There's a Fungus Among Us

It's fun for me to find things living in my backyard that are almost too small to see. I don't know why I find that so interesting, but there's just something about knowing those things are there when most of the time I walk blithely by without noticing them. It's almost like parallel universes, all of these different levels of existence in the backyard. There are surely things out there that really are too small for me to see. And there are things underground, and things high in the trees... When I find these little things that I can barely see, it's a reminder of all the life that is out there, living with us, that we don't ever think about.

As you might have guessed, today's Backyard Bug of the Day is very small. Almost too small to see.

Backyard Bug of the Day:

 A thrips. I know I explain this every time I post a thrips, but thrips is the singular and plural. It sounds weird, but there you go. I read that thrips have distinctive mouth parts, but they are too small for me to see them.

Here's a magnified view of this thrips.

 I thought this one was kind of a funny shot...

 Which you can see better with the magnification.

 This flower was swarming with thrips.

I first spotted them when I was taking pictures of this bee. Can you see the thrips in this picture?

Here's a better shot of the bee.

 Interesting hopper, being attended by an ant. I think this might be a sort of interim phase for the hopper? I don't know...

 Grasshopper nymph. This is about a quarter inch long.

Nice yellow racing stripe down its back.

Today I saw at least 4, and possibly 5 species of butterfly (One flew by too fast in my peripheral vision to see more than that it was orange).

 This one is a great spangled fritillary.

 

 Eastern tiger swallowtail. There were a pair of these having a bit of a fluttery encounter. Today for a change they were feeding on the honeysuckle flowers, instead of just flying high among the trees.

 Here we have a predator and a potential prey... It's fascinating how often you'll see something like this, where there is a predatory insect, and nearby something it might be interested in eating... if it knew the prey was there.

 Assassin bug

 Beetle

 Some kind of Hemiptera

 Crane fly

Here is a glorious sight!

 Gypsy moth caterpillars dead or dying from the fungus! Oh frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!* Now the trees are covered with fungus-stricken caterpillars. I have seen only a few that were pupating, and so many that are dying! It's finally working, all that rain actually did us some good!

 Moth

 The raspberries are in bloom, and attracting a lot of bees; I saw at least 5 species of bees today, feeding on the raspberries and honeysuckle (those two plants are sort of growing intertwined).

 Wasp

 Mostly the bees were too busy to be photographed. Fun thing about this picture–I did not take a picture of a bee landing on the flower, I took a picture as it was taking off. Backward.

*Jabberwocky, by Lewis Carroll

Arachnid Appreciation:

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Have at it, spider! I am trying to picture a spider actually attacking a GMC, and I can't picture it...