Wish I had more details on this photo — purported to be made of Corvettes:
Would it get more people to salute it this way?
Who dreams up this stuff?
_____________
Who dreams it up? A conclave called “Corvettes at Carlisle” (Pennsylvania):
Edited version, from Corvettes at Carlisle
Leave a Comment » | 
Flag etiquette, Fly your flag today, Humor | Tagged: Corvettes, Flag images, Fly your flag today, Humor, Made In America, U.S. Flag | 
Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Why not? These guys argue that the most rational solution is to get ready to deal with the problems, and stop worrying about the science behind “whether.”
If a global warming debate about certainty and cause only deepens doubt and defensiveness, what kind of debate would create support for action? We saw Hurricane Katrina as an opportunity to shift from the tired debate over cause and prevention to a new discussion about preparedness, thus reframing global warming from certainty to uncertainty and from limits on human activity to greater activity. Regardless of the cause, global warming is here and we need to prepare for it in the same way we prepare for any other imaginable natural disaster, not knowing exactly when or where it will strike. Global Warming Preparedness was created to test the possibility that action on global warming could be taken, not in spite of uncertainty, but because of it. (Breakthrough Institute, Plan for Global Warming Preparedness)
Are they right?
(Reminds me of the old wisdom from the Starbucks coffee cup.)
1 Comment | Climate change, climate_change, Disasters, Environment, Environmental protection, Global warming, Politics, Science | Tagged: Breakthrough Institute, Climate change, Disasters, environment, Global warming, Politics, Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Part of “Green Revolution,” a series on science and environmental awareness from the National Science Foundation (NSF). This is a quick introduction to wind power, with some good video:
Vodpod videos no longer available.
1 Comment | Conservation, Electricity, Energy, Science | Tagged: Conservation, Electrical Generation, Energy, National Science Foundation, NSF, Renewable Resources, Science, Wind Power | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
On a pedestal? Kathryn's potted bat-faced cuphea stands out when the mid-morning sun bathes it, but the yard in back still hovers in the shade of the live oak. Horticultural design by Kathryn Knowles; photo by Ed Darrell
Kathryn’s bat faced cuphea (Cuphea llavea) has graced our garden for several years with this particular plant, or its seedlings. It attracts butterflies and hummingbirds with regularity.
It gets its name because each blossom resembles the face of a tiny bat.
Each blossom of bat faced cuphea resembles the face of a bat.
Leave a Comment » | Gardening, Natural history, Nature | Tagged: Bat faced cuphea, Cuphea llavea, Gardening, Horticulture, Natural history, Nature | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Hoax claims died down a bit across the blogosphere, but the Missouri River still floods, and the two Nebraska nuclear power plants on the Missouri still face threats from the flood.
Comes news via the Omaha World-Herald that members of Nebraska’s and Iowa’s Air National Guard — many of them veterans of Iraq or Afghanistan — patrol the levees, helping protect against floods. Among points of special concern are the nuclear power plants at Fort Calhoun and Cooper.
The military helicopter’s black shadow dances on an engorged Missouri River as the aircraft slowly loops the flood-encircled Fort Calhoun Nuclear Station — the same left-leaning turns the pilot navigated two days prior.
Warrant Officer Boe Searight, 32, with the Nebraska Air National Guard wants the infrared camera mounted under the chopper to record similar flood scenes for levee experts on the ground to compare.
He and his colleague Chief Warrant Officer 2 Eric Schriner also are looking for new signs of trouble for the flooded plant.
“Keep daily eyes on it and see if anything changes,” says Schriner, 31.
Far below, on mosquito-infested riverbanks, two-person crews with the Nebraska National Guard and Iowa National Guard patrol the Omaha and Council Bluffs levees in mud-caked boots.
Members of the Guard are the front-line levee watchers in an operation that clearly has high stakes: Levees protect about 40,000 people from homelessness in the neighboring river cities — as well as the region’s key airport.
The levee watchers are out there right now — three shifts a day, all week, searching for gopher holes, chasing away sightseers who could fall from the levees, and checking for signs of water seepage.
More than 130 men and women with the Nebraska Army and Air National Guard work each day for flood duty, along with 120 from the Iowa Army and Air National Guard.
The idea is to spot trouble early. Levees don’t always give notice before they rupture, but more often than not they do.
If trouble is spotted, steps can be taken to shore up or boost a weakened levee.
Good to know. Still no nuclear incident along the lines of the hoax report from the Pakistani outlet alleged to be based on a report from a Russian agency — which is also good news — but no cause for abatement of overall concern.
Sometimes safety preparations work. Kudos to the Air National Guards, to the Nuclear Regulatory Agency, and to the companies who own the power plants. May their work continue to pay off in no nuclear incidents.
Idaho Samizdat noted earlier that the bizarre conspiracy theories haven’t borne out as accurate or true in the least:
The flooding situation in Nebraska has been the subject of bizarre conspiracy theories originating in Russia and Pakistan alleging that a meltdown has occurred at Ft. Calhoun and that the government is covering it up.
One U.S. web site, Business Insider, ran with the story as legitimate and set off a huge round of copy cat reports on the Internet.
Reports of a U.S. news blackout are also part of the conspiracy theory even though Nebraska papers such as the Omaha World-Herald and the New York Times have run major stories on measures by the two reactor sites to prevent the flood waters from reaching important infrastructure such as switch yards
1 Comment | Disasters, Hoaxes, Journalism, News, Rivers, Science | Tagged: Cooper, disaster, Fort Calhoun, Hoaxes, Journalism, Missouri River, Nebraska, News, Nuclear Power Plants, Omaha World-Herald, Rivers, Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Everybody else has to know it, or suffer without it.
Can you tell which of these is the parody?
Is it this one?
Or is it this one?
Stephen Law reports the science geek won the competition — maybe that will be enough to spur other beauty pageant contestants to get hip to reality?
Susana Speier explained what’s going on at Scientific American’s online site:
Last week, self proclaimed “geek,” Miss California, Alyssa Campanella made beauty pageant history…by default. When the interviewer posed a Theory of Evolution question, she was one of only two delegates to use the scientific definition of the word “theory” in her response.
The honey-drenched, colloquial definition that the majority of her competitors clung to was, yes, diplomatic. Miss California, now Miss USA, however, did not aim to please or to appease the 60% of Americans that a 2009 Gallup Poll concluded do not believe in Evolution. Rather than aiming to please or appease an ignorant majority, The future Miss USA delivered a response that supported an empirical evidence based definition of specified phenomena: the scientific definition of the word, “theory.”
Brains is beauty, it seems to me. We should certainly run our schools as if intelligence and learning are great virtues in themselves.
8 Comments | Charles Darwin, Creationism, Darwin, Education, Rampant stupidity, Reason, Science | Tagged: Creationism, Education, Evolution, Miss USA, Rampant Supidity, Reason, Science, Scientific American | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Life is just a constant bitch for tea partiers.
Rand Paul revealed why he’s full of . . . that certain fecality, shall we say. He did that in a hearing about light bulbs, and appliances. Energy conservation gives Rand Paul formication (look it up).
Burning money: Republicans prefer more heat than light, less energy conservation, and the libertarian, self-help yourself to others' money philosophy popularized in recent movies.
But what about efforts to undo the energy conservation bill that practically forces long-lived, low-energy light bulbs on us? The Tea Party doesn’t like that idea, either. Michael Patrick Leahy, writing at the blog for Rupert Murdoch’s Broadside Books, explains why he thinks the Tea Party should oppose Fred Upton’s bill to repeal the energy standards Rand Paul castigated.
Basically, none of these guys knows beans about energy, nor much about the technology or science of electricity and lighting — they just like to whine.
Leahy wrote:
Section 3 [of the “Better Use of Light Bulbs Act,” HR 2417] states that “No Federal, State, or local requirement or standard regarding energy efficient lighting shall be effective to the extent that the requirement or standard can be satisfied only by installing or using lamps containing mercury.” This reads to me that Congress is attacking the mercury laden CFL bulbs. The point of the individual economic choice guaranteed in the Constitution, however, is that Congress ought not to favor CFLs over incandescents, just as it ought not to favor incandescents over CFLs. I’m no fan of CFL bulbs personally, but look for CFL manufacturers like GE to make this argument against the bill at every opportunity.
Section 4 of the Act is designed to repeal the light bulb efficiency standards in effect in the State of California since January 1 of this year. The standards are essentially the federal standards that will go into effect January 1, 2012, but moved up a year. While I personally question the legal status of these very specific rules promulgated by the California Energy Commission based on a vague and non-specific 2007 California statute, it seems to me that there are serious Constitutional questions surrounding a Federal law prohibiting a State to establish its own product efficiency standards. While a good argument can be made that the Commerce Clause grants Congress the right to repeal California state regulations, a reasonable argument could be made by opponents of the bill that Congress can’t do this because the state of California is merely establishing local standards, which is its right.
Given these concerns about Sections 3 and 4, what purpose does it serve to include them in the bill? Both raise potential objections to the passage of the bill on the floor of the House if it comes to a vote this week.
Now, granted this is the House of Representatives, and not the Senate where Sen. Paul keeps a chair warmed, occasionally. Still, is it too much to ask the Tea Party to support the bills it asks for? Leahy said:
A full and open discussion of these issues in public hearings held by the House Energy and Commerce Committee would have been the right way to begin a legislative process that would have identified and addressed these potential objections. That’s the course that a Committee Chairman seriously committed to repealing the light bulb ban would have taken. Instead, Chairman Upton has followed this secretive, behind closed doors, last minute rushed vote approach.
There was a hearing in the Senate — good enough for most people — and of course, there were hearings on the issue in the House. The Tea Party was unconscious at the time. The bill they’re trying to repeal was a model of moderation as touted by the president when it passed, President George W. Bush — and it’s still a good idea to conserve energy and set standards that require energy conservation (the law does not ban incandescent bulbs).
Also, while they’re complaining about the mercury in Compact Fluorescent Light bulbs (CFLs), remember, Dear Reader, they oppose letting our Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) protect you from mercury in your drinking water or the air that you breathe. Pollution is only worrisome to them if they can use worry as a tool to whine about people making life work without pollution. A rational person would point out that the mercury released by coal-fired power plants to produce the energy required by repeal of the conservation law would more than equal the mercury from all the CFLs, even were all that mercury to be released as pollution (which it isn’t, if properly disposed of):
8 hours: The amount of time a person must be exposed to the mercury in a CFL bulb to acquire the same mercury level as eating a six-ounce can of tuna, according to Climate Progress’s Stephen Lacey.
Is it too much to ask for reason, circumspection, and a touch of wisdom from these guys? You’re supposed to drink the tea, Tea Party, not smoke it.
A wet shake of the old scrub brush in the general direction of Instapundit, who never met a form of pollution he didn’t prefer over clean water or clean air.
_____________
Update: Mike the Mad Biologist talks sense about the light bulb vote planned by the dim bulbs:
Because it’s not like more efficient light bulbs would be helpful at all:
The American Council on an Energy Efficient Economy says that the standards would eliminate the need to develop 30 new power plants – or about the electrical demand of Pennsylvania and Tennessee combined.
Only Republicans can make the current crop of Democrats look good…
Mike provides more points that make the Upton bill look simultaneously silly and craven: The current law does not ban incandescent bulbs at all, for example, one manufacturer has introduced two new incandescent bulbs in the past year. Tea Party Republicans: No fact left unignored, no sensible solution left undistorted and unattacked.
Also see:
35 Comments | Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, Conservation, Energy, Environment, Environmental protection, pollution, Regulation | Tagged: CFLs, Clean Air, Conservation, Department of Energy, Energy, environment, Environmental protection, EPA, Light Bulbs, pollution, Rampant stupidity, Regulation | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
In last eight years I’ve spent in frontline education, I cannot count the times I’ve had administrators bring up some management scheme misdescribed and misexecuted as a result, or rejected completely by businesses years ago. Each time I wonder, don’t these organizational leaders read the management journals, the leadership gurus?
Well, no they don’t.
So, for the three or four principals and administrators who occasionally read this blog, will you do us all a favor?
Follow Tom Peters and Rosabeth Moss Kanter on their Twitter feeds, will you? A few times a week you’ll get a gem of advice from each of them. It’ll improve your life, and it will improve your organizations if you pay attention.
Agree or disagree with me — let us know in comments.
Who is Rosabeth Moss Kanter? You should know her as the author of Teaching Elephants to Dance. It’s a hoary old classic by now — and not present in any of the libraries of the administrators I see daily.
Who is Tom Peters? He was co-author of In Search of Excellence, and has gone on to push excellence, quality and good change for the past quarter century plus.
If you, Ms. or Mr. Educator, do not know who these people are, you’re hopelessly behind the times. If you are not familiar with their writings, your schools are suffering for your ignorance.
Go change something.
2 Comments | Business, Education, Leadership | Tagged: Business, Education, Leadership | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
So I found myself in Waco, Texas, after noon and hungry. Where to eat?
Fortunately, I’d read about the burger emporium favored by none other than Elvis Presley, Health Camp.
Even after the lunch rush cars and pickups crowd the door at Health Camp.
Who names a burger joint “Health Camp?”
Established in 1949, it’s still dispensing “100% Angus ground chuck” burgers. While it’s not a competitor for the title of World’s Best, to me, it’s a good burger, and the fries were pretty good, too. The place specializes in milkshakes in a wide variety of flavors, including banana, butterscotch and peanut butter. I did not ask if the peach flavor comes from fresh, or real peaches.
Here’s a photo from a few years back:
Health Camp burger stand in Waco, Texas - TexasBurgerGuy
It looks much the same. If you’re passing through on Interstate 35, it’s not really that hard to find it at 2601 Circle Road. Circle Road terminates literally in a circle — a “circus” in British terminology — less than 100 yards off of I-35. Take Exit 333A going either north or south, aim for South Valley Mills Road on the east side of the freeway. The next intersection is the Circle off of Circle Road. Other roads going into the Circle include LaSalle Avenue, Robinson Road. Elite Circle Grill has a larger, easier to find sign — and the two essentially share a parking lot. If you’re at the Elite Circle Grill, you’re close enough to Health Camp to walk.
More parking than needed, Health Camp shares parking lot with the Elite Circle Grill; daytime shots suffer from not showing the neon on the flying-V sign. Photo by Ed Darrell, use encouraged, with attribution.
The business here is drive-in food, especially burgers and milkshakes. Someone did a photo essay on drive-ins in Texas, and a dozen or so framed pictures of famous greasers lines the small dine-in room. It’s formica and vinyl, and signs with plastic red letters on white — some of which have not been changed in months, perhaps in years.
It’s a classic place. Not classy, but classic.
Atmosphere? You came here for the burgers and the milkshakes. The seats work, the tables are clean, the ketchup isn't watered down. You want decor? Go to McDonalds.
They know what they’ve got. A combo meal — burger, fries or tots or rings, and drink, will be north of $6.00; add a shake, you’re up to $8.00 Change back from your $10 or $20.
I got a cheeseburger, mayo, “all the way.” Very good beef, satisfying, fresh and sweet onions. Fries could have been cut in the place, but I’ll wager they were frozen — not highly processed beyond that. Fried to a good crisp, they screamed for ketchup.
A stop here beats a stop at any of the big chains, but will cost you a bit more. True burger aficionados may complain. Let ’em.
I’ll stop there again with pleasure, unless I think I have time to try the Elite Circle Grill for a comparison. I thought fondly of the Owl Burger at the Owl Cafe in Albuquerque, and the Big H from Hires Drive-In in Salt Lake City, both superior to the Health Camp product. But they are related closely enough for horseshoes.
The Health Camp cheeseburger comes wrapped unassumingly in paper, served on a plastic tray. Clearly the management puts its effort into ingredients and preparation.
1 Comment | History | Tagged: Elvis Presley, Food history, Hamburger, Health Camp, History, Road Food, Travel, Waco | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Ben Stein is too easy to kick around anymore. His views on politics, science, and general public policy have inflated so much above the troposphere that he really cannot speak about life on the ground at all. The movie mockumentary “Expelled!” provided the early signs of pundit dementia.
Graphic for Ben Stein's American Spectator column: Even in the art, Stein's out of it; his column is titled, "Nation's Pulse," but the graphic shows Uncle Sam hooked up to a machine measuring everything but his pulse. Even Sam's genitals get wired, but the nurse isn't counting heartbeats, nor does it appear any other monitor is.
At the same time, he’s a friend of dogs. One of his tributes to his old dog literally brought tears to my eyes, and reminded me much of the old saying that heaven has no room for those who don’t like dogs. That also raised the horrible vision of spending eternity in a heaven with dog-lovers who also happen to be political idiots.
Stein won’t kick dogs, but he’ll kick scientists, and poor people, and anyone in the middle class. Maybe heavens don’t take people solely on the basis of their affection for dogs.
I digress.
At the remains of the American Spectator — a once-great, nearly revolutionary and smart journal of conservatism slipped on the slime to twitchy, bumper-sticker politics — Stein’s every-issue column turned to his vacation in an exclusive and expensive home in Sandpoint, Idaho, his distaste for undeveloped land and and outright fear of wilderness, friends, and the birth of his granddaughter, nicknamed Coco:
I feel so worried about Coco, She is only a tiny infant with eyes barely open. What do I want Coco to know? To do her best. To love her parents. To forgive. To be a lot more prudent about money than I am. To be grateful for this, our America, the best place in the universe. To turn her will and her life over to God and turn to Him for help in every situation.
But I wish my parents and Alex’s parents were here to help. And I wish my sister lived closer so she could help. And that Mr Nixon were still alive to give the leaders of this nation some clue about how to lead a nation. I am excited about Coco, but I am scared.
Right emotions, wrong thoughts. We need Lyndon Johnson, with a concern for eliminating poverty among the aged (something he did!), not Richard Nixon. With the possible exception of his trip to China, nothing Nixon did couldn’t have been done better by Johnson with another four years, or Humphrey, had we had the sense.
But that’s Stein. He’s human on the family front, full of emotion, loving dogs, getting a cold treat for his ill wife, worrying about the future his granddaughter faces, especially from his privileged palace in Sandpoint, a nice nearly-wild area unfortunately become home of right-wing militias, Aryan-loving neo-Nazis and Keystone Kops-style militias — then switching to his brain-driven mode from emotion-driven, and doing everything he can to make sure anyone who lacks a few million dollars in the bank courtesy of the Old Man will be unable to rise above the fears. Stein luckily led a charmed life, dependent on the kindness of family, friends and strangers, and he cannot understand why others don’t do the same. Stein’s solutions stand magnificently out of reason: Out of work? Take a tax cut. Need money to go to college? Your father needs a tax cut, if he’s rich. Health care tough to find because you can’t pay for it? Tax cuts for the owner of the company you wish to work for. And stop your arguing for more practical or workable solutions whining.
Stein stands in such sharp contrast to the Nepali prince Siddhartha, whose views of real life led him to forsake his princely heritage and seek spiritual enlightenment. One hopes for a Stein-like character with the conscience of Siddhartha, but the practicality of Ross Perot who once noted that what America really needs is a political leader who will fill some potholes, and then, instead of holding a press conference about it, fill some more potholes.
Ben Stein’s road of life has been stripped of most potholes. It’s so smooth, he can’t understand why everyone doesn’t drive that way, going to fancy school’s on Dad’s big money, hobnobbing with Republicans at the country club and occasionally taking the opportunities they toss your way. Wouldn’t such a life be divine?
8 Comments | History, Journalism, Politics, Republican Party | Tagged: American Spectator, Ben Stein, History, Journalism, Politics, Republicans, Siddhartha | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
One of the most dramatic categories of evidence that the U.S. landed men on the Moon is the detritus and other stuff they left behind. Now we have satellites orbiting the Moon that can send back images of the landing sites with an amazing amount of detail.
Around the 4th of July somebody usually wonders how those flags left behind, are doing.
CBS News reporter Jim Axelrod asked around; you can see his report at YouTube (CBS disallows embedding of these reports, so you’ll need to click the image a couple of times to go to the YouTube site for CBS):
(720 views of this report when I posted this; come on, news hounds, flag fliers and Moon and history buffs, you can boost that total.)
Leave a Comment » | Flag ceremony, Flag etiquette, History, Moon, NASA, Space exploration, Space Race | Tagged: CBS News, Flag etiquette, History, Jim Axelrod, Moon, NASA, Space exploration, Space Race | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
In a letter to the Majority Leader of the U.S. Senate, the President wrote:
This letter is to ask for your help and support, and that of your colleagues, in the passage of an increase in the limit on the public debt.
As [the Treasury Secretary] has told you, the Treasury’s cash balances have reached a dangerously low point. Henceforth the Treasury Department cannot guarantee that the Federal Government will have sufficient cash on any one day to meet all of its mandated expenses, and thus the United States could be forced to default on its obligations for the first time in history.
This country now possesses the strongest credit in the world. The full consequences of a default — or even the serious prospect of default — by the United States are impossible to predict and awesome to contemplate. Denigration of the full faith and credit of the United States would have substantial effects on the domestic financial markets and on the value of the dollar in exchange markets. The Nation can ill afford to allow such a result. The risks, the costs, the disruptions, and the incalculable damage lead me to but one conclusion: the Senate must pass this legislation before the Congress adjourns.
I want to thank you for your immediate attention to this urgent problem, and for your assistance in passing an extenstion of the debt ceiling.
Sincerely,
Ronald Reagan
True then. Still true now.
Letter from President Ronald Reagan to Senate Majority Leader Sen. Howard Baker, R-Tennessee, November 16, 1983. The Treasury Secretary at the time was Donald Regan.
Tip of the old scrub brush to mainstream media pillar, The Washington Post, where a .pdf of the letter is available.
Leave a Comment » | DBQ sources, Economics, Famous quotes, History, Politics, Public Debt, Quotes, U.S. Congress | Tagged: DBQ sources, Debt Ceiling, Economics, Famous quotes, History, Howard Baker, Politics, Ronald Reagan, U.S. Congress | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Dick Feynman taught in Rio de Janeiro for a while. He was frustrated at the way Brazilian students of that day learned physics by rote, instead of in labs. In a lecture he looked out from the classroom to the sun dancing on the waves of the Atlantic, and he realized it was a beautiful, brilliant demonstration of light refraction, the topic of the day. Sadly, the students didn’t understand that the beauty before them was a physics problem. (Was that story in Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman, or What Do You Care What Others Think?)
Here, a marriage of physics, moonlight, spring runoff over a cliff, and modern photography, in Yosemite. If you don’t gasp, call your physician and find a new sensei:
(Programs and maintenance of this park are threatened by Republican budget writers, BTW.)
Leave a Comment » | Art, National Parks, Natural history, Nature, Outdoor Recreation, photography, Physics, Travel, Video and film, Yosemite | Tagged: Art, Moonbows, Natural history, Nature, Outdoor Recreation, photography, Physics, Travel, Video and film, Yosemite National Park | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
The Century edition, 100th Carnival of History is up on the internet, over at Walking the Berkshires. Well worth the stroll.
Who says history isn’t sexy or exciting? Tim Abbott, in the text discussing entrants to the 100th History Carnival, tossed off this gem:
And then we have certain minted pneumismatic artifacts of scholarly interest blogged about at Hypervocal. Be forewarned that these may be considered NSFW in some quarters. Are they ancient Roman brothel tokens, or possibly pornographic gaming pieces? At right, a proposed design for a modern token, suitable for use by disgraced US Congressmen in exchange for sexting services, appropriately priced at “sex asses”, if I remember my High School Latin.
You’ll have to go read it there if you don’t know immediately what he’s talking about.
Other pointers to great posts, with more that I haven’t mentioned:
Now: Is there some way to sneak a copy of the 100th History Carnival into the e-mail of every member of the Texas Lege?
Leave a Comment » | History blogs, Weblogs | Tagged: Carnival of History, History, Weblogs | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
It’s slower population growth than in the past, but earlier, too.
In earlier years we’ve had cicada killer wasps — cicada hawks, in some parlance — as early as July 7. Rains fell all spring in 2010, which discouraged the emergence of cicadas and their predators. First certified sighting in our backyard did not occur until July 18.
Cicada Killer, with cicada - photo by Ronald F. Billings, Texas Forest Service, Bugwood.org, via University of Delaware Cooperative Extension
We had modified a planter, and that may have killed some of the larvae. Generally 2010 was a slow year for the large wasps. My guess is that they were less active locally because the ground remained wet through July and into August. I still get e-mails asking about how to get rid of them, and I still recommend watering the spots you want them to leave. The females sting and paralyze a cicada, then plant that cicada in a tunnel underground with one wasp egg. The young wasp hatches and feeds on the cicada, emerging usually the next summer to carry on the cycle (in a long summer, there may be a couple of hatchings, I imagine). Females do not like to tunnel in wet ground, partly because it collapses on them, and I suspect wet ground is conducive to fungi and other pests that kill the eggs or hatchlings. Our wet weather kept them away last year.
I waited to say anything this year because I wanted more, but we saw the first cicada killer wasps this year on June 27, 2011, the earliest date we recorded here. I had hoped to get a good photo, but that hasn’t happened yet.
Down at Colorado Bend State Park, the cicada killers greeted our arrival, much to the panic of the little kids in the campsite next door. They were happy to learn the wasps don’t aim to sting them, and the kids actually watched them at work. One of the wasps reminded me of just how much they like dry ground — she kept tunneling into the fire pit, unused now because of the fire bans that cover 252 of Texas’s 254 counties. Covering the holes, putting objects over the holes, nothing could dissuade her from using that site. I hope for the sake of the larvae that they hatch soon, and get out, before someone builds a fire in the pit. Some of the cicadas in that area hit 110 decibels at least, and they badly need the discipline of a force of cicada killers, if you ask me.
Prowling the yard this morning I found two more emergence holes. The wasps leave a smaller hole than the cicadas, so I’m pretty sure they are back in force.
Nature, red in tooth and claw, the poets say. Or in this case, moist in sting.
It’s summer. By the weather, it’s late summer. Hello, cicada killers, Sphecius speciosa.
Earlier at Millard Fillmore’s Bathtub:
More:
1 Comment | Entomology, Gardening, Natural history, Nature | Tagged: Cicada Hawks, Cicada Killers, Entomology, Gardening, Natural history, Nature, Summer | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
You are currently browsing the Millard Fillmore's Bathtub blog archives for the year 2011.
Ed Darrell on Texas's Colorado River
Come on in, the water's fine. Come often: Cleanliness is next to godliness.
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 