From the Archives of 2006—2
December 6, 2020
The new guardians should be ready to show themselves next week. Meanwhile, here are more photographs from my archives. I spent more time in Ohio than Florida in 2006, but it looks like I took more photographs in Florida. See if you can tell when the locale shifts in the photos below.
1 We start with the Vermilion River, where I spent time nearly every week when I was in Ohio.
2 The golden color in the water is not a reflection of a sunset or sunrise but of fall’s turning leaves along the bank.
3 For many years Schoepfle Garden planted Datura on the property. I don’t know the name of this butterfly (or is it a moth?). Maybe one of you does.
4 A cliff affords a view of fall leaves against a backdrop of the river.
5 Walking downriver from Schoepfle Garden rewarded me with one of my favorite images of a Leptothrix discophora film.
6 The reddish color of the film shown in the top half of this photograph indicates that it is relatively old.
7 This dumpster may be one of the first ones in my collection. My friend Alan just sent me this relevant link.
8 Did someone position these crates, or did they position themselves?
9 If you guessed that this is a photograph taken in Florida, you’re right. But the Florida photos began with the dumpster.
10 We just don’t paint many buildings pink up north.
11 Or chartreuse or turquoise.
12 This scene makes me think about “The Owl and the Pussycat.” (The meaning of the word “runcible,” BTW, is discussed in Wikipedia.)
13 It’s true that I rarely photograph people, but this relaxed angler and his sweatshirt in Sarasota’s South Lido Park were too good to pass up.
14 As was this offering on Main Street in downtown Sarasota.
15 My alley prowling began in Sarasota. This beauty has many sisters in the area.
Romancing Reality 
I’m pretty sure the critter in your white-on-white third photograph is a butterfly, based on the kind of antennae it has. That’s an interesting article you linked to about runcible; some people are given to contriving far-fetched explanations for words. It’s funny of you to mention the mop’s “sisters” in #15.
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December 6, 2020 at 10:09 AM
We’ve now received the definitive answer to what kind of critter is in #3. You were right that it’s a butterfly. See the comment from Janice below for the name. I thought I was just looking up the definition of runcible; didn’t expect to get into a whole interesting story. Glad you enjoyed my mop humor, Steve.
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December 6, 2020 at 2:23 PM
#15…American Gothic goes to Florida! Good work as usual!!
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December 6, 2020 at 10:40 AM
Oh, I love that. American Gothic for sure! Thanks, Clare. And to readers of this blog who might not know what Clare is referencing, see https://www.artic.edu/artworks/6565/american-gothic.
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December 6, 2020 at 2:28 PM
Hi Linda! Great photos as usual! I hope you and David are doing well in this too long period of caution.
I asked Margaret (our entomologist turned glass artist) about the moth/butterfly on the datura blossom. She says it’s a White Cabbage butterfly—pretty common around here, but nonetheless fun to see flitting around the vegetable garden. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pieris_brassicae
Warm regards to you both.
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December 6, 2020 at 11:32 AM
Thank you, Janice. I swear I replied to your comment two days ago, but it seems to have disappeared. Please thank Margaret for her authoritative identification of this butterfly. And for the link. Hope you and Jim are doing well, too. (We are.)
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December 8, 2020 at 12:59 PM
If in Europe, I would have said that is a Cabbage Butterfly (Pieris brassicae), a very common pest of cabbage plants. They are very common here. If it has reached the US, that would be bad news, they are an agricultural pest. However, there are other species in that Genus (Pieris) that are common in North America, so maybe it is one of those. But I am not an expert.
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December 6, 2020 at 4:33 PM
Thanks for weighing in, nannus. It looks like you don’t need to be an expert to be right. Your Cabbage Butterfly did indeed cross the ocean. A friend’s daughter, who is an entomologist, also said Cabbage Butterfly, and my friend give this link to the Large White: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pieris_brassicae. I’m wondering whether it is, instead, the Small White. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pieris_rapae. It wasn’t very big.
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December 7, 2020 at 2:11 PM
Its a butterfly, and in the UK we’d call it a White or Cabbage White. 🙂
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December 7, 2020 at 3:09 AM
Looks like you agree with the others here, Adrian. Thanks for writing.
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December 7, 2020 at 2:12 PM
I had a sweatshirt like #13 but it’s long gone now. Got it while living in Minnesota. I still have the UofM shirt, though. The Leptothrix discophora film shots are still a favorite, Linda.
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December 7, 2020 at 1:08 PM
So you’re a partial midwesterner, eh, Ken? Glad you aren’t tired of my Leptothrix discophora photos. You’ve seen a lot of them. I was sorry not to capture much of the films this summer and fall. Stupid old pandemic. Next year.
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December 7, 2020 at 2:16 PM
Yes, Cabbage white was what I thought too – I love it on the Datura, a plant that I’m very fond of. I really love that photo! And no wonder #5 is one of your favorite Leptothrix images – wow, it’s gorgeous! The crates! What fun! That’s very cool. You seem to have picked just the right angle and framing. I thought the FL photos began with the dumpster only because you challenged us and that would not have been the expected answer. 😉 #9 and #20 make a nice duo, a paean to everyday cheerfulness. Thank you for linking to the poem – it’s been decades since I’ve read. It’s a delight and who knew about runcible? I like the photo but am confused about the bird, which seems to be a Cormorant in plumage unfamiliar to me. I don’t think it’s an Anhinga. But what do I know? 😉 #14 is truly disorienting, and fun. Which leads perfectly into the last photo – your description really forces a funny face on my brain, but I’m good with that, Linda, I am!! 😉
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December 7, 2020 at 8:39 PM
I love the datura flowers, too, including the buds and the shrivelled ones. Wish the park people would plant them again. Maybe next year. This year, I think it was petunias. Ho hum. Good for you for guessing the dumpster photo as the switching place. About the cheerfulness: I’ll bet you mean #9 and #10—or maybe you dug further into my archives than I did. Wasn’t that fun about runcible? All I could remember about the poem was the first line, and that imperfectly, but I thought it every time I looked at that photo. I always get confused about cormorant and anhinga. Looking it up now, I see that a University of Florida website (http://blogs.ifas.ufl.edu/polkco/2018/07/16/commonly-confused-birds-in-central-florida/) says, “The best way to tell if a bird in question is a cormorant or anhinga is to use their beaks. Anhingas use their long, straight, pointed beak to spear their prey. Cormorants, on the other hand, use their hooked bills to grab their prey.” So this is a cormorant; I can tell in another, closer, shot of her (or him). The web page has photos. Glad you enjoyed #s 14 and 15, Lynn. Thanks for all your comments.
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December 8, 2020 at 12:54 PM
Totally excellent – again! I really enjoyed these photographs.
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December 8, 2020 at 2:52 AM
Thanks, Jessica. So glad you enjoyed them.
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December 8, 2020 at 12:55 PM