The Paper Birch Moth

It’s that time of year again when insects get stuck in the animals water bucket.  And as long as I see them there, I will scoop them out, and if they are still alive,  watch them dry off and move on their way.

I also take pictures and videos of the insects I rescue and share them here on my blog.

I’ll admit I’m a bit addicted it.   It’s very uplifting and inspiring to watch these small beings come back to life after facing death.  It gives me hope to see their comeback.

Taking videos and pictures of them  has opened up a whole new world to me.  The bugs are often so small I can barley see them, except though the lens of my camera.  It helps me see them as a small animal, shaking off the water and drying themselves,  the way any other animal might.

Usually, when I first pull them out, they walk around trailing the water behind them.  Then they run their long legs over their antenna and wings drying them like a cat or rabbit.   They shake their hind legs and sometimes their whole bodies, just like a dog after a swim.

I’ve only found a few insects in the water bucket so far this year.  But this morning a moth was flat out, floating on top of the water trailing a stream of white power from her wings.  When I scooped her up, her wings, soaking wet, hugged my finger.

It was raining so I took the moth to the back porch where I sat on the wicker bench and breathed on her  to warm her up and help dry her off.

She looked so much like the bark on the paper birch, I started to think of her as the Paper Birch Moth.

After a while her antenna and one leg moved,  but her wings were plastered to my finger.  So very gently, trying not to damage it, I lifted one wing with my pinky nail.

Released from my finger the wing fluttered to life.

So I did the same with the other three wings and the Paper Birch Moth was revived.

She walked along my finger to the palm of hand then started to move up my sleeve.  That’s when I decided she was ready to be on her own.

If wasn’t raining I would have put her on the Paper Birch, (although, the starlings who have a nest in the tree might have brought her home for a meal if they could see her).

Instead I put her on the giant mushroom that fell off the paper birch and is on the back porch.  She walked around a bit then settled, well camouflaged on the mushroom.

It’s been cold and raining all day, the last time I looked the moth was still there.

I don’t know how long this kind of moth lives, but if she’s still on the mushroom tomorrow and if the sun comes out, I’ll put her on the other side of the birch tree from the starling’s nest.

There she can warm up and hopefully fly away and do what it is that moths are born to do.