Next Year's Moths

 I almost thought I was not going to get to do a bug walk today because we had a thunderstorm that lasted most of the afternoon. It didn't rain much, but I am not going to walk around outside in a thunderstorm carrying a metal stick. It cooled the air quite a bit, so hopefully this is the end of our latest heat wave. Just throwing in some weather facts here, even though I try not to start blog posts with weather reports, because it's part of the environment of my backyard, and could have something to do with the bug populations. Anyway, today we broke a record for the number of days at or above 90ºF in Connecticut in a summer, and unless we get over an inch of rain in the next week we will break the record for the driest meteorological summer (June-August) for Connecticut in recorded history. Officially the state has had 3.03 inches since the start of June. For perspective, Connecticut averages about 4 inches of rain per month. I think we have had more than that locally, but it has definitely been a dry summer.

My bug walk was not successful in numbers of bugs seen, but I was pleased with what I did find, specifically I was quite excited by what I found for Backyard Bug of the Day:

Polyphemus moth caterpillar. Either first or second instar. This was an exciting find for a couple of reasons. I have only ever seen one of these before, about seven or eight years ago. It was in its final instar, only days away from making its cocoon. It was huge; this is going to be about three inches long eventually. Based on timing, this is going to make a cocoon (which it will do probably in a month or so) and then spend the entire winter inside it, emerging next May or June.

Polyphemus moths are one of the giant silk moth species, the family Saturniidae. Big caterpillars become big moths. 

I found five of these on an oak tree.

Other Bugs:

Tachinid fly on virgin's bower

Stilt bug and bumblebee on goldenrod

Nymphs of milkweed bugs, I am pretty sure they are large milkweed bugs, because that is what I have seen in this milkweed patch. Note the very different instars–some of these are tiny, and others look close to becoming adults. Interesting that this is the first I have seen of them, but I think that they mostly feed on the milkweed seeds, and have probably been inside the seed pod up until now. 

Milkweed tussock moth caterpillar and tachinid fly. I think the fly was trying to parasitize the caterpillar. The fly kept circling around the caterpillar and trying to land on it, while the caterpillar kept thrashing around, particularly when the fly made attempts to land on it.

Cricket

Arachnid Appreciation:

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I think this is a funnel web spider, but instead of living in a funnel among the grass or other foliage...

... it lives in a hole in this metal post. I first saw it the other day, but when you get too close to it, it zooms down into the hole.

Still on the same leaf. I wonder if it is having a lot of success there, or if it's just not hungry enough to go somewhere else? What's interesting is that the tree this vine is dangling from used to be a place I could always find a lot of bugs, and lately there's nothing there. Did the spider eat it all? (Just kidding. I don't actually think it did).