mealworms for nestlings

A beautiful morning.  I put a fresh supply of mealworms in the plate.  Eastern Bluebirds, nesting in the distant box, are the first to gather breakfast for their babies.  What more can I say?

Worms? Monsters?

Worms?  Monsters? These are “finger galls”.

Insects or mites feeding on a leaf, or laying eggs on or injecting eggs into part of a plant, cause galls to form. The leaf tissue reacts by increased production of normal plant hormones and localized plant growth.  The outcome is an abnormal plant structure called a gall.  These look like tiny wiggly "fingers" protruding from elm leaves.

Gall formation usually occurs in late spring during the accelerated growth period of new leaves, shoots, and flowers.  This is when insects might be feeding on plant tissue, or emerging in their life cycle to lay eggs.  The gall-making insect develops inside the gall and the gall continues to grow as the organism feeds and matures.  In autumn and winter, some birds feast on the insects they find inside galls, especially on goldenrod.

toad

A 3-inch long toad Anaxyrus americanus makes its home in the garden at the edge of the wild wild woods, among the shady spots strewn with vegetable leaf litter.  Her job is bug control in an organic garden, since her diet consists of worms, slugs, grubs, ants, spiders, and other invertebrates.