Posted By FarmerJ on June 24, 2011

We’re a live-and-let-live kind of people here on the Prairie Farmstead, plus I have a really tender heart when it comes to nature’s critters.  I stop the mower for snake and toad crossings, and I worry about ‘my’ little birds when a big storm rolls through.

Back on Monday, May 30, we experienced some ‘special’ wind that day.  [What is it about Mondays and whacky weather?!]  We didn’t have any tornadoes, but all day long we were blasted with 40 – 50 mph winds with gusts even higher.  The Lexington Airport reported 90 mph winds.  Nice, huh?  No, it wasn’t.

Husbie was working in his shop, enjoying a much-needed day off from work.  On one of my trips out there ~ to take him an ice cold beverage ~ I spotted the hugest moth I’d ever seen desperately clinging to the foundation of the garage.  With wings the size of potholders, it was having a difficult time!  I felt sorry for it, so I grabbed it up and put it in the L-shaped corner where the house and garage meet.  It was a little more sheltered from the brutal wind, but not completely.

To shorten the story a little bit, after two more attempts to help keep this undoubtedly exhausted creature from blowing away, I finally carried it into the garage.  There’s a bucket of day lily bulbs I never got around to planting in there, so I put it in there.  It provided a nice place to rest and stretch its potholders wings.  I was a little worried about it not having a food or water source in the garage, but I planned on releasing it as soon as the winds let up.

In the meantime, I had to research what kind of moth this was!  It was a Cecropia Moth ~ North America’s largest native silk moth.  Turns out, they don’t have mouths, so they don’t eat or drink anyway!  Their typical life cycle is a total of 7 – 10 days, and their sole purpose in life is to breed.  My moth, I learned, was a female ~ apparent by her ‘smaller,’ less fuzzy antenna…and by the little eggs she’d laid on one of the day lily roots she wouldn’t let go of when Darling Husbie brought her upstairs to my desk for her photo shoot session.  Do take a moment to enlarge these photos and get a look at that fuzzy body and those antenna.  I think I could use one of them for a mascara brush, don’t you?!

Anyway, after the quick glamor shots, I took her back outside and placed her in the bush you see in the first photo.  She gleefully stretched her wings and quickly started doing her thing ~ for she only had a short time left to do it in!  I may, or may not, have extended her short lifespan by removing her from the relentless winds that day.  But, at least in my heart, I feel like I helped.

Now, for my second rescue mission…

Meet Jake, Jr.  I found him, or rather half of him, in the house Monday afternoon.  [Again with the Monday ~ this one was the big tornado day.]  I’d been outside with the girls for a little bit.  When we came back inside, I closed the door behind me without looking back.  We went upstairs to continue with our daily tasks, like usual.

About an hour or so later, I went back downstairs to get something out of the pantry.  As I was walking down the stairs, I noticed something long and skinny in the corner of the door frame.  Once I got half way down, I realized what I was looking at was the back half of Jake, Jr.  Oh, the poor thing!  I’d closed him in the door, and he’d been there all that time.  I felt terrible!

I opened the door, thinking for sure that I’d killed him, squishing him to death.  He didn’t move.  So, I tickled him a little.  He wiggled.  Yay!  I couldn’t see his head, though.  He had somehow wedged his way into a tiny gap in the door frame.  I grabbed him by the tail and tried to gently pull him out so I could relocate him outside.  He didn’t want to come that way.  He wanted to keep going the way he’d been going.  So, I kept tickling him.  [Who would have ever thought this girl would tickle a snake?  I can see the business card now ~ Farmer J, Snake Tickler.]

Anyway, we finally tickled our way through the door frame and back outside.  Poor thing.  You can see the mark on his side in the coil section second down from the top where he’d been pinched by the door.  I felt so bad, but was relieved that I hadn’t killed him.

Actually, Jake, Jr. seemed to have quite a bit of spunk left in him.  He stuck his tongue out at me several times ~ undoubtedly in pure disgust with me for closing the door on him ~ and then he slithered off to hide under an old bucket I have sitting near the doorstep.  I can’t blame him for wanting to steer clear of that lady and her door!  I think Jake, Jr. recovered just fine, too.  After the big tornado storms rolled through, Husbie and I checked under the bucket.  Jake, Jr. wasn’t there anymore.  I’m sure he slithered home to tell all his relatives what a meanie I am!

But, I’m a tender-hearted meanie, yes?  ♥

We’re linking up to Farmgirl Friday today ~ venture on over there to take a peek at what all the other farmgirls have been up to this week!

Categories: Farm Life
Tags: