Roads End Naturalist

Exploring the natural world as we wander at the end of the road


Author: Mike Dunn

  • See No Weevil…Well, Just One

    A big nose never spoiled a handsome face. ~French proverb I set out the moth light the other night and had a few species come in, but had many non-moth visitors – katydids, a praying mantis, lots of caddisflies, and one very interesting little guy, a weevil. Weevils are the largest family of beetles with Read more…

  • Snippets

    Life moves pretty fast.If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it. ~John Hughes Indeed, life has been moving too fast of late, with so many things happening at work and in our personal lives. Luckily, I work in a magical place, and it doesn’t take much time to Read more…

  • A Week of Moments

    The butterfly counts not months, but moments, and has time enough. ~Rabindranath Tagore Last week was a busy one (actually, aren’t they all) at work with getting everything back out after the hurricane and preparing for and delivering several programs. And yet, it was still a week full of natural history highlights, brief moments when Read more…

  • Moths in a Storm

    Intimate connection allows recognition in an all-too-often anonymous world… Intimacy gives us a different way of seeing. ~Robin Wall Kimmerer As the rains continue to pour down from what was the hurricane that mercifully just glanced by us here in the woods, we are both reading and pursuing some indoor activities. I decided to look Read more…

  • Florence Cats

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    If you spend your whole life waiting for the storm, you’ll never enjoy the sunshine. ~Morris West Florence has already had a huge impact on things here in the Piedmont, far away from her predicted point of landfall. While this is minor compared to what people in the more direct path of the storm will Read more…

  • Hot Holiday

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    It’s summer and time for wandering… ~Kellie Elmore After I retired (you remember back when I was retired) I loved the fact that I could go to some of my favorite places on a week day when fewer people would be out and about in the wild places I love. I certainly didn’t want to Read more…

  • Mothing, Part 2

    Look closely. The beautiful may be small. ~Immanuel Kant The last post had some recognizable moths, some big ones, some brightly colored ones. But countless moths are frustratingly small (when you are trying to identify them), and many are, at least at first glance, LBT’s (little brown things). But the magic of a macro lens Read more…

  • Mothing, Part 1

    …to understand something of the wonders of a world which becomes the more wonderful the more we know of it. ~W.J. Holland, in The Moth Book, 1903 I set out my moth light for two nights a little over a week ago to see what species might drop by here at the house. Melissa and Read more…

  • Stripes

    These caterpillars come in brilliant green, pink and yellow, banded, and striped forms that often look nothing at all like each other. ~MOSI Outside blog post If you are not a fan of bugs, then you may want to take a break from this blog for a bit because it is what is happening right Read more…

  • Caterpillar Clusters

    Groups tend to be more extreme than individuals. ~Daniel Kahneman In spite of the heat and humidity (or maybe because of it), this is one of my favorite times of year – caterpillar time. The period between mid-August and mid-September tends to be the best time to find the greatest variety of interesting caterpillars in Read more…