By Pauline Tom
The newspaper inadvertently labeled last week’s photo of a wheel bug, “rhinoceros beetle” and mentioned, “leave it be”.
Contrary to last week’s featured “wheel bug”, the fierce-looking rhinoceros beetle is harmaless to humans. In fact, in Japan they are sold and kept as pets.
Still, “leave it be” leaves the rhinoceros beetle to help in the decay of organic material, such as leaves. (Did you know that leaving a section, even if 6-foot by 6-foot, of your yard space covered with decaying leaves helps provide an oasis for birds?)
The rhinoceros beetle also gets moniker’d “Hercules beetle.” National Wildlife Federation says, “Adults of some species can lift objects 850 times their weight! That would be equivalent to a human lifting nine fully grown male elephants!”
Research took me back to “The Dirt Doctor’s” website, to the exact paragraph I found 11 months ago when we found gigantic grubs that looked like June bugs on steroids. Those grubs are the larval form of the rhinoceros beetle. Oh my! These interesting finds in Mountain City!
Melissa Garraway mentioned an abundance of frogs (not toads) this year. Below our stacked-boulders bird fountain, RonTom just about always finds frogs in the catch basin water.
That native-plant surrounded fountain drew birds this past week throughout the scorching days: Northern cardinal, eastern bluebird, lesser goldfinch, American goldfinch, ladder-back woodpecker, golden-fronted woodpecker, American robin (including a juvenile with a speckled breast), summer tanager, orchard oriole, Bewick’s wren, white-winged dove, Inca dove, mourning dove, mockingbird, blue jay. I cannot remember them all. And, unfortunately, house sparrows.
I almost forgot! The fountain drew the long-awaited yellow-billed cuckoo on August 11!
Even as I write in mid-August, a male painted bunting feeds outside our office, next to a covered-with-goldfinch thistle feeder. We take Laura Craig’s advice, “Purchase the Wagner’s brand of thistle from Home Depot.”
Safe Place for Safe Trade
Beth Smith forwarded to her email distribution a notification,
“Residents who use online classified sites like Craigslist now have a new, safe place to exchange goods. The San Marcos Police Department is the latest agency to join the SafeTrade program.
The program provides two, well lit spaces in the police department’s parking lot, and the use of the police department lobby as safe places to meet online buyers or sellers to conduct a transaction. Both locations are monitored by surveillance cameras.”
In addition to Craigslist type exchanges, child custody exchanges can also be done in the safe zone.”
The safe zone for tree limb pick up is near the street, not on the street. Limbs must be out by Sunday, August 30, so they get included in a bid from tree limb picker-uppers. The process takes a while.
I pick up tidbits from ptom5678@gmail.com and 512-268-5678. Please leave some soon. Thanks! Love, Pauline.
