Dolphins frolicking in the water outside the boat. Our guide said that it is mating time.
2021-09-19 Chincoteague Inlet, Chincoteague, VA [DSC01573]
A cloudless sulphur visiting a false foxglove flower. You can tell she is a female from the spots on the topside of her wings that you can see in the second photo. She keeps her wings folded while sitting so it is hard to get a shot of the upper side of the wing. I pulled this one out of a video of her flying between flowers.
2021-09-17 Chincoteague NWR, Chincoteague, VA [DSC01573]
Top-side wing extracted from video.
2021-09-17 Chincoteague NWR, Chincoteague, VA [DSC02060]
A ribbed jelly with the sunset shining through. Elliot washed it off and held it on top of a pool noodle. Doesn't help with the id but the light looks pretty.
2021-09-17 Assateague Beach, Chincoteague, VA [DSC01202]
This little guy found a large tasty morsel. (S)he wasn't able to eat it immediately, but rather than go up the beach and chow down, (s)he ran up and down the sand chasing the waves, pausing occasionally to take bites. I think it was to throw off the seagulls. As soon as they notice (s)he had something, a group of five of them surrounded h(er)im to try to take it away. Instead of giving it to them (s)he took to wing and dumped it in the sea so nobody got it.
2021-09-18 Assateague Beach, Chincoteague, VA [DSC01133]
Bird on the beach at sunrise. It's a sanderling, not that you can tell from the photo. There's also a flock of seagulls playing in the background.
2021-09-19 Assateague Beach, Chincoteague, VA [DSC01375]
A juvenile brown pelican sitting on a post in Chincoteague inlet. In the '70s the post was the support for a house on the island but now the house is gone, and the island, too, has moved on (it's all sandbars), so now there's a group of posts stuck in the sea.
2021-09-19 Chincoteague Inlet, Chincoteague, VA [DSC01937]
A scoliid wasp on some kind of goldenrod.
2021-08-31 Blue Mash, Gaithersburg, MD [DSC09522]
2021-08-15 Cabin John powerline, Bethesda, MD [DSC07747]
I guess it must do what its name says, though in this case it is sitting on a boneset flower. I wouldn't have guessed "moth" from a quick glance. Don't eat too many of them 'cuz they make cyanide for defense.
2021-08-15 Bethesda, MD [DSC09247]
A bumble bee sampling from goldenrod.
2021-09-02 NIH pond, Bethesda, MD [DSC09684]
What's black and white and red on over? A zebra swallowtail!
2021-09-04 Bethesda, MD [DSC09749]
On a butterfly bush (aptly named, but unfortunately an introduced species) down the street.
2021-09-04 Bethesda, MD [DSC09753]
Jay's favourite labour saving device is the lawn mower.
2021-06-20 Bethesda, MD [DSC00455]
A greater yellowlegs being surprised by a gust of wind. Not exactly Marilyn, but it is showing a lot of leg.
2021-08-31 Blue Mash, Gaithersburg, MD [DSC09574]
Here's a summer azure, like the eastern tailed-blue (#85, #86, #93), but with no tail. Again, the wing tops are bluish to grayish depending on sex. We didn't have the patience to get a picture on this walk.
2021-09-05 Dyke Marsh, Alexandria, VA [DSC09940]
A mourning dove and a woodpecker sharing the bird feeder. A birder might be able to tell you if it is a "downy" or a "hairy" from beak length and head shape but I'm not one. Probably a downy woodpecker since they are far more common around here.
2021-09-09 NIH field, Bethesda, MD [DSC00146]
A pair of female house sparrows at the neighbour's bird feeder.
2021-09-03 Bethesda, MD [DSC09715]
There was a hummingbird clearwing in the same vernonia patch as the snowberry clearwing but I didn't get a photo of it. Instead, here is one from last September visiting a thistle.
2020-09-05 Lake Needwood, Rockville, MD [IMG_20200905_110457392]
A snowberry clearwing is a moth that acts as a hummingbird, hovering over a flower to eat nectar. In this case a new york ironweed. This from the McKee-Beshers Wildlife Management Area, that attractive nuisance where they provide food and shelter for animals in the county so that we can go out and shoot them (with camera or otherwise).
2021-08-28 McKee-Beshers WMA, Poolesville, MD [DSC08806]
Speaking of insectivores, here's a blue-gray gnatcatcher checking me out from high in the tree. They swoop over greenery gleaning bugs or they may catch them mid-air. The blue-gray is on the back and wings; all you see are its white underpants in this photo. Wikipedia says the nests are built from lichen, hair and spiderwebs, which sounds pretty comfy. I've never seen one.
2021-08-28 McKee-Beshers WMA, Poolesville, MD [DSC08967]
Another dragonfly, this one a black saddlebags. According to wikipedia they love to eat mosquitos, so I'm always happy to see them.
2021-08-31 Blue Mash, Gaithersburg, MD [DSC09491]
Common wood nymph lower wing. Not as dramatic as some because of the eye spots. I do like the fake wood grain effect.
2021-08-31 Blue Mash, Gaithersburg, MD [DSC09520]
Top-side wing of a common wood-nymph butterfly. Wikipedia says the markings are variable, but this is the only one I've seen.
2021-08-31 Blue Mash, Gaithersburg, MD [DSC09516]
Not a monarch, though it looks very much like one. Not really a mimic either, since it, too, is awful tasting (not that I've tried one). They are bright and flashy to warn the birds not to eat them, but they have different toxins, the monarch picking up cardiac glycosides from milkweed and the viceroy getting salicylic acid from willows.
2021-08-31 Blue Mash, Gaithersburg, MD [DSC09532]
A young Cooper's hawk enjoying lunch.*
2021-08-31 NIH pond, Bethesda, MD [DSC09391]
* Tanya had me edit out the more visceral parts of the image.
A well-camouflaged owlet moth known as a goldenrod stowaway, but also hangs out on Coreopsis and Bidens.
2021-08-31 Blue Mash, Gaithersburg, MD [DSC09529]
On a walk yesterday I caught the top-side wing of a male eastern tailed-blue. Unlike the female in #86, he actually shows some blue in the wings. Okay, so not so very blue and not so long a tail, but distinctive enough to be called a tailed-blue.
2021-08-31 Blue Mash, Gaithersburg, MD [DSC09473]