They flutter around like sweet fairies, but they don't fool me. I've seen them before. In 2007 to be exact. I read back then that they come every 5-10 years and since it was the first time we'd seen them we figured the cycle was usually the longer of that. Well, they're baaaa-ack!
The worms have a voracious appetite and have denuded 100's of evergreen live oak trees in our neighborhood. It looks like winter without the fall color prelude. And our winters are usually green! Just about every surface was covered with little worms: fences, paths in our driveway and even the front of our house. Fortunately those are gone now and we're just left with millions of moths.
The article written in 2007 said they do not kill the trees which we found to be true. It also said that they actually do good by leaving their carcasses to fertilize our yards. If you can imagine the weight of a moth it seems incredulous that they would do much good, but there they are laying eggs, dying, and getting caught in a breeze to get caught under some equally dead looking grass. You see we really asked for rain, not moths. Maybe if we get some rain it'll speed up the process of their return to earth?
Gross, but the yellow dots on right are their eggs.A few that won't hatch in 5-10 years!
This brings me to a favorite subject of mine: inspiration. I never lack for it for very long, but I know others struggle at times.I was taking my first small metals course back in the Fall of 2007 and our final project was to work with multiple metals, multiple surface treatments, and multiple soldering techniques. We had only a couple of days to come up with a design. Much to my husband's not well hidden disgust, I decided to create a pendant honoring the oak moth.
Oak Moth Memorial: copper, brass, sterling silverchasing, etching, rolling mill
It wasn't to honor it in the I'm so proud of your prolific work, but more in honor of its cycle of life where we see nature's challenges in today's world, but it appears that darn oak moth is going to keep coming back.