Extremely tiny reddish-brown soil mite
Elongated Springtail from Terrarium
The pine plantation west of our house was thinned back in 2014, and the stumps left behind from the cut trees have gotten pretty rotten and punky. And, on September 19 of 2020, we found these little pink fungusy things popping up between the growth rings.
read more…Red and Yellow Mushrooms from Maasto Hiihto
The Maasto Hiihto trails up north of Hancock are primarily cross-country skiing trails[1], but they are also open for general hiking when there is no snow on the ground. When we went up there on August 2, 2020, it had been raining for a while, and the mushrooms were popping up in some numbers. There were quite a number of these mostly-red ones, which were about the size of the palm of my hand.
read more…We found these bug nymphs on a piece of landscaping timber on September 15, 2019. Given the time of year, I think this is a hibernation aggregation. They were looking for a protected spot to overwinter.
read more…When one looks at the ecosystem of northern Michigan (along with the northern tier of US states and most of Canada), there is an unusual feature – on top of there being relatively few species compared to further south, there is a distinct lack of endemic species (species that live here and nowhere else). Practically everything that lives in this region belongs to widespread species with ranges that extend considerably south of here. This is in contrast to places like Florida, which has tens of thousands of species of invertebrates, and at least 1500 of them are considered endemic to Florida.
So why is that? Well, we can sum it up in one word: Glaciers.