The Bugs in the Backyard: Golden Afternoon

I did my full bug walk today, but it wasn't really necessary. Most of the bugs in the backyard today were all within an area of about 30 square feet. And what were they all doing there?

Feeding on this:

This particular patch of goldenrod was teeming with insects (and arachnids). There were Lepidoptera, Hemiptera, Diptera, Hymenoptera, Orthoptera... That may be all the "opteras." No Coeloptera, now that I think of it... wait, no there was one, a ladybeetle, but I didn't get a picture of it. I took almost 500 pictures today - the first time this summer I have taken anywhere near that many. Fewer than 100 of those were taken in other parts of the backyard other than this patch of goldenrod, and most of those were my attempts to get a shot of a spiderweb in focus. A caveat, though: well over 200 of the pictures were of one of today's Backyard Co-Bugs of the Day. But let's start with the other Backyard Co-Bug of the Day, which was one of the few bugs found outside this patch of goldenrod (though it was still on a goldenrod plant, the Flower of the Hour (Yes, I know it should be Flower of the Day, but Flower of the Hour sounds cool).

Backyard Co-Bug of the Day #1:

Brown hooded owlet moth caterpillar. This caterpillar is a prime example of a brilliant caterpillar that turns into something rather dull. Well before I had a macro lens, and therefore well before I really started looking around my backyard for bugs, I found one of these once, and it was possibly the first time I was really blown away by a bug I found in my backyard. It was so exotic looking, like something that belongs in the tropical rain forests. I was disappointed then to discover that it would turn into a rather nondescript, brown moth, but now I think it's kind of funny.

Caterpillar close-up

And speaking of nondescript, brown moths, Backyard Co-Bug of the Day #2:

You may be wondering why I have chosen a nondescript, brown moth as a Backyard Co-Bug of the Day (No, it is not a brown hooded owlet moth). I couldn't help it. I really liked this moth, and that was before I knew that it was (I think) a corn earworm moth. You see, this moth, or its caterpillar, anyway, is a pest on corn crops. I feel bad for the losses that farmers may suffer from this, but personally, I hate corn (except for popcorn). An insect that destroys one of my Top 3 Most Hated Foods cannot be other than charming to me (Now if there was only a caterpillar that would destroy peas and mayonnaise...). Anyway, I don't know if you'll be able to discern what I liked so much about this moth from the pictures (and I am about to inundate you with pictures of this moth), but it had a lot of personality. It also hung around this patch of goldenrod for at least ten minutes, and let me take a LOT of pictures (close to 300, perhaps), so... I like it. I think also I was kind of surprised to see it - I know that there are moths that are diurnal, but so many more of them are nocturnal, and it's a lot more common for me to see moths on my front porch around the porch light than in the backyard actually feeding on flowers. Most of the time if I see a moth during the day it is on the trunk of a tree, trying to look like bark. So this one blithely feeding on goldenrod really caught my fancy. But enough rhapsodizing about a nondescript brown moth. Let's look at the pictures!

As I mentioned there were a lot of insects in this patch of goldenrod today. A couple of the bees/wasps were kind of aggressive toward this moth.

None of them succeeded in scaring it away, though.

Love those eyes! Its green eyes were among its many charms.

At first I thought it might be an underwing moth, but it's not in that section of the book.

Note the ant.

Another aggressive competitor for the flowers.

Here's a zoomed-in shot, just for fun, because it's the only one that shows the curly tongue really well.

So, who else was on the goldenrod, you may be wondering?

This bee was actually on a different patch of goldenrod, and was one of the few bugs in that part of the yard. I think this bee was ill...

In this zoomed-in picture, it looks like it was some kind of infection. It was alive, but very sluggish.

I know, you've seen this moth already. But see the tiny bug flying in the background? I don't have any pictures that show it, but there was just constant insect air traffic around these goldenrod plants. I think part of the attraction at the time was that it was the only part of the backyard that was still in sunshine - it was getting toward late afternoon, and most of the backyard was in the shade. However, by the time I finished taking pictures there, most of this patch was in the shade, too.

Grasshopper...

Grasshoppers. I didn't get a good picture of it, but for a while these two grasshoppers were sitting on branches about six inches apart - one above the other, and about 1/4 of the way around the plant. They were not facing each other, and I don't know if they could see each other, but they were each moving their legs alternately with each other, almost as if they were doing a call-and-answer kind of thing. I didn't hear anything, but I suppose it's possible that they were making a sound that they could each hear, or they were feeling each other's vibrations through the plant. Anyway, eventually the one below climbed up, they had a brief moment of interaction, and the one above began to climb away...

Another grasshopper. There were a lot of them. This is one of the two areas of the yard where I most often see them. On a milkweed leaf in that same flower bed.

And another. This one is on evening primrose, in the same flowerbed.

Fly, and can you see other insects in here?

Of course, if there are insects to be eaten, there will be the kinds of insects that like to eat them, like this assassin bug.

I think this is a red-banded hairstreak butterfly.

Leaf-footed bug nymph

All of this is still completely inadequate to demonstrate to you how many bugs, of how many different kinds, were on that patch of golden flowers. For one thing, I have only shown you maybe three or four species of bees/wasps, and there were many more. And there were bugs I could hear, and not see, specifically crickets. It was the center of all life in my backyard today.

I did find a couple of Random Bugs that were not on goldenrod:

I'll bet you can guess what this is.

The sawfly larvae have eaten almost all of the leaves on the dogwood sapling they have been on for the last couple of weeks. This one is on the move, whether to find more food elsewhere, or to find a place to undergo metamorphosis, I don't know.