Now I was going a round-about way back to the car on level ground again.
Mosses are not always found on edges of banks, but also on top. So this beauty caught my eye.
While sitting with my moss friend, I turned to find a cicada exuvia nearby.
And this was an opportunity to look up close. 🙂
The white fungus was hard at work in the leaf litter! Fun fact, fungi could be in fact at least 2.4 billion years old. The forms we are more familiar with branched off about 570 mya.
Splitbeard Bluestem (Andropogon ternarius) still was holding its seeds!
My first friend of the day that had legs!
One of the winter colors for a Prickly Pear (Opuntia)! It’s the golden colored glochids that have made me throw away a perfectly good pair of gloves. They seem to disappear and very hard to find them in skin or clothing. I managed to avoid them that day!
A many legged friend, the millipede (Aniulus) found under a cow patty!
A tiny Buckeye (Junonia coenia) caterpillar!
Adults can found all winter on warm days. However, I don’t recall finding a Buckeye larva before in the winter. But then again, in the past I hadn’t been looking so close to the ground. 😉 In fact, this winter I have also found an American Lady cat too!
Indeed it had been a great warm Thursday afternoon. Now the cold is here…again!
Those glochids are hateful things. I can never get them out of clothes or body. I try to stay very far away😄
Ouch on the glochids! Cannot count how many times I have unwittingly kneeled or sat on them while distracted looking at something else.
Love your closeups. That cicada exuvia is fascinating that even the hairs are shed.
So much to see close up! And I agree fascinating 🙂