Things Aren't Always What They Seem

The forecast for the now post-tropical storm Hermine has been evolving, and it looks like we're probably not going to feel much effect from it, and not for a few days, but today felt like the calm before the storm. There was not a breath of wind. It was weirdly still, especially when thinking about the incredible turmoil in the atmosphere elsewhere. Whether or not the weather (cooler than it has been, but still humid) had any effect on the bugs that were around, I have no idea. There were not multitudes, but it wasn't bad. What was most interesting is that bugs have seasons, times of the spring or summer when you see a lot of a certain kind of bug, and some of the bugs I found today seemed a little bit out of season. And I found something new, too, which is, I think, the 4th time this week? That in itself is pretty astounding for me, to find so many things I have not seen before, after so much time doing this.

Backyard Bug of the Day #1:

 I don't know what this is. I think there is a caterpillar or other kind of larva inside. This is a brand new thing for me. So here's the story: I went outside to get the mail, and when I was walking up the porch steps, I felt that there was a bug on my arm. I looked and saw something that looked like a seed, and I could feel something like a spider thread on my arm, too. I brushed it off, and realized that the seed was attached to the thread. I dropped it, but as I was moving my arm to drop it, it looked a little bit like the thing, the "seed", was moving. But I didn't really bother to look at it, because it just looked like a seed. So then later I went on my bug walk, and found something that looked just like that seed, hanging from a thread in the middle of the path. I tried to capture the thread on my hand, and the "seed" hanging from it dropped a bit, like spiders and caterpillars do when they are dangling from a thread. So I managed to get the thing onto a nearby leaf and focus on it with my camera. And this is what I saw. It still looked like a seed. But it was moving. If you look at the upper edge of this thing, you can just barely see the head of whatever is inside it, poking out.

Then I found another, hanging from a nearby leaf. This one you can see the head a little bit more. I would guess these are some kind of case-bearing moth larvae, but I really don't know.

Backyard Co-Bug of the Day #2:

Spicebush swallowtail butterfly (actually, it might be a black swallowtail, but I think spicebush). I wasn't going to have this as a C-Bug of the Day, until I realized that this is not a tiger swallowtail (not that those are not interesting. It's probably not a distinction I should have made), and I actually got some pictures in focus. That is a photographic miracle - the whole time this butterfly was feeding on these flowers, it was fluttering its wings like mad. I was just shooting and hoping for the best.

In flight!

A glimpse of the dorsal side of the wings

 Leaf hopper

 Another bee on the autumn joy sedum!

 Assassin bug with prey

 Tiny fly

 Funny thing about white hickory tussock moth caterpillars. I have never seen one eating. I have only ever seen them sitting on tree trunks and leaves. I think they spend most of their lives high up in trees, eating, and then come down when it's near time to pupate, and so I only see them when they come down. Actually, no, I take that back - I think one year there was one feeding on a sapling, so it was low enough for me to see. But MOST of the time I only see them resting.

 Weevils

 Small milkweed bugs. On milkweed.

 I found them on a couple of milkweed plants today.

 

 Stinkbug

 Ants on a cucumber blossom

 Wasp. This was small enough that I thought it was an aphid.

 This is one of those bugs that seems a little out of season. I haven't seen a thorn-mimic plant hopper in months. This one is being diligently tended by ants.

 A pair of moths

 I think this is a pearl crescent butterfly.

Pearl crescent. And can you see both of the bees?

 A cricket on my knee

 Winter firefly. Haven't seen one of those in months, either.

I only found two spiders today, but they were both different than the others I found this week, so my total spider species for the week is at least 8, and one of them is quite a rare find for my backyard - I think I have only seen it twice before, a few summers ago. Arachnid Appreciation:
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 I saw this on a leaf above my head, and wasn't going to bother checking it out up close, because it didn't look like it was anything thrilling, but I decided to look anyway (I should just always do that. It often pays off), and found an ant mimic spider. I saw two of these a couple of summers ago, and have not seen one since. Well, I might have seen one and thought it was an ant, but I can't scrutinize every any I see. If you look closely you see that it has two body segments, not three, like an ant, and it has eight legs. It was underneath a web that was attached to the bottom of the leaf.

 It pushed its way out of the web.

 I didn't get any great pictures, because it wouldn't sit still, but you can see how cool it is.

 

 It was tricky getting pictures of this spider because it was a tiny bit too high on the tree trunk for me, and the trunk was covered in slug slime, so I had to be very particular in placing my hand against the trunk to steady the camera. Not that there's a reason you can't touch slug slime, that I am aware of, but ew.

Daddy-long-legs. Just a reminder that though this is an arachnid, it is not a spider. This one is only missing one leg. It's in better shape than most. I hardly ever see one with all eight legs.