Tag Archives: Ephemera

Garden Ephemera, April 21, 2006: Trees in Spring (a View from the “Tree Fort”)

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This photo was taken April 21, 2006, from my “tree fort”: the back porch off the second floor of our house. The view is looking north along the backs of our neighbor’s houses. The tree just leafing out in the foreground is the apple tree growing over the fence from our next door neighbor’s back yard. The tree with pink flowers is, I think, a flowering cherry. The tall tree with yellow flowers on the right is a maple. I don’t know what the more distant trees are.

Garden Ephemera: Insect (Orthoptera-Tettigoniidae?) on Mugwort

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Photo taken: June 4, 2006, Garden #4, Flatbush, Brooklyn

Unknown insect on Artemisia vulgaris, Mugwort, in the sunny border at Garden #4 in Flatbush, Brooklyn.

It was small, the body no more than 1/2 inch long. I think it may be a juvenile form; it doesn’t appear to have any wings at all.

The antenna on this little guy are incredible. They look to be three times the length of the body, not including the legs. The hind legs themselves are about 1.5 times the length of the body.

I have no idea what it is. I think it’s in the Order Orthoptera, Family Tettigoniidae, which includes grasshoppers, katydids, and the like. It’s hard to tell with this image, but the hind tarsi, the rear feet, look like they have only three segments instead of the four which is a key for this family of insects.

Artemisia vulgaris, Mugwort, is an invasive plant. I’ll have a profile of it on another day. After I took this and some other pictures, I removed it from the border. It’s been almost three weeks, and it’s coming back up now, so Ill have to go at it again.