Anthidium psoraleae, f, right, Lake Co, MN
Here is a prairie Anthidium. A. psoraleae. There are 36 Anthidiums in the U.S. In the East and the Midwest, none are what you would call common any longer...except for 2 of the exotic ones A. oblongatum and A. manicatum. They, are common. Why? Because they like weeds and are weedy themselves and in places where people with cameras live there are lots of weeds. In fact, except for you, dear reader, the story of the average house is this: Land in a luxurious state of unbelievable bioplexity is tornout, crushed, flattened, spread with subsoil from the new basement, and in its place weed gardens advertently and inadvertently grown. No native Anthidiums here, no sir, they need native plants not fake ones. Nature wants you to fix that. Photo by Cole Cheng and specimen from Minnesota from Patrick Pennarola's study of ...prairie restoration.
We Are Made One with What We Touch and See
We are resolved into the supreme air,
We are made one with what we touch and see,
With our heart's blood each crimson sun is fair,
With our young lives each spring impassioned tree
Flames into green, the wildest beasts that range
The moor our kinsmen are, all life is one, and all is change.
- Oscar Wilde. Original public domain image from Flickr