January Days

By Ed Wesely

A BLUSH OF COLOR — In a column of January 2000 I wrote: “It’s unusual around here to find a wildflower that survives to greet the winter solstice.” That was to preface a disclosure that a couple of dandelion flowers had survived in a swale near Peck’s market, to greet the solstice of December 22, 1999.

Mild December days that marked the millennium’s end had encouraged the dandelions. But December 2000 righted the balance, with temperatures hitting single digits, and the Narrowsburg eddy supporting its first ice fishermen on December 14.

So it’s astonished me that two wildflower blossoms I’d discovered last month have persisted through a deluge of rain, a nor’easter snowstorm and even a couple of sub-zero January mornings. When I checked before starting this column (1/8), they were still intact—clenched tightly against the frost, then unbending as the day brightened to display a couple of thin, lemon-yellow petals.

These paired witch hazel flowers appeared in early December, on a plant that had shed its “normal” flowers the month before. Their parent shrub, on a knoll that gets doused with highway salts during snowfalls, is a hardy survivor that’s chosen the depth of winter to test the resolve of this pair of buds.

COCOONS — These winter dens of caterpillars are as unique as thumbprints, with each one a signature of its species. Sequestered inside veneers of silk and/or rolled leaves are the hardened “pupal” cases that will protect, through winter, dormant living tissue.

The cecropia moth — A fairly common cocoon, and easiest to discover in winter, is the huge cocoon of the cecropia caterpillar, which encases tissues that will become our largest native moth. A male cecropia, which is slightly larger than its mate, has a wing span of four-six inches.

	TRR drawing by Ed Wesely Ceropia moth cocoon.

The cecropia is a member of North America’s “silk moth” family, a group of large moths that gets its name from the family habit of weaving copious amounts of silk into cocoons. (The commercial silk moth is an Asian species.)

I recently found a cecropia cocoon attached to a horizontal twig on the very witch hazel shrub that I’ve been describing. It was dun colored like many of its kind, and about three inches long, by an inch or so wide at the middle. About 20 feet away was a second cecropia cocoon, but this one was positioned vertically.

Aside from color and size, a good field mark is the way the cocoon is attached lengthwise along a twig surface. Its structure is tough and papery, and if it occasionally incorporates leaves, they aren’t wrapped as carefully as in cocoons of other silk moths.

For a reason that escapes me, the name “cecropia” is derived from Cecrops, a legendary king of Attica in Greece.

The promethea moth — Last week I discovered a cocoon, fashioned by the caterpillar of this beautiful silk moth, suspended from a twig in a striped maple shrub, near a little stream. Small stream banks and wetlands are often favored habitats, especially if they harbor spicebush shrubs, whose leaves are favored foods of promethea caterpillars.

	TRR drawing by Ed Wesely Promethea moth cocoon.

To make its cocoon, the promethea caterpillar chooses a leaf on its food plant, and covers the leaf stem (the “petiole”) with silk to secure it to a twig. It then curls the leaf lengthwise, fastens it with silk, and builds a silken web inside before forming a pupal case. Its cocoon is about an inch shorter and a lot slimmer than a cecropia moth’s, and the adult promethea, when hatched in May, will have a wing span of 2.5 to 4 inches.

Because adult moths lack chewing mouth-parts, the promethea, cecropia and their relatives depend on specialized enzymes to escape their cocoons. Before these moths hatch, they secrete a fluid that softens the silk that encloses them.

The name “promethea” is derived from “Prometheus,” who was punished by the Greek god Zeus for bringing fire to humankind.

A WORD OF CAUTION — It’s instructive to discover and observe these and other cocoons. But please don’t disturb them or bring them home. The occupants will do a lot better in nature, without our intervention. Inside a warm home, they will hatch prematurely, without a chance to feed or to mate.