Larval Thoughts

Yesterday morning while digging in the garden I turned up a little, smooth, brown pupa of a moth. I reburied it and went on digging.

Which prompted the thought that I have a bit of a double standard, when it comes to Miller Moths ... sort of a catch-all name, I suppose, for the cutworm-type nondescript gray moths of cultivated areas everywhere.

If I see one of these moths, I watch it for a moment with curiosity before going my merry way. For I like moths.

If I dig up one of the pupae, I rebury it. For same reason.

If, however, I dig up a cutworm in the dirt ...

Last year the robins grew so accustomed to us that we could feed them. Martha discovered this: for if she dug up a lovely little grub, she could toss it toward her current pet robin, which would then hop forward and pluck up the morsel. It was probably one of her pets, too, that soon accepted grubbed-up grubs from me.

And this means that Martha, too, has this double standard -- in this case with regard to May beetles or June bugs. Whatever you want to call them, we are fond of them.

The grass-root-eating grubs she was feeding the robins were undoubtedly June bug children -- alas.

Well, I do the same. That morning, besides the pupa, I unearthed an adult June bug .. or April bug.

I smiled benignly upon it and reburied it.

Cheers ...