Wild Life

It can be easy to forget what nature is really like for the wildlife that lives in it. I get reminders in my backyard, not just by seeing insects devouring each other or trapped in spiders' webs, but in the piles of feathers I sometimes find that indicate that a bird has become prey. There are other little things...

Take this adorable bunny, for instance (don't worry, I am not about to post pictures of a bunny getting eaten by a predator. But this might be kind of icky):

 This bunny was eating clover near the back steps of my house.

With the telephoto lens I could see something...

 I believe that is an engorged tick on the rabbit's neck.

 And from this angle...

 ... it appears there are several ticks attached. When you're a wild animal there is nobody petting and cuddling you and making sure you don't have ticks attached to you. I don't know how much this affects the rabbit. I don't know if they can get Lyme disease or other tick-borne illnesses. I do know that according to biologists, moose are being affected badly by ticks in other states, having so many attached to them that it ultimately kills them. This bunny doesn't have that many (that I can see). But it is one of the harsh realities of being a wild animal.

Sorry to be so grim. I am just tired of trying to do this when it's dark, and wet, and cold, and windy outside. It was a very discouraging day to be trying to take pictures of bugs. However, in spite of the cold nights the last couple of nights, and the not very warm days (I think it only got to 62ºF today, and it was 61ºF when I went out on my bug walk), there were a lot of bugs around today. I just struggled with the wind and the darkness of the overcast skies in trying to photograph them.

On a happier note...

Judging from the sounds coming from inside, the wrens have had babies.

Backyard Co-Bug of the Day #1:

 White lined tussock moth caterpillar. This is the smallest one I have ever seen, and I don't think I have ever seen one so early in the summer. This is a caterpillar that looks like it was put together out of parts that were leftover from building other caterpillars.

Backyard Co-Bug of the Day #2:

 This is probably some terribly harmful beetle, and I should probably be upset that it was on my hazelnut tree (you can see it has eaten part of the leaf) but it is quite beautiful.

Yesterday I posted a picture of a leaf that was surrounded by sawfly larvae. Here's what's left of that leaf:

 Just the center rib, with a few larvae left who are not ready to give up on it.

The other larvae have moved on to other leaves, but they are not all on the same one now, they have taken over a couple of them.This is about half of them, and they have already eaten half of this leaf.

 Lots of long-legged flies on the milkweed today

 Assassin bug

 Flower beetle

 Longhorn flower beetle

 Fly in an iris

 Caterpillar

 Caterpillar living in a rolled-up leaf

 Damselfly. This is the third species I have seen in the last two days. Only moderately cooperative.

 It looks like it is covered with mites.

 I can't find anymore eastern tent caterpillars on their tree anymore, but I am finding them in random other places.

 Caterpillar close-up

 Leaf bug

 Looper caterpillar

 Buffalo plant hopper

 Moth

 This is my favorite kind of beetle larva. I am not a huge fan of larvae, but these are blue, so it's hard not to like them.

 Around this time of year there are suddenly lots of them around.

 Lady beetle

Mayfly. I don't think I have ever seen one this small before; I thought it was an aphid at first.

I had an interesting spider encounter last night that I will tell you about in Arachnid Appreciation:
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Last night as I was sitting at my computer, writing the night's blog post, suddenly a spider dropped in front of me:

 As I am no longer programmed to immediately squish any spider that appears, after exclaiming in surprise I reached for my camera, which was right next to me. I was too slow, though, and after lowering itself down to touch the keyboard of my computer, the spider started to climb back up to the ceiling:

I have high ceilings in my house. The part where the spider was dangling from is close to ten feet. It climbed back up and then began to descend again. It got all the way down to the keyboard and then... back up it went.

 It kept dropping slowly down, touching either the J or the K on the computer keyboard, and then climbing back up. This went on for over an hour. Every time it came down I grabbed my camera, trying to get a good picture of this. As you can see, I didn't succeed. But it was still fascinating and funny, and I have no idea why it was doing this.

 Finally, it just landed on the keyboard...

 ... and marched off. At that point I captured it in my bug vacuum and released it outside today.

 Six-spotted orb weaver

 I am not sure what this is, possibly some kind of micrathena. It's quite small, but it could just be young.

 

 I didn't get any good pictures of it, but I wanted to post it just as a record of another spider seen in the last week.

 And then there's this one, hiding underneath its legs.

 Jumping spider