Bug Breaks

Today I didn't really need to do a bug walk, most of the bugs that I found were seen while I was finishing up mowing the lawn. I did my bug walk after I was finished mowing, and found hardly anything, but I found quite a few insects while I was working. In fact, it was great to find bugs and have an excuse to take a break and go get my camera.

Backyard Bug of the Day:

 Large milkweed bug. I have been wondering why there have been no milkweed bugs around, either large milkweed bugs or small milkweed bugs. I finally found one today.

Other Bugs:

 Last night the two monarch caterpillars lined up nicely so I could show their relative sizes. The black thing on the leaf next to the larger one is its skin that it has just molted. What I didn't notice at the time is the other insects on the leaf. There are three of them along the spine, two aphids and...

 ... a lacewing larva, I think. Anyway, it's an aphid eater.

 Viceroy caterpillar pretending to be bird droppings.

 A pair of weevils

 Remember I posted pictures a couple of days ago of a bunch of these caterpillars in a web of thread (or tent, I suppose)?

 One of them is now a chrysalis.

 Tree cricket

 Cricket

 I don't think that ball of liquid is something this beetle was eating, I think it is a noxious substance it created because I was annoying it. That is just a hunch, though.

 I think this is the same pair of ragged ambush bugs from yesterday. The female caught a bee today.

 Camouflage looper caterpillar

 Katydid

Plant bug