Ten (10) Years of TomFoolery

Posted August 18, 2019

Filed under Audubon Community Nature Center, Jamestown, NY, Checkerspot, Eatonton, GA, Pearly-Eye, Raccoon Creek State Park, PA, Swallowtail

Northern Pearly Eye butterfly

Baltimore Checkerspot butterfly

Male Black Swallowtail Butterfly photographed by Jeff Zablow in the Briar Patch Habitat in Eatonton, GA

Me? I’ve taught high school Biology to thousands of young Americans, in New York City and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. I am pleased with the respect and admiration that my students afforded me. I retired in 2006, to become the caregiver for Frieda A”H. I lost that job, when she passed in January 2008.

I’ve been in the bushes as much as possible, for these last 25 years. I search for and photograph butterflies. This wingedbeauty.com that you’re reading here is the product of my love and fascination with butterflies & wildflowers.

I have watched the health and well being of our land become taken over by ‘naturalists’ who claim 1) that they must protect our land for all of us and 2) lecture and alarm us that our pristine habitat will soon be destroyed by “Global Warming.” I have watched as they chastise us for the coming annihilation of our fauna and flora, and for the coming destruction of all that is wild and loved,.

It seems that to be an academic today, you must join the ranks of the alarmists. You must declare that butterflies, birds, wildflowers, dragonflies, wasps, moths and macro- animals are all soon to leave us.

All not so. I spend hundreds/thousands of hours in the bush, seeking and searching for butterflies, and I can Thankfully report that they are well, normal and unchanged, with an excellent future. There is no Global Warming and there will be none in the future. G-d is in control and has been since the beginning of time.

True it is, that if the relations of the loudest Global Warming supporters would stop developing valuable habitat, usually the home of endangered butterflies and living things, if they would stop developing the choicest sites along our oceans, lakes and rivers . . . if they would stop overdeveloping California, Oregon, Colorado, Texas, Washington State, Arizona, Florida, New Mexico and more, our children and grandchildren would so benefit, and species would not continue disappearing.

There is no Global Warming. These 3 American butterflies attest to that.

Jeff

Knowing Moths? at Ft. Federica

Posted November 2, 2018

Filed under Ft Federica Saint Simons Island, GA, Other Insects

Unidentified Moth photographed by Jeff Zablow at Fort Federica, Saint Simons Island, GA

Ft. Federica, the National Monument on St.Simons Island. This coastal fort, once a thriving village on a coastal river, was the other side of fascinating. Standing there where the fort and village once stood, I stopped alot. It triggered my rich life experience, too many times challenged by threat and impending risk/danger. My artillery unit (155 mm howitzer, towed) didn’t go to ‘Nam, but we sure thought we were going, and being a green 2nd Lt. gave some pause, for sure. Dangerous guys back then in Brooklyn had to be kept on the radar, constantly, and yes, there were times I was steeled for trouble. Riding the subway each day, through a notorious part of NYNY, alone, always was much. Working as a Dean at John Adams H.S. (knives, guns, riots, murders and Gotti’s crew’s kids) . . . a rich life of kind of tight-rope walking. Thank You G-d.

I tried to imagine myself a junior officer at the fort. back then in what, 1738? Imagine a Spanish Armada appearing down river, headed to overwhelm the fort and the village, full of homes with women and children.

Good that there were butterflies flying in the meadows surrounding the fort, as Virginia had hoped. That was when I spotted this fascinating moth, motionless amidst the foliage.

I don’t know the hundreds of moths found in the southeastern USA, so I was unable to ID this one. I admired those lipstick red spots on each wing, and that white stripe across the abdomen?

I see so much in the field that I want to know. Curt? Barbara Ann? Virginia? Phil? Angela? David K? David Wagner?

Jeff

Success by Ralph Waldo Emerson

Posted February 26, 2018

Filed under Flowers Loved by Butterflies, Native Plants and Flowers, Pittsburgh, PA, Wildflowers

Ralph Waldo Emerson And . . . The Garden I Said Goodbye To In ’12

Winged Beauty Butterflies

I have read this often, and attempt to emulate it in my own life, whether gardening to attract winged beauties, or with family and friends, in my spiritual life, and in the field, as I attempt to capture ever more beautiful images of butterflies, darners, wildflowers, whatever . . . .

Success
To laugh often and to love much . . .
To win the respect of intelligent persons
and the affections of children . . . To earn
the approbation of honest critics and to
endure the betrayal of false friends , , ,
To appreciate beauty; to give of one’s self . . .
To leave the world a bit better whether by
a healthy child, a garden patch, or
a redeemed social condition . . .
To laugh and play with enthusiasm and to sing with
exultation and to know that one life
has breathed easier because…

View original post 66 more words

Spring Antidotes XII – Wildflowers of the Field

Posted February 24, 2015

Filed under Flowers Loved by Butterflies, Other Insects, Raccoon Creek State Park, PA

Late summer in a 100+ acre field in Southwestern Pennsylvania. I went there almost every day for 2 weeks. This September 5th, 2014 view was in the southeastern margin of the field. Wildflowers grew along the treeline. Nectar? More than enough for the butterflies, flies, wasps, bees, moths and ruby-throated hummingbirds that worked the field.

If. If I would have counted the number of goldenrod blossoms in the entire field, I would say a reasonable count would have approached, 10,000,000. The purple New York ironweed plants were few in number and strategically located, for reasons of their own, no doubt.

Three hours in the field that day, and, not a single other person about. Monarchs flew there that morning. Why weren’t you there?

Jeff

Success by Ralph Waldo Emerson

Posted December 11, 2014

Filed under Flowers Loved by Butterflies, Native Plants and Flowers, Other Insects, Pittsburgh, PA, Wildflowers

Success

To laugh often and to love much . . .
To win the respect of intelligent persons
and the affections of children . . . To earn
the approbation of honest critics and to
endure the betrayal of false friends , , ,
To appreciate beauty; to give of one’s self . . .
To leave the world a bit better whether by
a healthy child, a garden patch, or
a redeemed social condition . . .
To laugh and play with enthusiasm and to sing with
exultation and to know that one life
has breathed easier because you have lived –
. . . That is to succeed . . .

–Ralph Waldo Emerson

This perennial garden that I loved brought butterflies from great distances, nurtured scores of butterflies, bees, moths and ruby-throateds, the latter coming every hour on the hour. It brought joy to family, though concealed from the world, as it grew behind the house, and remained unknown to most.

Jeff