An accidental capture
So, while we were capturing the Gammarus for last week’s entry, we scooped up some water from the stream into a jar to put them in. In the process, since the stream was so shallow, we got some debris off of the bottom into the jar, too. Then, when we got it back to the house and started looking at what we had, S_ noticed that one of the bits of debris was oddly symmetrical and had a hole in one end[1]. So, we put it into the petri dish along with the amphipods, and waited to see if anything came out. Something did:
Not really a freshwater shrimp
Last Sunday, it was pretty warm, and S_ suggested that it would be a good day to take Sam down to the stream[1] to turn over some rocks to see what was underneath[2]. So, I grabbed this rock that was in the middle of the stream, turned it over, and found about 20 of these clinging to the bottom:
Back in November, I posted pictures of a male crab spider, today we have some pictures of a female, for contrast. She probably isn’t exactly the same genus, but she’s fairly close.
In February, I posted a picture of a larva of a carpet beetle. Well, now we have some pictures of an adult[1] that I found climbing up the side of the shower, to round out the set:
This is the second Ichneumon wasp (photographed last June), that I mentioned in last week’s posting:
The very long ovipositor (in this case, longer than her body!) is pretty characteristic. While it looks dangerous, it isn’t a stinger and she’s harmless (to us! More on this later . . .) – the ovipositor is used for laying eggs in awkward places.
This wasp was on the window in the entryway last fall, and sadly, it died when I put it in the refrigerator to cool it down for photography.
It appears to be some type of Ichneumon wasp, based on the fact that (a) it looks wasp-like, and (b) its hind trochanter[1] is divided into 2 segments (the next picture is a close-up of the point where the hind leg meets the body).
OK, I’ve got to do this one. Any insect-themed blog eventually has to have an entry about Monarch butterflies, Danaus plexippus. It’s required[1]. So, here we go. Last summer, S_ and Sam caught[2] several Monarch caterpillars and raised them in a terrarium. While this made it easy to watch them, the glass made it hard to get really sharp photographs.
I’d like to say right now that, if you want to get pictures of all the bugs in your house, you really can’t beat having a 2-3 year old child helping you find them. Sam found this spider on the rug just a couple of weeks ago (in January)[*], and brought it to me alive and undamaged. It even has all of its legs for once!
S_ was growing some petunias in pots on the south side of the house last spring, and one day noticed that she had quite an infestation of some pretty eye-catching caterpillars. You can see three of them just in this one picture[1], there were probably a dozen or so in total:
And, in the “Things found under rocks” category, we have this specimen from back in May[1]. It is a “pillbug” (also known as “potato bugs”, “sow bugs”, “woodlice”, “roly-polys”, and probably dozens of other names).
