Night Lights

 Firefly season in my backyard ended about a month ago, but last week I thought I saw one when I was out on the back porch for sky time. I wasn't sure if that's what I saw, and it was a very yellow light, unlike the usual greenish glow of the fireflies I see here. Then tonight I saw one (or more? Hard to tell) again, definitely yellow, and this time my husband saw it too. So I am now wondering if I have a new (to me and my backyard) species of firefly. I hope so. I only saw it flash a couple of times, and didn't get a chance to try to see it up close. I'll have to keep an eye out for it again.

It's been hot and disgustingly humid, so I didn't even want to go outside today, but I did, because even when I don't want to go outside I want to go outside. I definitely didn't want to do a bug walk, so I didn't bring my camera on my woods walk. I soon regretted it, as I saw quite a few cool bugs, but I finally got to a point when I thought I would regret it if I didn't walk back to the house and get it. This added about a quarter of a mile, at least, to my walk today, but hey, exercise is good for your heart. See, there is a clearing in the woods with goldenrod along the sides of the path, and I found a goldenrod plant that had four different species of insects on it, none of them bees or wasps. I was taking a chance by walking all the way back for my camera, hoping that at least one particular bug would still be there when I got back, and I got really lucky–3 of them were. One was a species that I saw about a week or so ago, which was the first time I have seen it in a couple of years, so I really wanted to get a picture of it. 

So, here it is, Backyard Co-Bug of the Day #1:

I think this should be called a moose beetle or a Bullwinkle beetle, but it is a species of wedge-shaped beetle called Macrosiagon limbatum. This is a male. You can tell by a few things, but primarily the giant tv antennae on its head. I wonder how many channels he can pick up with those things; when we got rid of our cable and tried to use an antenna we didn't have much luck.

Also on that plant was a related species:

Tumbling flower beetle. I have a rule on this blog that if I ever get a really good picture of a tumbling flower beetle it gets to be Backyard Bug of the Day. This is pretty close, but not good enough. I am an idealist.

I am shocked that I got as many pictures as I did–usually they live up to their name and tumble off the plants before I can get much. Which, by the way, is a popular technique with many beetles, so I don't know why these got the name.

And another beetle on that plant:

Spotted cucumber beetle

Another insect fond of goldenrod is Backyard Co-Bug of the Day #2:

Ailanthus webworm moth

Other Bugs:

Katydid on goldenrod. There was another species of katydid only inches away, but it jumped out of sight before I could take a picture.

Tree cricket

Honey bee on goldenrod

I couldn't find the monarch caterpillar, but this milkweed tussock moth caterpillar showed up on the plant where I saw the monarch the other day.

Katydid (female) that I found while harvesting cucamelons in the garden.

Progress report on the ladybeetles:

One has decided to pupate on the wall of the back porch...

... another will be joining it soon...

And while I was putting my shoes on for my second woods walk, I looked up at the back porch tree and saw that one has finished pupating...

... and was eclosing as an adult!

We left on our walk, which was a short one, and by the time we came back, it was all the way out. It hasn't developed its full color yet, as is often the case when insects either molt or emerge from pupation.

Today I saw quite a few really interesting bugs that I was unable to get pictures of. And then, there was this one:

This moth fluttered into the beam of my flashlight, and I could see that it had a cool underwing pattern. I followed it with the light to see if it would land, and it seemed to zoom past me... but it had actually landed on the side of my leg. It is tricky to take a picture of the side of your own leg with a cellphone while holding a flashlight.

You can just barely see the orange and black stripes of the underwing pattern. Strangely, one of the other insects that got away when I tried to photograph it today was another species of moth that looks very different with its wings closed, but has a very similar underwing pattern.

Also seen in the woods today:

There is a family of deer, a doe and two fawns–one from this year, and one I think that is probably a year old–that I encounter on my walks occasionally. I always frighten them away before I notice them, so what I see is them bounding through the woods. Today I quietly followed them, and got a few shots, none of them good... Here you can see two deer...

... and you can just barely see a fawn fleeing when they decided to run off again.

Today I think I must have set a record for the number of frogs I saw on my walk. It had to be around twenty, from at least 4 different species. They were more skittish than usual; usually they jump into the stream or off the path when I am almost upon them, but today I saw them splashing into the water when I was about twenty feet away. Yesterday and earlier in the week there were a few really complacent ones who let me get close, but not today. Interesting thing, though, is that I have had an answer to one of my longtime frog questions this week, and particularly today. I have always wondered how precise frogs are in their leaps. Sometimes I see them leap quite long distances, jumps of a couple of feet in length, many times their body lengths. And I have wondered whether they were calculating where they wanted to land, and trajectories, and all that, or if it was just a leap of faith. Well twice today, and once earlier in the week, I saw frogs jump and crash into things, dropping into the water or onto the ground. There are sticks and plants along the edge of the stream, and frogs leaping toward the water have bonked into them, clearly not what they intended to do.

Anyway, here's the two I got shots of today:

This is the only one that landed in the stream where I could still see it and photograph it, and as soon as my shutter clicked it darted away.

Wood frog. I only see these on land.

Yesterday I found a lot of a new fungus that has just sprung up:

This is the first one I saw, and I was really puzzled by it. It looks like an egg with two yolks, and slimy-looking goo with these two orange orbs in it. There was no egg shell, though. But later I found several more, with more orbs per goo pile. I eagerly await the development of these.

Arachnid Appreciation:

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

Bowl and doily spider with prey

Female spined micrathena

I have been trying to figure out for several years what these next spiders are, to no avail. I still don't have a spider guide, and none of my insect guides really cover spiders well (because they're not insects). They LOOK like a smaller version of a spined micrathena, so I thought maybe they were males, but I looked up what male spined micrathenas look like, and it's not this. Today, I think I finally found out what they are: white micrathenas:

Very hard to tell from this angle, but...

They look related to spined micrathenas, just not spiky. Well, as it turns out, they are related, in the same genus. They also have the same annoying habit of building their webs at face level across my walking paths. Fortunately, today I noticed all of them before walking through them.