moaned and groaned in a darkened bedroom. The severe sunburns halted our lakeside romping. We were sore all over, unable to find a comfortable position to rest.
Still, it had been a memorable week. To top it off, our parents remembered the general store with toys. My eyes lit up when I saw the rotating stand displaying several kinds of English-made Matchbox toys. There was no plastic to be found in these miniatures of reality, and they were only a dollar each. I was ecstatic because our parents had given each of their five children a dollar before entering the store. So, I took my time and finally decided on an English-style fire truck as the ferry horn sounded for people to board.
We scurried to the dock across the road, and I carefully clutched my prize, not wanting to crush the colorful cardboard matchbox containing my precious purchase. I bid Pelee farewell as we walked up the ferry’s ramp for the return cruise to Ohio.
It had been a memorable week of fun in the sun, filled with ferry rides, fresh fish, and playing in the water with my siblings and cousins. Those pleasures successfully blocked the short-term memory of my painful sunburn.
These well-worn Matchbox toys are the only ones I have left. Photo by Bruce Stambaugh
A female American Goldfinch plucks a seed from a sunflower head. Photo by Bruce Stambaugh
Can you eat upside down? American Goldfinches sure can!
In the summertime, the acrobatic little birds put on a show around sunflowers. Often, they hint at their arrival at a sunflower patch with a distinctive, cheery call. Soon, they land atop a flower and begin their feeding.
The lively and colorful birds use their short, sharp beaks to pry the juicy new seeds from the flower head. Their sturdy pinkish bill effortlessly cracks open the seed, and the birds devour their reward.
The American Goldfinches seem able to eat in any position: upside down, sideways, or at any angle. Since the laden flower heads bend toward the ground as their seeds mature, the birds have no choice but to attack their target in any way they can. The birds gain needed nutrition and moisture from the fresh seeds.
The male looks regal in its summer mating plumage of bright yellow with jet-black wings, tail, and forehead. A white wing-bar adorns each wing. The female is duller in color year-round. She is feathered more for camouflage than fashion. Her pale yellow-green is much duller to help blend in with the greenery she inhabits. The female’s coloration helps conceal the eggs during incubation and the young when they hatch.
In the winter, both sexes turn dull to protect themselves by blending in with their weedy surroundings. Black oil sunflower seeds draw them to feeders, though the pulp center has to be much drier than the fresh-off-the-flower summer offerings.
Of course, goldfinches aren’t the only species with this feeding trait. Nevertheless, it’s a joy to watch their antics in any season.
Birds aren’t the only animals that prefer fresh sunflower seeds. Photo by Bruce Stambaugh
Thistle blossoms ready to flower. Photo by Bruce Stambaugh
When I awoke, I noticed the ripples of the morning’s mackerel clouds glowed pink. I headed for a location with an open view to the east. Arriving a few minutes later, the colors had dimmed but were still lovely.
I hustled to a high point on a paved trail that separates a golf course and an overgrown field. I snapped several shots of the sunrise but quickly became distracted by all the bird calls.
When I turned to find the Indigo Bunting, this stand of ready-to-bloom thistles caught my focus. I was struck by the faint kiss of the day’s sunrise on the thistle’s buds. The embrace was subtle but evident nonetheless.
I never did find the Indigo Bunting, however.
My initial view of the morning’s beauty. Photo by Bruce Stambaugh
A Sweat Bee on a sunflower. Photo by Bruce Stambaugh
The volunteer sunflowers in our backyard appear to be at their peak bloom. In the photo of the prettiest one, I spotted a Sweat Bee on one of the flower’s pedals. I decided to feature the sole insect on the lovely blossoms.
According to Kenn Kaufman in Field Guide to Insects of North America, more than 500 species of the tiny bee inhabit the North American continent north of Mexico. It’s a female-dominated society, too. The daughters help their mothers maintain their expanding nests in the soil. Males aren’t born until later in the summer, so my subject is likely a female.
The Upper Falls at Letchworth State Park in New York.
My wife and I love to travel the country’s backroads. There are many positive reasons for our preference for highways other than interstates and expressways.
Engineers design and build multi-lane thoroughfares to save time by avoiding small towns, winding mountainous roads, lower speed limits, and often slower traffic. When you are retired, those reasons play second fiddle to scenery, wildlife, and plain old country charm.
The secondary roads hold surprises along the way. We find sleepy towns with impressive century-old homes, cozy diners and restaurants, locally owned and operated cafes, and shops we would miss on the superhighways. We discover fascinating state parks and cascading streams that play tag with the roads. We enter canopy tunnels of giant oaks and maples, flashy sycamores, and towering tulip poplar trees.
We also see too many storefronts shuttered in once-thriving downtown business districts. In the country, we pass abandoned houses far too often. They remind us of our younger years and serve as a reality check for the 21st century.
Of course, driving the roads less traveled has its drawbacks. Traffic comes to a crawl behind agricultural equipment, traveling at a snail’s pace from one farm to another. Semi-trucks delivering goods to local businesses block traffic flow for minutes while they attempt to squeeze into awkward and narrow loading docks. We feel the driver’s frustration.
Occasionally, traffic halts completely as cowboys on ATVs round up a herd of wayward cattle. I’ve even had to pull the car off the road to let them pass. Others might consider these situations as inconveniences. Rather than despair, I accept them as a part of everyday rural living.
Our latest trip to visit our son and his family in upstate New York, nearly 500 miles from our home in Virginia’s lovely Shenandoah Valley, offered similar experiences.
The ancient Allegheny Mountains bend northeast across Pennsylvania, making a direct route north impossible. So, we have learned to divide the trip into two days, taking alternate routes each time. Traveling with patience allows us to observe and appreciate whatever we see along the state and county roads that deliver us to our destination.
An Amish couple along the Susquehanna River in central Pennsylvania. Photo by Bruce Stambaugh
With the folded forested mountains on either side of us, the roads hugged and crossed the Susquehanna River with its many rapids and occasional islands. We stay the night in small cities like Williamsport, Pennsylvania, or Corning, New York.
We stop at overlooks to view the Susquehanna, tour the famous glass factory, or visit an old-fashioned country store and still arrive at our appointed time relaxed and stress-free. It’s a win-win situation.
A hobbyist’s backyard in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. Photo by Bruce Stambaugh
We headed south after our joyous visit with our son, his wife, and their curious two-year-old son. However, a last-minute decision turned our car west toward New York’s Letchworth State Park. It was time well spent.
Avid birder that I am, I stopped at several overlooks to view the impressive Genesee River Gorge and scout for birds. At one spot, a pair of Scarlet Tanagers foraged in an old oak tree, its leaves still not completely unfurled. A Summer Tanager landed nearby, but I was too slow with my camera. I savored the image of the bright red bird with a light-colored beak and was happier still that my wife got to see it, too.
The cheery songs of migrating songbirds resounded, but we had to keep moving since we were already taking the slow way home. Soon, we arrived at the lookouts to view the river’s inspiring trio of falls that cut the deep gorge a millennia ago.
I parked beside a vehicle identical in every way to our midsized SUV. The occupants exited their car just as we did, ecstatic about the fate of two metallic bronze Subarus parked side by side. I caught the stranger’s infectious joy and soaked in the three roaring falls.
I set the GPS for Altoona and noted that we would travel unexplored territory en route to the hotel. For most of the way, it was all state and county roads.
I knew we had hit the jackpot when we turned onto Short Track Road, a narrow county highway built to convenience locals. It wasn’t long until we began passing white homes with fading red barns. That combination meant one thing: Amish. Those farmsteads reminded us of our nearly four decades in Ohio’s Amish country, where we daily viewed similar scenes.
The hand-painted signs with mismatched upper and lowercase letters advertising cottage industries of hand-stitched quilts, local honey, brown eggs, and sawmill services brought familiarity. However, as is often the case with the Amish, they tweaked their clothing and buggies slightly different from their home communities in Ohio and Pennsylvania.
We noted that the crown of men’s black felt hats tapered from the brim to a flat top. The buggies were styled more plainly, equipped with different lighting and reflective tape, and displayed no orange, slow-moving triangle on the back. It was a sign of both their independence and connectedness to one another.
The blue bridge. Photo by Bruce Stambaugh
We crossed the fast-running headwaters of the Susquehanna on a decades-old, baby-blue iron bridge. Our car tires hummed over the meshed steel grating. Soon, we passed a white-brick country church that caused me to double-take. Its marque read, “Forget hope. Attend church.” Even though it was a Sunday, we kept driving.
We passed the entrance to yet another state park that looked immaculate. The road quickly turned and began a winding, steady climb up a low mountain. The rushing white waters of a roadside stream beckoned, but with no pullouts, we couldn’t stop to enjoy it fully.
The box turtle. Photo by Bruce Stambaugh
On the downslope, the road straightened and eventually flattened out, with pasturelands on one side and wetlands on the other. I spotted a box turtle crossing the road. With little to no traffic, I stopped and carried it across. It was the least I could do.
Our journey continued the next day with similar effects. We visited the Paw Paw Tunnel Towpath Trail near Old Town, Maryland. As we left the car, birdsong and butterflies filled the air.
Walking from the parking lot to the old Chesapeake and Ohio Canal tunnel, the sights and sounds only improved. Baltimore and Orchard Orioles chattered competing calls from adjacent trees. A pair of Eastern Phoebes fed their young in a nest built on the canal’s old stone retaining wall. Blackburnian Warblers and Warbling Vireos serenaded us hidden among the leaves.
Black and Tiger Swallowtails, Pipevine, Dusky Wings, and Cabbage butterflies danced from wildflower to wildflower. Some gathered nutrients from puddles on the trail.
Please click on the photos to enlarge them.
We exchanged greetings with other hikers and bikers as we strolled along. The graveled trail’s dappled light, filtered by a mix of deciduous trees, big and small, cooled the hot day.
Satisfied and ready to be home, we crossed the Potomac River into West Virginia and steered south. Though arriving home tired, our drive on the backroads proved more refreshing than this septuagenarian could have imagined. That’s why we take them.
Like many Mid-West and eastern U.S. areas, the National Weather Service issued a Heat Advisory for Virginia for today. Many urban areas have Excessive Heat Warnings for heat indexes well above 100.
People without air conditioning, and especially the homeless, have to find ways to stay cool. Many have nowhere to turn unless agencies or regular institutions intervene. Individuals can make a difference, too.
As I write this, it is currently 96 degrees Fahrenheit, but it feels like 103 when the humidity and dewpoint are factored in. This morning, I drove to downtown Harrisonburg, Virginia, where we live, and I distributed a case of bottled water to folks who needed it.
Because Harrisonburg is a small metropolitan area, I knew where to go, where the homeless hangout. However, I had to hunt for them because they were already seeking shelter wherever they could find it.
I found several people gathered under small shade trees, their few belongings stuffed in shopping bags, duffle bags, and backpacks. As I approached the largest group huddled under the larger tree, one of the men came out to greet me and offered to help me with the carton of water.
I simply handed it to him with the instructions to make sure everyone got what they needed. He thanked me and said he would. As I pulled out of the parking lot, I saw the same man distributing bottles of water to those under the other tree closer to the road. I smiled and waited until he had finished before driving away.
I am not sharing this to brag. I am posting this in the hope that those of you reading this post will do likewise in your own community. When the opportunity to help others arises, respond appropriately and humbly in ways that people’s needs are met. It’s the right thing to do.
The gang of volunteer sunflowers. Photo by Bruce Stambaugh
What better way to celebrate the Summer Solstice than to feature sunflowers?
We were fortunate to have volunteer sunflowers sprout up in our backyard flower garden this year. Seeds dropped by birds or buried by squirrels from one of my birdfeeders created these wonders.
At first, the gang of neighborhood rabbits nibbled the tender leaves. But apparently, there were so many sunflower shoots that the bunnies couldn’t keep up. Consequently, for the first time in the seven years we have lived in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley, we have a helter-skelter stand of sunflowers.
I have enjoyed watching them grow so quickly in the string of warm days and nights we have experienced. As the flowerheads began to form, their various shapes, textures, and swirling patterns intrigued me. At the corner of our back porch, pure art in nature flourishes.
Ants, bees, butterflies, flies, wasps, and other insects depend on sunflowers for nourishment. See how many different creatures you can spot in this series of photos.
Please click on the photos to enlarge them.
How long will it be before the American Goldfinches and other seed-eating birds begin to dismantle these living sculptures in the quest for fresh, tasty seeds?
Sometimes, reality is stranger than fantasy. Photo by Bruce Stambaugh
When I happened upon this tender scene, I did a double-take.
My wife and I had joined an entourage from church for a Sunday afternoon of baptisms for three teens in the chilly mountain stream. After the dunkings and the celebratory congratulations shared, I wandered away from the rest of the revelers to see what I could find.
Scores of Pipevine Butterflies and Tiger Swallowtail Butterflies flitted through the woods. They danced carefree from rays of broken sunlight to dense shade, oblivious to the human invaders.
I certainly didn’t expect to find a cat casually nursing three young ones in the forest. And I especially didn’t expect to find a stuffed cat and her young stuffed kittens. But that is exactly what I discovered.
Some children not connected with our group were splashing in the nearby stream. Perhaps one of them thought this wild cherry tree along the banks of the Dry River at the base of Shenandoah Mountain was a lovely and safe haven while romping in the water.
I’ll never know for sure, but this composition of fantasy playthings among nature’s real and evolving habitat was too good not to share.
Roadkill Crossing 
You must be logged in to post a comment.