Summer! For Real!

June 21, 2014

Happy First Day of Summer!

It was a beautiful, sunshiny, long day (though preceded by, and now followed by some quite chilly nights), and I spent a nice share of it outside, both appreciating life and destroying it.

Hmmm... That sounds kind of alarming. All I was doing was cutting invasive vines that are choking out trees and other native vegetation. Mostly I just let nature do its thing, but I feel I have to get involved when invasive plants start trying to pull down trees.

With what is becoming habitual indecision, I was once again unable to choose one Backyard Bug of the Day. I thought I had, but then a nice butterfly came along and was so cooperative... Hey, there's no guarantee that will happen again, so I have to seize the opportunity.

So, Backyard Bug of the Day #1:

 I went to take a picture of this tall cinquefoil, and was surprised to see this little bug there. It looks like the nymph of a bug I thought was an assassin bug (that is to say, it looks like a small version of that assassin bug), and it definitely has the proboscis of a Hemiptera (true bug), but it was obviously feeding on this plant. So, either it is not what I thought it was, which is a very good possibility, or this is an assassin bug that feeds on flower nectar when it is young.

 You can see the proboscis a little bit in these last two pictures.

Backyard Bug of the Day #2:

 Pearl crescent butterfly. It was so obliging as to fly out of the brush and land almost at my feet.

 Both Backyard Bugs of the Day today have something in common - the both have proboscises (or proboscides if you prefer the spelling derived from ancient Greek).

 The difference is that with Lepidoptera (butterflies and moths), the proboscis curls up when it's not being used, while for Hemiptera it folds back along the body.

I had to pose this picture of that face, even though there were blades of grass in the way when I took it.

Backyard Bud of the Day:

 Sumac. Not the poison kind. We used to suck on the berries when we were kids; they taste lemony.

 I found this critter on top of some of the sumac buds.

You may remember this from a while ago, when I said I thought it was a nymph from an assassin bug, but now I am not sure. It clearly doesn't have the mouth parts of a Hemiptera, so unless that is something it is going to develop later, then this is something else. I bought a new bug book today, but this is not in it (there are some nymphs shown, but not a lot). But this is what I get for looking for answers on the internet!

More pretty things blooming...

 Deptford pinks

Lavender

The milkweed is looking lovely...

 And the bees are enjoying it.

Honestly, I don't know how anyone can consider this a weed.

Remember that caterpillar that looks like bird poop? The one that ate that entire leaf in one day? Well, I've been keeping an eye on it all week, and... it's pretty much done nothing. Seriously. Almost every time I have seen it, it's been just sitting still in the same spot. A couple of leaves nearby look like they have been nibbled, but this caterpillar has just been like a statue. Today I saw it moving around a bit...

 Walking along the leaf...

 Aaaaand, back to the usual spot. I don't know if you can see it, but it looks a bit like there is some silk spun on the leaf. That is how it has looked in the spot where the caterpillar has been sitting all week.

Turning around. Big excitement.

 I think that the leaf of the left is where it's been sitting all week, and now it is on the leaf next door. It does look bigger than when I first saw it, but for a caterpillar, it doesn't seem to be growing very fast. Also, since I don't know what kind of caterpillar it is, I don't know how big it is ultimately supposed to get. All this time sitting around could have meant it was about to make a cocoon or chrysalis, but not so far...

Remember those pearly pink eggs I posted a picture of the other day?

 This is what they look like now. I hope this means they are about to hatch, not that they have gone wrong.

And I found these eggs on the wall of the front porch.

I really wish my bug book had pictures of the eggs. Someone really needs to make a bug book that show every bug with its male and female forms, the eggs, the larva or nymph in all its stages, and the actual sizes of everything.

Now for some Arachnid Appreciation! We'll start with just a web, and then I'll put in the break:

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 This is the spider that was on the leaf with the larvae the other day - the apparently oblivious one. The larvae are now all on other leaves, but the spider is still there. It's not alone, though...

This spider is there, too. It looks similar, but not exactly the same. My current hypothesis is that they are male and female of the same species. Perhaps love is in the air for the spiders...

Have a beautiful summer!