Soggy

To be perfectly honest, some days I just don't feel like doing this. I don't always want to go outside and look for bugs, particularly knowing that if I am successful, I have a couple of hours work ahead of me to produce a blog post about it. And as much as I love being outside, I don't love it ALL the time. Some days I just want to stay inside and not get sweaty, or... whatever the extreme is outside. I thought that today was going to be a day off, and I really wanted it to be; it was pouring rain all morning and into the afternoon, and I was sure that it was not going to let up all day, and I could, without having to admit to being lazy, take a day off from hunting for bugs. And it was really just because the weather was gross. I don't really like doing my bug walks after it has been raining all day. I don't like the sogginess of it, and the darkness, and the fact that everything is just wet. I mean, you just end up feeling like this:

 

 

So I was not thrilled when it stopped raining today just as I was getting home from running errands. I didn't want to go out, and it wasn't just because everything was soaked, it was because the aftermath of the rain was humidity that you could cut with a knife. Not nice weather for being outside. By every measure of how I decide how nice the weather is, this was awful. But there was a cute caterpillar on a plant right next to the front walk as I got home, so I wanted to take a picture of it...

 

 (I know, I keep posting pictures of the same caterpillar, but it's cute)

...and then... well, I didn't do a complete bug walk. I only walked around the grassy areas of the backyard, and skipped the wooded areas because they would have been drippy and just wetter. And at first it seemed like it was a big waste of time, because I had a hard time finding any bugs at first. But then I came to the milkweed flowers that are in bloom... I keep saying if you want to find bugs, you have to go where the bugs are, and right now the bugs are on the milkweed flowers in bloom. Ultimately it was a very satisfying bug walk, and I went into the house in a better mood (albeit very sweaty and gross).

Backyard Co-Bug of the Day #1:

 I think this is a silver spotted skipper

Backyard Co-Bug of the Day #2:

 I don't know what this is, other than it is a Hemiptera of some kind and something I have not seen before, so, yay, another new species for the backyard!

It had a droplet of water on its eye, which magnifies it quite interestingly. I don't know how this was not driving it crazy, and I wonder what effect it had on the insect's vision.

 Side view; you can see the proboscis and the drop of water on its eye.

 I found this nest nestled (ha!) on the ground. There are no eggs in it, and I don't know if this is an abandoned nest, or one that has been recently built but not had eggs laid in it yet. I haven't noticed it before, and it is in a pretty exposed spot. I found one like this last summer with four eggs in it, abandoned; one of the eggs was broken and empty, and the others were intact, but it was clear that nobody was tending the nest. I wonder if this is the same birds. I found another nest today in a tree; I didn't see it at first, but every time I walked past the tree a bird darted away, and I realized I was probably disturbing a bird on her nest. I peeked in among the many vines covering the tree and saw the nest. So now I have to avoid that area for a while.

Other Bugs:

 Candy striped leaf hopper. I have been seeing them around lately, and have noticed that they are much brighter in color than when I see them basking in the late winter/early spring.

 Hover fly

 Not all the bees were waterlogged...

 

But this black firefly seems to have gotten caught in water droplets on the garden shed; it was stuck to the shed and struggling. I gently righted it, and I hope it was okay. I note that there don't appear to be any light organs, unless that light line on its underside is the "smaller" light organs one of the books said they had.

 I think this is a fall webworm moth caterpillar?

 Plume moth

Fly

 Washing its face

 Tiny caterpillar