Stretching

I cannot deny that I am in need of some exercise, so I should be grateful for the intense photoga workout I got during my bug walk today, but I still found it aggravating that almost all of the insects I found today were on or near the ground. I had to do a lot of bending and balancing in awkward poses. I can't wait for the plant world to fill out so that there will be more bugs at or near eye level. That won't be for a while, though, so for now I will just appreciate that today was lovely and warm (in the 60s!), and felt like spring, even if it still mostly looks like winter.

Backyard Co-Bug of the Day #1:

 Grasshopper nymph. I only saw it because it hopped in front of me, and then I couldn't find it again until it hopped again.

Backyard Co-Bug of the Day #2:

 First bee of spring! There was another one, too, on the same tree, but it flew away before I could get a picture.

The bees were on the candy striped leaf hoppers' favorite tree:

There weren't a lot of them out today, but there are 4 here.

 I don't know what this is. It is on an oak branch, and the oak tree only just lost its leaves from last year (they turn brown in the fall, but many of them stay on the tree until spring), so I didn't see it before now. It looks like a caterpillar's cocoon, but it has that hole in it, and appears to be full of debris, and have eggs laid on it. It could actually BE a cocoon, and the moth has emerged and laid her eggs on it. That happens.

Closer look at the eggs and the jumble of things inside.

 Twice stabbed lady beetle

 Not sure if this is a wasp or a winged ant.

 Winter fireflies

 Sawfly, I think.

 I am not happy to see what I think is a sawfly on this tree. Last summer sawfly larvae almost completely defoliated this tree.

 Beetle

 Rove beetle, I think.

 We went out this evening, and when we got home and the car was turning into the driveway I caught a glimpse of something in the headlights that I thought might be a woolly bear caterpillar...

 ... and so when I got out of the car I walked down the driveway to see, and sure enough, it was a woolly bear, crawling around on a rock. I asked my husband to go inside and get my camera, while I kept an eye on it...

 ... and when he came back with the camera he spotted this scurrying around on the rock. I think it is a bristletail.

I saw a lot of spiders today for Arachnid Appreciation:
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Mostly jumping spiders:

 

 This one has caught something.

 

 

 

 An itsy-bitsy jumping spider

This is the only species of jumping spider that I know the name of… bold jumping spider. I think.

 You'll have to look closely to find this one.

Searching Through Tears

 The lack of blog posts this last week is due to my having been out of town again. I returned last night, and was pleased to hear the singing of spring peepers when I got home. It was a melancholy return, however; I was away because I was attending the funeral of my father, who died last week. My previous absence was due to my having been there to help attend to him in his final illness. Maybe I shouldn't be writing about this here, on my blog about bugs, but it is right now the thing that is foremost in my mind at all times. My most recent bug walks have been tearful, as I walked around my backyard and cried. I don't think that is why I had a hard time finding insects, I think there just weren't many bugs around, but it does make it difficult to see bugs when your eyes are brimming with tears. I miss him terribly, and about the only thing in my life right now that does not remind me of my father is the bugs in my backyard, because he was not interested in bugs, but he did once ask for a copy of one of my pictures, a nice shot of a green lacewing. I was surprised at the request, because, like I said, he was not interested in bugs, but he had seen the picture when I posted it as Backyard Bug of the Day on Facebook, and thought it was beautiful. He had never seen a green lacewing before, and was struck by its delicate beauty. He wanted the picture to use in the religion class he taught; I don't remember specifically the lesson he meant to illustrate with it. I was happy to oblige him. So that was an instance where what I am trying to do here worked: my father, who was not interested in bugs, saw beauty in a bug picture that I took, and was fascinated by it. I gave him the picture, and he gave me the gift that day of feeling like what I am doing was worth it.

Backyard Bug of the Day:

Sawfly, I think. Or some other kind of wasp. I still get a lot of things confused.

There were only a few snow fleas on their usual rock.

Lady beetle on male flowers of the hazelnut tree. It rained a bit in the morning; you can see a little raindrop on the back of the lady beetle.

There were a few candy striped leaf hoppers on their favorite tree. It was not sunny today, but it was in the mid-50s, so warm enough for them.

Winter firefly crawling around

We went out in the evening, and when we came home there were a few moths (and a LOT of midges) on the porch, attracted by the light:

Arachnid Appreciation:
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Jumping Spider

Jumping Into Spring

Archnophobes, this is not going to be a post for you. All I found in my backyard today were spiders. Today I spotted my first jumping spiders of the year–it's the first day of Spring, and the first day of Jumping, too. Otherwise, I saw two midges and a couple of winter fireflies. That's all. And all I took pictures of were the spiders. So... this is the time to check out for the day, Arachnopohobes, because here comes...

Arachnid Appreciation:
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 The reason I spotted this tiny spider was because it was hopping about, and the movement caught my eye.

The other two jumping spiders were on the side of the house, which is a common place for me to see them:

Scarcity

The last couple of days I haven't found many bugs, maybe because it's been a little bit colder, so today's find for Backyard Bug of the Day was particularly surprising.

Backyard Bug of the Day:

 Sharpshooter. Definitely not something I expect to see this time of year. It was down on the rocks by the street, which is a warmer area of the yard. In fact, all of my pictures that I am posting today were taken down there.

Other than that, I saw some winter fireflies, and a winter stone fly (it wouldn't sit still for a picture), and an ant that was hurrying too fast for me to take its picture. That's all. The wingless moths, which were still around yesterday and the day before, were gone, and I didn't see anything that looked like an egg mass on that tree. Even the snowfleas were scarce–places where a few days ago I saw a hundred only had a few today. I don't know why there weren't more bugs around; yes, it was colder than a few days ago, but it was still in the 40s. There weren't even any candy striped leaf hoppers, though it was sunny.

Arachnid Appreciation:
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Crick Crick Crick

I think I heard a cricket in my backyard today. Crickets overwinter as adults, so it is definitely possible that the warmer weather the last couple of days woke one up, but this isn't the time of year for their song. However, I would never tell a cricket not to sing, even if it's the wrong season, so... play on, little cricket!

I didn't choose a Backyard Bug of the Day today, because there wasn't really anything that I wanted to choose, so here's the insects I found in my backyard today:

 Ant. Could be a winter ant.

But this one is not a winter ant; it is much bigger.

There were wingless moths on that tree again:

 Yesterday there were two, today there were three, but I don't know if two of them were the ones from yesterday. They were not in the same places anyway. I didn't see any males, or any egg masses.

 Twice-stabbed lady beetle

 Fly

 Arachnid Appreciation:
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Flightless

I tried and failed to buy a pair of rain boots today. With all the rain we've had in the last few months the backyard is often squishy, but as the weather warms up I am not going to want to wear my winter boots, so I figured I finally need rain boots. My shopping expedition was not successful. I haven't owned a pair of rain boots since elementary school, but for a few years I have thought that it might be useful to have a pair of wellies for when the ground is too saturated for me to want to squelch around in my garden clogs. Like my garden clogs, though, I will also limit my wearing of such boots, if I manage to acquire a pair, to my backyard. They are by nature hideous footwear. I don't think I could go out in public in them. But the bugs don't mind what I wear on my feet, as long as I don't step on them.

Given that it was 60ºF when I went outside for my bug walk I was hoping for a lot more than I found, but at least I found something new for Backyard Bug of the Day:

 Just teasing. There are two of them there, but here's a better view:

 

 Female moth, possibly either a tussock moth or a geometer moth. In some species of moths the females have no wings, or have tiny, useless wings. They emerge from their cocoons and just stay around where they emerged, emitting pheromones to attract a mate; meanwhile, the males have wings and they fly around trying to find females. The female will then lay her eggs, and that's it for her life span. I can't tell if that's a droplet of something sticking out of her back end, or some kind of organ, but my guess would be that that is how she is emitting her pheromones.

 

 She then retracted that.

 

I don't know what species it is, but I know it is not a white marked tussock moth, because though that is another wingless female moth, it doesn't look like this.

The candy striped leaf hoppers were out:

 

And midges:

 

 Female...

 

...and male.

Arachnid Appreciation:
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 Spider eating a midge