Burnt Fork Watershed Alliance

Sadly, kill on sight

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Good worms!

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Before you reach for anything, look at what you're actually looking at. Seven of the most common caterpillars in American gardens and yards — and the butterfly or moth each one becomes. 🌿

Seven transformations to recognize:

Black Swallowtail — the green caterpillar with bold black bands and yellow-orange spots on your dill, parsley, or fennel. Leave it. The adult is one of the most striking butterflies in the country.

Mourning Cloak — black with red spots and branched spines, often found on willow, elm, and cottonwood. One of the longest-lived butterflies in North America — adults overwinter and emerge in late winter.

Red Admiral — spiny dark caterpillar on stinging nettles or false nettle. The adult's orange-red wing bands are unmistakable.

American Lady — bristly dark caterpillar often found on pearly everlasting and pussytoes. The adult has distinctive eyespots on the hindwing underside.

Milbert's Tortoiseshell — black and spiny with yellow side spots, found on stinging nettles. Northern species, vivid orange and dark wings.

Cloudless Sulphur — smooth bright green, nearly invisible on its host. Becomes one of the most vivid large yellow butterflies in the US — common from the Great Plains to the Atlantic coast.

Tomato hornworm — the large green caterpillar with diagonal white stripes and a curved rear horn. It becomes the Five-spotted Hawkmoth — a substantial moth with pink and grey patterning and a wingspan approaching five inches. 🌱

Every caterpillar is a future pollinator. Observe before you react.

Please do not move rocks in the creek

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That cute rock stack by the creek just killed a bunch of mosquito killers.

Dragonflies spend most of their lives underwater, sometimes up to five years, clinging to rocks while they grow.

A single dragonfly larva eats hundreds of mosquito larvae before it ever flies.

But dragonflies are just one species. The rocks in a healthy stream are also covering caddisfly larvae, mayflies, stoneflies, water beetles, salamander egg clutches, and the freshwater snails that fish depend on.

Eastern Hellbenders, an endangered giant salamander species, lay their eggs specifically under flat stream rocks. Moving the rock kills the clutch.

When you pull a wet rock out of the water and stack it on the bank, everything clinging to that rock dies. They desiccate within minutes in the sun.

A single rock pile is dozens of small lives lost. Most stream cairns are stacks of fifteen to twenty rocks.

If you see stacked rocks at a creek, knock them over. The stream rebuilds itself faster when rocks are scattered the way water put them.

Leave no trace isn't an aesthetic preference. It's real habitat protection.

Our own former board member, Bill Witherspoon!

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Have you noticed those interesting rock formations along some of Atlanta’s interstates and highways? Georgia is full of geological diversity, like Stone Mountain, Arabia Mountain, Tallulah Gorge, and definitely around the Chattahoochee, as well!

Dr. Bill Witherspoon has noticed - that’s why he coauthored a book about it (Roadside Geology of Georgia). That’s also why he’s partnered with the National Park Service to lead a Geology Hike! Join us for a hike along the river at Island Ford, where Dr. Witherspoon will help us observe and teach us all about the important local geology. By the end of it, your geology knowledge will be rock-solid. 🪨

🗓️ Sunday, April 19th (1:30 - 3:30 PM)
📍 Island Ford (1978 Island Ford Pkwy, Sandy Springs, GA 30350)

Learn more and register at https://chattahoocheeparks.app.neoncrm.com/nx/portal/neonevents/events?path=%2Fportal%2Fevents%2F37307