The Bugs in the Backyard: Click, Buzz

Today we went from a low of 27ºF in the early morning to 60ºF in the afternoon. I was expecting to find more bugs today due to the niceness of the day, but I think most of the bugs were feeling disgruntled due to the extremely cold (for late April) night, and chose not to make an appearance.

Though there were a lot of gnats. Gnats, however, are not really interesting, at least not unless you are like me, and spend a lot of time looking for bugs, and then if you saw one in January it would be interesting. But now well into spring, with many more interesting bugs around, gnats are just annoying. And it's not like I was going to get pictures of them, anyway - they were swarming around my head, which is the second most annoying thing gnats do. Well, maybe the third most annoying, numbers one and two being biting and flying into eyes and noses.

Anyway, not a great bug turnout today, but not bad, either. There were definitely some highlights.

Backyard Bug(s) of the Day:

Sawflies, I am almost certain. I say Bug(s) of the day, because I think there were two different species of sawfly on this bush (and more than 2 individual bugs, which means this bush is probably going to be covered with sawfly larvae again this year, which is both cool and squicky, and possibly not good for the bush).

They are not the most cooperative little beings.

So, this one has a yellow face...

And this one has an orange face.

But I think they are both sawflies.

The rock garden was full of bees again today, but not just bumblebees this time:

There were a lot of what I think are honeybees, too. Unfortunately, from a photography standpoint, they were mostly moving too much and too fast for pictures. I caught this one, though...

This deserves a zoomed-in look.

It is both fun and hazardous observing bees in the rock garden: fun, because bees are just fun to watch, and the buzzing is a delightful noise. Hazardous because the rock garden is full of small rocks underneath the carpet of creeping myrtle, and that makes for wonky footing, especially in gardening clogs. But it is hazardous for the bees, too - I sort of stepped on one today. I don't think my weight was on the actual bee, but I was trying to get a shot of one bee, and heard a sort of frantic buzzing at my feet. I quickly moved my foot and a bee shot away. I think it was under a plant and I pinned it down. Sorry bee. Another interesting thing to ponder while observing bees in the rock garden is that there are thousands of flowers in the rock garden, and the bees appear to be quite selective about which ones they land on, and will fly around, ignoring most of the flowers, until they find one they want. I know from many years ago, like probably in school at some point, but maybe just something I read somewhere, that bees don't see the way we do, that they can see ultraviolet light. So flowers look very different to them than they do to us. Even knowing that, I have no idea what it is that makes a bee reject most of the thousands of flowers and go for specific ones. I just know that when you watch them, it looks like they are thinking, "Nope. Nope. Nope. Ooh, that... nope, never mind. Nope. Nope. Ah, here we go."

For a while I thought this fly was the only bug I was going to find today. I took a picture because it seemed like an interesting fly, as flies go. Kind of shiny and silvery.

I'm sort of over ladybugs, but I couldn't resist this one.

I'm seeing a lot of click beetles lately. And by a lot I mean I saw two today, and a couple of others this week. As a percentage of bugs I have seen this week, it's probably significant.

I complain a lot about uncooperative bugs, and so now I am going to praise this very cooperative bug. I spotted it while I was putting away my newly sharpened lawn mower, and went to get my camera. It was still there when I came back. Then it sat still while I took many, many pictures of it, getting closer and closer. And then it was still there when I walked by a little later (no, I don't think it was dead).

This ant didn't bother it.

This tiny whatever it is didn't bother it (it was much closer to the click beetle when I spotted it).

Yeah, we need to zoom in on this picture... Springtail? Or something related? Anyway, it was miniscule, even through the camera. I wish I had been able to get a shot of it by the click beetle, but it moved fast, and I didn't get it in focus. It's almost too small to see with the naked eye.

Actually, looking closely, I can see it in this picture. Next to the right antenna, right where it curves, on the outside, there is a yellow blur. Compare to this next picture...

Now the yellow blur is under the tip of that right antenna. So that is the tiny thing, moving along.

I suppose you are probably peering at this picture, trying to find the bug. Don't bother, there isn't one. At least, not one I am aware of. This is a picture of that wet blotch. That wet blotch is a drop of sap. The trees - I think it is the black birches in particular, are dripping sap. I got sapped today.