Rockin'

Today the buggiest place in my backyard was actually my front yard, the rock garden in front of the house. Mostly what made it buggy was the high number of grasshoppers. It's fun to watch an area full of grasshoppers. But it wasn't just grasshoppers; the rock garden hosted all three kinds of Orthoptera today, grasshoppers, crickets, and a katydid.

 Grasshoppers in the bird bath. (By now it is full of water; it rained all evening).

 Ground crickets were everywhere. Sometimes they would hop away, if I got too close, but they don't hop quite as prodigiously as the grasshoppers.

 Cricket and katydid. This is another species of cricket.

I looked in one of my bug books to see if I could identify the grasshoppers, and confirm that there was more than one species hopping around the rock garden today. I think this was the first time I have ever bothered to look up grasshoppers. It will probably be the last. I had no idea there were so many different species listed. Identifying these is not going to happen, especially because they appear to be juveniles still, and therefore don't really look like the pictures.

 I do know this one, which is an adult (fully formed wings). This is a red-legged grasshopper.

Also in the rock garden: Oleander aphids on milkweed.

Amphibian of the Day:

Backyard Co-Bug of the Day #1:

 

As promised, I looked for this caterpillar again today, and found it in a better spot for photography, so here it is, Backyard Bug of the Day. I tried looking this up in my book, but didn't find anything that looked even close to this. It is kind of on the small side, so it is possible it is an early instar, and will look different when it progresses further; the books rarely show early instars.

Backyard Co-Bug of the Day #2:

I realize this might be the same as another BBotD from a few weeks ago, and therefore I should not have chosen it, particularly when I had other choices, but I did. Some kind of fly.

Backyard Co-Bug of the Day #3:

 A species of tachinid fly, from the genus Trichopoda.

 I love the feathery legs.

Other Bugs:

This is the third moth I have seen on the autumn joy sedum recently. In other years I don't remember these flowers attracting moths.

Coccon

Still sitting in the same spot, but it looks bigger somehow.

Bumblebee on autumn joy sedum

Ants with their hopper "herd."

There are crickets everywhere...

This year the purple coneflowers have been unusually barren of insects. Usually they are a huge draw, especially for butterflies. I haven't seen a single great spangled fritillary butterfly on them this year, and usually they are constant visitors. I did find this stinkbug nymph today, but that was the only bug on any of the purple coneflowers.

In the spot that used to be our vegetable garden, and is now half overgrown with wildflowers (which most people would consider weeds, but you know I don't), I have seen a lot of katydids and crickets in recent weeks. Today as I was standing there, looking at the tangle of plants, I thought about how strange it is that I have seen so many species of katydids lately, but for the last several days all I can find is one species (see above section about the rock garden), and specifically I thought about having seen conehead katydids, which are new for me this year, in that particular part of the backyard, when suddenly a large, green insect jumped out of the "garden" and landed on my monopod:

Ah, the conehead katydid! I had to take my camera off the monopod to get this picture.

Then it obligingly jumped onto this plant.

Then I found another conehead in the same garden, about a foot away from the first one. This one is a juvenile, with wings that are not fully developed.

 Woolly bear caterpillar.

 Fly

 I saw three damselflies today (photographed two), and I think they were all different species:

 

Banded tussock moth caterpillars:

 

 White hickory tussock moth caterpillar.

I found this caterpillar making itself a shelter by attaching silk threads to a leaf edge:

 It was moving its body back and forth, attaching the threads to the edge of the leaf, and the body of the leaf...

 More on this caterpillar in a moment...

Arachnid Appreciation:
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... but this leaf already has a silk-spinning inhabitant...

I am guessing this is a six-spotted orb weaver. I haven't seen one in weeks. Maybe months.

The tachinid fly from above was not alone... Harvestman lurking in the corner of the picture.

Flower crab spider

I think this one has an egg mass, that white blob in the lower right of the picture.