Spittlebugs
Have you ever noticed spittle blobs stuck to leaves or to the stems of plants? Spittlebugs are the nymphs or young forms of froghoppers (of the superfamily Cercopoidea). The nymphs make their protective homes by surrounding themselves with a frothy mass of little bubbles. They live in their bubble housing while they grow and molt, and they spend their time sucking plant fluids and continually making more spittle by pumping their abdomens and excreting bubbly urine. They drink a lot of sap, so the output is a lot of bubbles, and sometimes you’ll find several nymphs living together in one big spittle mass.
Gross or cool?
After their final molt, the adult froghoppers emerge from the spittle. The bugs continue to feed on sap, hopping and visiting their favorite plants.
Wildlife Care Support
Pictured: Ruffner Mountain Executive Director, Carlee Sanford, Representative of Alabama House District 54, Neil Rafferty, and Ruffner Mountain Wildlife Care Naturalist, Emily Stauss
Big thanks to Neil Rafferty, Representative for Alabama House District 54, for supporting Jefferson County greenspaces. The benefits of educating with live animals are well established, but caring for wildlife requires skilled staff, time, and expense. This funding provides food, bedding, exhibit maintenance equipment, and enrichment items for our animal ambassadors. Grady, the gray ratsnake thanks you, too!
Ruffner Tree House Village
We are excited for our new neighbor, Randi Pink, who recently purchased several lots in East Lake near Ruffner Mountain. To learn more about her project (independent of us), check out the article in Bham Now: https://bhamnow.com/2021/08/10/birmingham-author-starts-a-treehouse-village-at-ruffner-mountain-heres-how-you-can-help/
Leave No Trace
We all want to be good and considerate stewards when we visit and hike on Ruffner Mountain, right?
We like the Leave No Trace Seven Principles from the Leave No Trace Center for Outdoor Ethics:
1. Plan ahead and prepare.
2. Travel and camp on durable surfaces.
3. Dispose of waste properly.
4. Leave what you find.
5. Minimize campfire impacts.
6. Respect wildlife.
7. Be considerate of other visitors.
These are good rules for anyone visiting the outdoors!
Disposing of waste properly is a big one here. We understand that sometimes trash is dropped or left behind by accident, but the impact on nature is nevertheless the same.
How long will it be there? You might be surprised.
plastic bottle: 100-1000 years
aluminum can: 200 years
wet wipe: 100 years
plastic bag: 10-20 years
cigarette butt: 10 years
wrappers: 5 years
orange peel: 2 years
cardboard: 3 months
paper: 2-6 weeks
Black Botanists Week 2021
Celebrate diversity! It is Black Botanists Week and Monday’s roll call is about introducing yourself in this wonderful world of people and plants: #PlantsAroundTheGlobe and #GlobalBotany
Follow @blackbotanistsweek and the hashtags all week on social media (Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter) and connect to a web of botanical scientists, gardeners, and plant enthusiasts.
Tent Caterpillars
We don’t like to think of eastern tent caterpillars (Malacosoma americanum) as pests, but instead, they are juicy nuggets of protein for the birds. Since birds and other wildlife eat them, we advise against using pesticides or the destruction of silky tents. And since the moths reproduce only one generation per year, there’s plenty of time for the defoliated section to recover.
The life cycle of the lappet moth is a long and interesting one. Soon after emergence from their cocoons, the moths mate, and females attach eggs to branches in masses of 150 to 400 eggs. In about 3 weeks, embryos develop to first-stage larvae and spend summer, fall and most of the winter unhatched. Eggs begin to hatch in early spring, just as leaves begin to develop on trees. Newly hatched caterpillars feed on the egg mass covering and then move to a nearby fork in the branches where they spin their silken tents. As the caterpillars grow, the tent is added onto to accommodate their size.
Vulnerable to birds, parasitic insects, squirrels, lizards, frogs, and other forest dwellers when they leave the nest to feed on leaves, they return to the warmth and safety of the family tent to rest and grow. By leaving exploratory trails, the caterpillars follow the pheromone paths back to the nest. After 4 to 6 weeks and 6 larval instars, caterpillars are fully grown. They then leave the tent alone and spin a silk cocoon in a protected nook. The pupal stage lasts 3 to 4 weeks. The adult moths live about 5 days. Images by Project Manager, Stella Pfau
