Thawing Out

Today began my second favorite season. My favorite season, as I have probably mentioned many times, is Spring. My second favorite is January Thaw. Now, I realize that it is not a season, really. But to me there are many more seasons than just Spring, Summer, Winter, and Autumn. There are bug seasons, and flower seasons, and weather seasons... and there is January Thaw, which might last a day, and might last a week, and it perfectly delightful. Some January Thaws are warmer than others, getting up into the 60s for a glorious day or two. We're not going to have that, I don't think. But given that this past Sunday was record-breakingly cold overnight, and that Monday was the first time since Christmas that the temperature was above freezing, a couple of days in the 50s sounds incredible. We didn't quite reach that today, topping out at 49 and a bit, I think, but it was wonderful. And it is especially nice to have a January Thaw when there is snow on the ground, because it's a very agreeable thing to tromp around in the snow in a t-shirt and feel comfortable (all of this being relative, because if the temperature gets down to 50ºF in September, it's not t-shirt weather). So I did some snow tromping today, in my new, not-leaky, warm boots, my arms exposed in a t-shirt, and went looking for insects.

I have been out looking for insects a couple of times this week; although it was in the 30s, the high 30s, I thought maybe with the sunshine there would be some winter fireflies about, and I have kept looking for snow fleas. I didn't find either, but I was sure I would today, as warm as it was, even though there was no sunshine. I didn't find either, and I didn't find any winter crane flies or other flies, as I thought I might. But today was not disappointing by any means.

Backyard Bug of the Day:

 Woolly bear caterpillar, also known as Isabella tiger moth caterpillar. Not shocking to see in the winter, because they overwinter as caterpillars, and have a tendency to wander when the temperature is above freezing, I think. But given that the ground is mostly covered with snow, it is certainly not something I expected to see crawling up the side of the house. If you were trying to figure out what kind of weather we're going to have this winter, I think that this particular caterpillar is giving mixed signals; the black stripe in the front is quite large, but the one in the back is quite small. I am not sure how that fits into the folkloric method of forecasting the winter, given that it is supposedly determined by the relative lengths of the black and brown segments.

 

Though I didn't find any of the insects I expected, the woolly bear was not the only one I found unexpectedly:

 Some kind of Hemiptera.

 A sowbug is not so unexpected, given the warmth and the wetness involved in melting snow. And I know, this is a terrible picture of the sowbug, but it's a pretty good picture of the photobombing springtail to the left of the frame. Those were not surprising at all; thought I didn't find any snow fleas, which are another species of springtail, I was certainly on the lookout for these, as well, and did espy a couple.

I saw a few small flying things, but I didn't get a close enough look to know what they were. Gnats, or something. There were also a couple of midges that were attracted to the porch light, but they did not remain to be photographed. It remains to be seen if I will be able to go out looking for bugs tomorrow; the next couple of days are supposed to be even warmer than today, but it is also supposed to be pouring rain for the next two days, so I guess I'll have to wait and see.

 I was not expecting to find any spiders, either, but here's some Arachnid Appreciation:
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The white background is snow.