Our mystery seeds this week were not what I expected.
After watching the seed pods for nearly a month, out burst these seeds with white wings.
Do you recognize them?
Be sure to leave a comment if you have a guess.
Edit:Â The answer is now posted.
Month: May 2012 (Page 4 of 6)
The cone- or column-shaped seed head gave away our mystery seeds to at least a few of you last week. The seeds were from the Mexican hat or prairie coneflower, Ratibida columnifera.
The Mexican hat is named for the way its flower has whimsical resemblance to a colorful sombrero.
The flowers are unusual because the disk flowers in the center form a column, rather than a flat disk as seen in the sunflowers and daisies (hence the species name “columnifera“.)
It is fascinating to watch the ray flowers, which look like petals, unfurl from the bottom.
Slowly the disk flowers start to open at the bottom, then move up to the top over a few days.
The leaves are delicate and highly cut in, giving the plant a lacy and open look.
Mexican hats are perennial plants that grow throughout much of North America. They are particularly common in the prairies.
They are will tolerate quite dry conditions and are regularly grown in Arizona.
Mexican hat plants grow readily from seeds. (See a close up photograph of Mexican hat seeds at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center)
Do Mexican hats grow where you live? Have you ever watched their flowers unfurl?
After being on the look out last week for flies, it wasn’t surprising that I spotted this one resting in the sun.
I knew right away what is was.
A fly with a fuzzy body and colored wings, it had to be a similar species to the illustration I have framed on my wall.
This illustration is by Edmund J. Detmold, who was born in 1883. On the print you can see his initials, EJD, in the corner.
Detmold did this illustration for Fabre’s Book of Insects in 1921. Jean Henri Fabre was a French entomologist known for his keen observations of insects and his poetic text. The last chapter of his book is devoted to the habits of “The Anthrax Fly.”
On the back of my framed version it says,
“The Anthrax Fly:Â Her delicate suit of downy velvet, from which you could take the bloom by merely breathing on it, could not withstand the contact with rough tunnels.”
The fly in the picture is a bee fly of the genus Anthrax. These flies usually lay their eggs in bee or wasp nests, which are the tunnels from the quote. Their larvae are for the most part parasites of bees and wasps.
You can see more photographs of bee flies in the genus Anthrax at BugGuide.
Sometimes discovering an insect can feel like discovering a bit of history.
A translated version of Fabre’s Book of Insects is still available from Dover Publications, although Detmold’s illustrations are not included.
For more information, see Roberta Gibson Writes.