Tag: bug of the week

Bug o’the Week – Bee Moth

Bug o’the Week
by Kate Redmond

Bee Moth

Greetings, BugFans,

BugFan Danielle sent these shots and wondered if the moth might be a Bee moth (Aphomia sociella) (the Bee moth is not to be mistaken for the amazing little Moth fly, of previous BOTW fame – https://www.bugguide.net/node/view/1352263).  The BugLady agreed that it could very well be, but she emphasized that if there is a secret handshake for moth identification, she hasn’t learned it yet.

Bee moths are in the family Pyralidae, the Grass or Snout moths (the family Crambidae shares the name “Snout moths,” and for the same reason – because the sensory mouthparts (labial palps) of some members are prominent and protruding https://www.bugguide.net/node/view/1788429/bgpage).  This is the BugLady’s favorite Pyralid moth https://www.bugguide.net/node/view/2498157/bgimage.

Pyralids are mostly small, drab moths, some of which, like the Bee moth, take a toll on economically important plants or pollinators, some of which control unwanted plants, some of which are bred commercially as pet foods and bait, and many of which simply live out their lives under our radar.  Pyralid moths may hold their wings flat at rest or may roll them (https://www.bugguide.net/node/view/2438633/bgimage) or may hold them out to the sides.  They have tymbals (hearing organs), presumably so they can detect bats’ echolocation signals and dodge them.  Their larvae live concealed lives in stems, fruits, or seeds, within tied leaf shelters, in the soil, or in nests of bees and wasps and sometimes mice. 

BEE MOTHS, also called Bumble bee wax moths, aren’t from around here.  They were first reported in North America in 1864, and like the BugLady’s ancestors, they came over on the boat from Europe.  They’re found in the northeastern quadrant of North America from Tennessee, north (plus Mississippi), and in a few western states and British Columbia. 

Their wingspan is listed as about 0.70 to 1.50 inches, which is quite a range in a species this size, especially since females are not much larger than males.  They may be tan, reddish https://www.bugguide.net/node/view/1665136/bgimage, or greenish https://www.bugguide.net/node/view/2370594.  Males are more intensely-colored and patterned, and females have a dark spot in the middle of each fore (top) wing.  They seem to have a little iridescence going on.

Courtship is complicated, involving wing-fanning and the deployment of pheromones by both females and males (whose scents may also repel competitors, but if that doesn’t work, fisticuffs may ensue).  Males also produce ultrasonic sounds (songs).  One source suggested that the pheromones are biosynthesized from the Aspergillus fungus eaten by the larvae in nests and hives.  Using her sense of smell, a female locates exposed, above-ground nests of some social bees and wasps like honey bees, bumble bees, German yellowjackets, and bald-faced hornets and lays as many as 100 eggs there.  She arrives in early summer, before the hive/nest population peaks and the hosts’ defenses strengthen. 

Several sources labeled the small, yellow larvae as “inquilines,” feeding on the nest detritus, waste, dead bodies, pollen and honey, wax, and fungus from within a tough tent of silk.  But they’re not just harmless guests – they cross the line by damaging the nest structure with their tunneling and later with their dense webs and galleries https://nurturing-nature.co.uk/wildlife-garden-videos/waxmoth-larvae-safe-behind-their-tough-silken-blanket-video/, and as they get older, by eating the eggs, larvae, and pupae of their hosts (unusual because most moth larvae are vegetarians).  In some cases, the larvae may end up relegated to a small section of a nest as it expands.  They exit the nest in fall, overwinter as larvae, and pupate in spring.  They are not welcome in commercial bee operations, and they seem more able to get a foothold in honey bee hives that are already compromised.  

The feeding tent may protect larvae in case their hosts discover them; adult moths play possum when alarmed, which may serve them both outside and inside the host’s nest.

Sources danced around the severity of the impact that Bee moths might have on honey bees.  They’re obviously a potential problem in commercial bee operations, but they’re not listed among the major offenders – various mites and lice and the larvae of another alien Pyralid called the Wax moth – and the internet didn’t light up with Bee moth Wanted posters.  A blog from Yorkshire, England stated that “They are not a pest of honey bees.”  An interesting point was made in one research paper about the connection between nearby commercial honey bee operations and the health of wild bumble bee nests.  Researchers noted that competition with honey bees – sharing food resources – stresses bumble bees, and that having honey bees as close neighbors increases the risk of transferring disease organisms and parasites (like Bee moths) from honey bee hives to bumble bee nests, where their impact may be greater.  

Thanks, Danielle! multiple generations in the south, where the final generation of caterpillars overwinters.  They form a cocoon in spring.

Kate Redmond, The BugLady

Bug of the Week archives:
http://uwm.edu/field-station/category/bug-of-the-week/

Bug o’the Week – Giant Leopard Moth

Bug o’the Week
by Kate Redmond

Giant Leopard Moth

Howdy, BugFans,

Honorary BugFan Lisa sent the BugLady a picture of her glove posed next to a big, fat caterpillar and asked if it might be a wooly bear.  There are a number of species of caterpillars that are called wooly bears, but the wooly bear in question is the caterpillar of the Isabella Tiger Moth, a caterpillar that has found a place in folklore for its (supposed) ability to predict winter weather https://uwm.edu/field-station/bug-of-the-week/wooly-bear-caterpillar-again/.  When a wooly bear has wide, black bands, it’s predicting a harsh winter.  Mistaking this black caterpillar for a wooly bear that’s gone all in for an Armageddon winter is a common mistake

Turns out that the caterpillar was something less common and way more exciting, and coincidentally, the BugLady had found a similar caterpillar in the same area earlier in fall.  She’s seen one adult – tucked up under the eaves in Ohio, and would love to find another.

GIANT/GREAT LEOPARD MOTHS, aka Eyed Tiger Moths (Hypercompe scribonia) (also called “fever worms” in Missouri) are in the family Erebidae – Erebidae comes from the Greek Erebus, which means “from the darkness.”  The family was created from parts of several other moth families, and it includes the Tiger https://www.bugguide.net/node/view/1548841/bgpage,

Lichen https://www.bugguide.net/node/view/2144967/bgimage,

Tussock https://www.bugguide.net/node/view/987864/bgpage, and

Underwing moths https://www.bugguide.net/node/view/2284502/bgimage, among others, whose subfamilies and tribes have some pretty spiffy members.

Look for Giant Leopard Moths in grasslands and along woodland edges from the Great Plains to the Atlantic and from far southern Ontario through Texas to South America.  They are widespread but are not considered common within their range.

This is one spectacular moth!  Some individuals are more “dotted” https://www.bugguide.net/node/view/1852552/bgimage than “eyed” https://www.bugguide.net/node/view/2265267/bgimage, and those beautiful, black and white wings hide a colorful body https://www.bugguide.net/node/view/977160/bgimage.  And then there are the blue spots (more prominent in some individuals than in others) (and again – how does iridescence benefit a nocturnal species?) https://www.bugguide.net/node/view/1967173/bgimage!  And they’re sizeable moths https://www.bugguide.net/node/view/2254472/bgimage, with a wingspread exceeding three inches (females are a bit larger than males https://www.bugguide.net/node/view/1388256/bgimage).  There are six other members in the genus Hypercompe in North America, mostly western or Texan, and they all have a similar gestalt.   

Ohio blogger Jim McCormac notes that, counterintuitively, this brilliant moth can be difficult to see on a tree trunk, its shape broken up by the pattern of dots and eyes.  It has been theorized that the bold, black and white wings may be a kind of aposematic (warning) coloration because the moths do have a chemical defense – when alarmed, they exude drops of bad-tasting, yellow liquid from their thorax https://www.bugguide.net/node/view/1586453/bgimage.  The moths will flip their wings up and display their technicolor body, possibly a behavioral defense to scare predators.  Apparently, no one knows if they’re palatable to birds, and the BugLady didn’t find any accounts of enterprising scientists who admitted to tasting one (don’t laugh, someone tried a Viceroy butterfly) (not toxic like its Monarch look-a-like, but bitter because the caterpillar eats willow leaves).

Older caterpillars, which may grow to three inches long, have red spiracles (breathing pores) in a line along their sides, and red bands between the segments https://www.bugguide.net/node/view/58331.  The BugLady once used the metaphor of a demure woman whose undergarments are red, but she may well have borrowed that phrase from somewhere.  Some fuzzy caterpillars have irritating hairs, but not Giant Leopard Moths. 

Adults mate, a process that may take as long as a day and include walking from sunny to shady spots as needed.  Eggs are laid on one of the species’ many host plants, which include some woody plants (maples, willows, cherries, and mulberries), but mostly a variety of low-growing, bitter, herbaceous plants like dandelions, broad-leaved plantain, violets, and, surprisingly, broccoli and cabbage.  Caterpillars are nocturnal eaters that hide under leaf litter or tree bark during the day.  Adults do not feed.

They overwinter as caterpillars, often under the bark of decaying trees, fortified by a natural glycerol antifreeze.  Jim Sogaard, in Moths and Caterpillars of the North Woods (a great little book that’s currently out-of-print, so snap one up if you find one) writes that “Caterpillars can survive temperatures of 26.6 degrees F. with 45% of their body water frozen to ice but perish when temperatures reach 14 degrees F.”  Like the wooly bear, caterpillars may rouse during mid-winter thaws and take a hike, only to tuck themselves in again when winter returns.  There’s one generation per year in the north and multiple generations in the south, where the final generation of caterpillars overwinters.  They form a cocoon in spring.

Kate Redmond, The BugLady

Bug of the Week archives:
http://uwm.edu/field-station/category/bug-of-the-week/

Bug o’the Week – Eastern Parson Spider

Bug o’the Week
by Kate Redmond

Eastern Parson Spider

Howdy, BugFans,

One of the BugLady’s inquilines is an Eastern parson spider.  An inquiline (from the Latin inquilinus meaning “lodger” or “tenant”) is an animal that lives in the dwelling of another animal.  Like the Tree frog that overwintered with the BugLady last year, the Parson spider is finding enough to eat.

Some definitions of inquiline allow for the possibility that the “roomer” might morph into an eater or an eat-ee of the host, but that would nudge it into a different ecological category.  The relationship of the host to its inquiline guest is defined as a “commensal” one – positive for the guest; neutral for the host(ess).

Eastern parson spiders (Herpyllus ecclesiasticus) (great scientific name!) get their name from the white markings on the top of the abdomen that are reminiscent of the white cravats of 19th century preachers.  They’re in the ground spider family Gnaphosidae.  There are a dozen species in the genus Herpyllus in North America, and most can’t be identified to species with photos.  The Western parson spider (H. propinquus – another great name) (the BugLady’s Dad used to introduce juicy vocabulary words when she was a kid, and “propinquity” was one of them, along with “prestidigitation,” “prevarication,” and, of course, “procrastination”) is nearly identical to the Eastern parson spider, mostly separated by range.  Eastern parson spiders occur mainly east of the Rockies, from Canada into Mexico.   

These small, hairy spiders live on the ground under rocks, logs, and other forest debris, and on tree trunks, but it’s not uncommon for them to get into mailboxes, where they might be collected with the day’s mail, or to come indoors in fall, where adults may overwinter (they don’t breed indoors).  

Females are about 3/8” long, and males are about ¼”, and they are speedy spiders that often run in a zigzag line, so the BugLady photographed her spider at the bottom of her “Invertebrate-Catch-and-Release Jar,” a repurposed parmesan cheese shaker.  Contributors to bugguide.net have done better – here’s a good shot https://bugguide.net/node/view/1399774/bgimage and a glamour shot https://bugguide.net/node/view/1635888/bgimage.  

Eastern parson spiders don’t spin trap webs, they’re active, nocturnal/crepuscular hunters that search for their prey – small invertebrates, including other spiders – on foot.  This one has subdued a moth that was bigger than it was https://bugguide.net/node/view/1002561/bgimage.  They do use silk for other purposes – they rest in silk retreats under boards, bark, rocks, etc. in the daytime, young spiders that stay outside during winter make a silk cocoon under loose tree bark, and females enclose their eggs in a silken sac in summer before hiding it (and they stay around to protect it).  Not a lot is known about their natural history, but the fact that adult parson spiders can be found in any season suggests that they may have a two-year life cycle.   

Along with the usual “Scare sites” that pop up when you Google animals (“Eastern parson spider bite”/“Eastern parson spider poisonous”), there’s some discussion about whether the Parson spider’s bite is problematic for humans, beyond the rare individual who might be allergic.  The conclusion seems to be that the bite is painful and may produce some temporary inflammation, but it’s not a medical emergency, and the odds are good that you’ll never be bitten by one because spiders would rather flee than fight.  As one author points out, spider bites are very rare occurrences and misinformation is rampant. 

Kate Redmond, The BugLady

Bug of the Week archives:
http://uwm.edu/field-station/category/bug-of-the-week/

Bug o’the Week – Tri-colored Harp Ground Beetle

Bug o’the Week
by Kate Redmond

Tri-colored Harp Ground Beetle

Howdy, BugFans,

What an awesome beetle – thanks to BugFan Dave for sharing it!

There’s not a whole lot of information out there about this species, and there’s some misinformation (more about that in a sec), so let’s sneak up on it, taxonomically.  Tri-colored harp ground beetles are in the Ground beetle family Carabidae, a huge (34,000 species), cosmopolitan (found ‘round the world) family of often metallic or dark and shiny, mostly nocturnal (except for the wonderful, diurnal Tiger beetles and a few others), carnivorous beetles whose eggs, larvae, and adults tend to live under debris or in crevices on/near the ground.  (The BugLady wouldn’t want to diagram that sentence).  Most insects have a one-year life span and spend more than three-quarters of it in the larval, nymphal, or naiad stage, but Ground beetles may live two or three years as adults.

Tri-colored harp ground beetles are in the subfamily Harpalinae, the Harp ground beetles, which, with about 6,400 species worldwide (1,230 in North America) is the largest subfamily of Ground beetles.  Lots of species, lots of variety, and lots of lifestyles, and some species are considered biological controls for nuisance insects.  Like other Ground beetles, Harp ground beetles defend themselves chemically with noxious or odorous secretions from pygidial glands located toward the rear of the abdomen.  According to Wikipedia, the members of another Carabid subfamily, the Anthini, “can mechanically squirt their defensive secretions for considerable distances and are able to aim with a startling degree of accuracy; in Afrikaans, they are known as oogpisters (“eye-pissers).“

Members of the genus Chlaenius are called “Vivid Metallic Ground Beetles” “chlaeri” comes from a Greek word for “cloak” and refers to the pubescence (fine hairs) on the dorsal side of the elytra (wing covers) – the pubescence that may wear off as the beetle moves through its world.   Here are some close relatives: https://bugguide.net/node/view/1516694/bgimage, https://bugguide.net/node/view/2506203/bgimage, https://bugguide.net/node/view/2044112/bgimage, https://bugguide.net/node/view/891445/bgimage. A really, big Chlaenius beetle would approach an inch in length. 

TRI-COLORED HARP GROUND BEETLES (Chlaenius tricolor) aka Yellow and Green Harp Ground Beetles, are divided into two subspecies.  One (Chlaenius tricolor tricolor) is found east of the Rockies from Canada south to Georgia, and the other one (Chlaenius tricolor vigilans) lives west of the Rockies from Canada to Guatemala.  They’re found under leaf litter or logs in damp areas and shores of rivers and bottomlands.  They go through life at a run. 

They’re about a half-inch long, and iridescent, and one source speculated about the need for/use of iridescence in a nocturnal beetle, noting that their bodies reflect moonlight, but drawing no conclusions about it. 

In their “Guess the Pest” feature (the spirit of which the BugLady objects to on principle), the University of Delaware Cooperative Extension calls TCHGBs “a beneficial predator of slugs and caterpillars.” Their diet also includes a variety of insects including Japanese beetles and some corn borers and armyworms. 

The beetles overwinter as adults and breed in spring; females place their eggs in mud cells that they attach to vegetation. 

The BugLady has trust issues – she tries to get her information from sources she knows are reliable, and she rarely looks at the AI summary that tops all her search results.  In the case of the TCHGB,AI presented a long and very generic (but well-organized) collection of information about the Ground beetle family, disguised as a write-up about TCHGBs (along with the tiny disclaimer “AI responses may include mistakes.”).  Another site – “Picture Insect” (“an Entomologist in your pocket”), one that doesn’t pop up often in her searches and that seems to have been AI’s primary source (and that spelled “Tricolored” the British way) – stated that the “Tricoloured harp ground beetle can emit a bright, bioluminescent glow from its abdomen, a rare trait within its family not primarily known for light production.”  Just the kind of tidbit that the BugLady lives for, except that she couldn’t find any other sources to back that up.  She Googled “ground beetle bioluminescence” with no results.

Caveat emptor!  A motto for our times.

Kate Redmond, The BugLady

Bug of the Week archives:
http://uwm.edu/field-station/category/bug-of-the-week/

Bug o’the Week – Carrot Wasp Rerun

Bug o’the Week
by Kate Redmond

Carrot Wasp Rerun

Greetings, BugFans,

It’s the week between Christmas and NewYear’s, and the TV stations that aren’t showing sports and reruns are airing Hallmark Holiday movies.  Here’s a rerun from 2012 – old words, new pictures.

Here’s the “take-home” – when you meet a critter with a name like Gasteruption, you just have to stop what you’re doing and embrace the Gasteruption experience.

First, the name.  Gasteruption is a genus in the family Gasteruptiidae (of course), the Carrot Wasp family– so-called because the adults are usually found eating nectar and pollen on flowers in the carrot family (including Wild Parsnip).  “Gaster” is an anatomical term referring to the wider/inflated, distal segments of a wasp’s abdomen, the puffy part behind the “petiole” or pinched-in “waist” of the wasp.  The BugLady is only guessing about the “uption” part, here; the root word for the second syllable of “interruption” is “rumpere”, from the Latin for “to break.”  Is that a reference to the arched gaster set high up on the wasp’s thorax?  Maybe yes, maybe no.

Second, the experience.  The BugLady was moseying around in her favorite wetland the other day, checking the flower tops, looking for bugs to photograph.  Oh, some Water Parsnip and Joe Pye Weed did hold some insects (mainly bumblebees and ambush bugs), but two particular clumps of Water Parsnip, six feet away from each other, absolutely hummed with Hymenopterans like cuckoo wasps, sweat bees, yellow jackets, and ants – and Carrot Wasps (though their voices must be pretty soft).  The BugLady decided to try for more pictures the next day, and in a 1 ¼ mile hike through likely habitat at two different sites, found them only when she returned to those original plants. 

These are seriously small insects – not super short, but oh-so-thin.  Each of the little bunches of flowers on the Water Parsnip’s umbel is smaller than a 25-cent piece; the Carrot Wasps look like mini sewing needles approaching the plant (they often fly in and land on the side of the umbel and then climb up and over, onto its top).  Their posture in flight reminds the BugLady of someone who has just gone off a ski jump.  

The long, arched abdomen is similar to that of an Ichneumon wasp, but a Carrot Wasp also has a noticeable neck, and the tibias on its back legs are enlarged.  There are 15 species in the genus in North America, five of those in the east, and they look pretty much alike – mostly black with varying orange bands on the gaster.  While the females of some species have ovipositors that are as long as their body, three of our species have a short ovipositor and one of those is southern.  This Carrot Wasp is (probably) either Gasteruption kirbii or G. assectator (which also occurs in Europe).  These are not stingers and they are harmless, and the end of the male’s abdomen is not pointy. 

Male
Female

Carrot Wasps range over the US and into Canada.  Look for them on flower tops in grasslands and gardens (and wetlands, it seems) throughout late spring and summer.  They can also be found casing out the brood cells of solitary wasps and bees that nest in wood (remember – most bees and wasps are solitary, not social). 

Adult Carrot Wasps may be vegetarians, but their young are not.

When she finds a bee/wasp nest, a female Carrot Wasp checks it with her antennae, “feeling” for the activity of a wasp/bee larva within its cell.  Satisfied, she inserts her ovipositor into the cell and lays an egg.  BugFans can find a YouTube video of a female Gasteruption wasp trying to puncture the sealant that one kind of plasterer bee spreads over her nest’s opening. 

Her egg is placed, depending on the Carrot Wasp species, near or on the host’s egg, or on the supply of food provided by the bee for its offspring, or on the wall of the cell.  The wasp larva is an inquiline in the nest – a boarder – and a predatory guest at that.  Some Carrot Wasp larvae eat the food cache that was meant for the original inhabitant; some eat/parasitize the wasp/bee larva, and some do both.  They’ve been recorded in the nests of digger bees, plasterer bees, leaf-cutter bees, mud daubers, and pollen wasps.  Carrot Wasps overwinter as larvae and pupate in spring; not a lot is known about their pupation, but the pupal stage is probably passed within the bee/wasp nest.  Carrot Wasps would have potential as biological control agents except that they also parasitize native pollinators.

Gasteruption!

Wishing you a wonderful New Year.

Kate Redmond, The BugLady

Bug of the Week archives:
http://uwm.edu/field-station/category/bug-of-the-week/

Bug o’the Week – The Twelve Bugs of Christmas

Bug o’the Week
by Kate Redmond

The Twelve Bugs of Christmas

Howdy, BugFans,

It’s that time of year again – time to put our feet up, sip adult beverages by the light of the tree, hum “The Twelve Bugs Days of Christmas,” and dream of spring (the days are getting longer, you know).  Here are a Baker’s Dozen from 2025.

This glorious POLYPHEMUS MOTH CATERPILLAR, in the giant silk moth family Saturniidae (not the same family as the moths that produce silk for textiles), is huge!  How big is it?  https://bugguide.net/node/view/2500815/bgimage.  And it’s going to grow up to be a very large moth https://bugguide.net/node/view/2224393/bgimage.    

AMERICAN RUBYSPOT – One of the lovely River damsels.  Males are beautiful (https://bugguide.net/node/view/991176/bgimage) but this female is pretty spectacular in her own right.  The BugLady wishes she knew how she got that halo effect (probably a random sparkle off the Milwaukee River beyond) – she d employ it in more pictures.

AMBUSH BUG – Seasoned BugFans can attest to the BugLady’s fascination with Ambush bugs, which lay in wait on flowers until lunch arrives.  When she took this shot, the Ambush bug reminded her of another fascinating insect, the Orchid Mantis https://www.sciencefriday.com/articles/unraveling-the-orchid-mantis-mystery/  (for a deeper Orchid Mantis dive, see https://www.pbs.org/video/orchid-mantis-looks-that-kill-p9mkih/.

DOGBANE LEAF BEETLES are spectacular green beetles (https://bugguide.net/node/view/6438/bgimage) – except when they aren’t.  The beetle’s color and incandescence are the result of the play of light on exceedingly small, tilted plates that overlay its pigment layer. As you walk around it, the light bouncing off both the pigment and the plates causes the colors to change with your angle (and sometimes bring up Christmas colors).  Life is Physics.  Check the bugguide.net image gallery for more https://bugguide.net/node/view/461/bgimage. 

OBLONG-WINGED KATYDID – A splendid katydid, splendidly in tune with its surroundings!

BEE FLY – This Bee fly deposits her eggs in the egg tunnels of solitary wasps that live in sandy/bare areas, though “deposit” doesn’t quite describe the process.  She hovers above the tunnel of a wasp like this one https://bugguide.net/node/view/1455229/bgimage and lobs an egg down into the opening.  But – there’s a secret sauce.  She dips her rear end into the sand in order to take up some sand grains, which she will store in a special receptacle.  As an egg emerges, it gets a gritty coating that may help camouflage it and may also make it heavier so that her” throw” will be more accurate.

BUMBLE BEE – the BugLady has pictures of a number of insects nectaring on the spiny center of Purple coneflower (Echinacea sp.), and it always looks like an iffy proposition.  The name “Echinacea” comes from the Greek word for hedgehog.

CRAB SPIDER – Crab spiders like orchids (this one is on a Small Yellow Lady’s Slipper)!  They don’t spin trap webs, and orchids give them a nice platform on which to wait for pollinators (though some might have a long wait because not all orchids are pollinated by insects).  The BugLady has a color slide of a Bog candle orchid with a white crab spider fitting neatly onto a horizontal flower.  Just as there is an orchid-mimic mantis, there’s an Orchid mimic crab spider https://www.notesfromtheroad.com/roam/flower-crab-spider.html.

TUFTED BIRD LIME/BIRD-DROPPING MOTHS look marbled to the BugLady.  Jim Sogarrd, author of Moths and Caterpillars of the North Woods, tell a story about attempting to collect a bird-dropping moth from the side of a building, only to discover that it actually was a bird dropping.

ROBBER FLY – Robber flies are carnivorous flies that come in quite a variety of sizes and shapes (https://wisconsinbutterflies.org/robberfly).  Larger species, like this green-eyed beauty https://bugguide.net/node/view/319451/bgimage, can gather bees, butterflies, grasshoppers, dragonflies, and even cicadas for lunch.  Others are great bumble bee mimics https://bugguide.net/node/view/2119764/bgimage, and still others, like this small  fly sitting on a daisy fleabane, capture mosquitoes and gnats.

HACKBERRY EMPEROR BUTTERFLIES – Some kinds of caterpillars feed on a variety of plants, but Hackberry Emperor caterpillars eat only one thing and so can live only where Hackberry trees grow – no hackberry; no Emperor https://bugguide.net/node/view/2116852/bgimage.  This one was posing under the roof overhang of the Barn, at Riveredge.  Adults rarely feed on flowers, preferring tree sap, rotting fruit, carrion, and dung, and they collect minerals from damp/muddy soil with their proboscis their top side is handsome, too) https://bugguide.net/node/view/1450763/bgimage.  They’re not pollinators – when they do visit flowers, they don’t touch down with their feet, and they avoid putting their antennae on the flower, only extending their proboscis into the flower. and so not picking up or spreading pollen.  

JUMPING SPIDER – even people who don’t like spiders like Jumping spiders, and some keep them as pets (this one looks like the Bold jumper, Phidippus audax).

BLUE DASHER – When the BugLady was a kid, Angie the Christmas Tree Angel (those BugFans who are old enough can hum a few bars here) used to smile benignly from the top of the tree.  That was before the BugLady knew about dragonflies.  This guy makes an excellent substitute for Angie or for the Partridge in the Pear Tree.

May your days be merry and bright,eber, they are “active hunters at night. They sometimes run with groups of carpenter ants (Camponotus species)………”  They spin their tube-shaped retreats where ants can be found. 

Kate Redmond, The BugLady

Bug of the Week archives:
http://uwm.edu/field-station/category/bug-of-the-week/

Bug o’the Week – Redspotted Antmimic Spider

Bug o’the Week
by Kate Redmond

Redspotted Antmimic Spider

Howdy, BugFans,

In mid-summer, BugFan Dave shared these dynamite pictures of a pretty spiffy little spider that the BugLady has never seen – the (unhyphenated) Redspotted antmimic spider (Castianeira descripta).  Thanks, Dave!

Antmimic spiders used to be in the “catchall” Sac spider family Clubionidae, but now they’re found in the family Corinnidae, the Corinnid sac spiders.  Antmimic spiders don’t spin trap webs – they pursue their prey on foot – but they do use silk to encase their eggs and to spin retreats in sheltered places.  They tend to be drab, fast-moving spiders.

REDSPOTTED ANTMIMICS can be found in forests, grasslands, and suburbs, on the ground, on sandy shores, and on low vegetation, and under logs and leaf litter, (and sometimes in buildings) across our northern regions and in an odd, checkerboard distribution south of Canada Species Castianeira descripta – Redspotted Antmimic – BugGuide.Net.  Considering their size and their habitat preferences, they’re probably found in a bunch of the in-between spaces, too. 

They are sexually dimorphic – males are about ¼” long, and females are a tad larger, and females tend to have more variable patterns of red Casianeira descripta – Castianeira descripta – BugGuide.Net.  Southern and western individuals have larger red patches Leaf litter inhabitant – Castianeira descripta – BugGuide.Net.

The ant-mimic thing may be a “twofer.”  Because they look (and behave) like ants, some predators may give them a pass – ants, armed with jaws at one end and a stinger at the other end that may be fortified with formic acid), are not predator-friendly.  In addition, the disguise may allow them to get closer to their prey (aggressive mimicry).  According to the “Spiderzrule” website, “These spiders walk about slowly the way ants do and then only move fast when disturbed. Castianeira descripta, the red spotted ant mimic spider only walks with six legs, like an ant. As they walk, their front two legs are raised in the air and quiver quickly up and down like antennae. They also quiver them briefly after they stop walking. They do this to emulate ant antennae and spiders that imitate ant antennae frequently have conspicuous front legs.”  In addition, the pale/translucent front legs may mimic wasp wings.

Members of the genus Castianeira appear to be mimics of larger species of ants like carpenter ants Camponotus? – Camponotus – BugGuide.Net and velvet ants, which are actually a kind of flightless, female wasp Pseudomethoca simillima? (2) – Pseudomethoca simillima – BugGuide.Net.  In Spiders of the North Woods, Larry Weber writes that antmimics “often occupy the habitat of their mimic model.”

Though they don’t make trap webs, females tend to be relative homebodies, and wandering males must seek them out.  Females use saliva to attach disc-like egg sacs to rocks or debris, and the spiderlings hatch in spring.  One source said that the female protects the egg sac. 

Besides ants, Redspotted antmimics eat tiny invertebrates like mites and aphids that they find on or near the ground.  According to Weber, they are “active hunters at night. They sometimes run with groups of carpenter ants (Camponotus species)………”  They spin their tube-shaped retreats where ants can be found. 

Kate Redmond, The BugLady

Bug of the Week archives:
http://uwm.edu/field-station/category/bug-of-the-week/

Bug o’the Week – Goldenrod Watch redux

Bug o’the Week
by Kate Redmond

Goldenrod Watch redux

Howdy, BugFans,

It’s the start of December – and of meteorological winter – and it’s cold out, and the BugLady is still wondering what, exactly, happened to August.  Here’s a little slice of August, from 15 years ago.

The BugLady’s advice for the day is: Find yourselves a big clump of goldenrod and start looking.  Bring your camera.  Bring a lawn chair.  Bring Eaton & Kaufman’s Field Guide to Insects of North America and The Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Insects and Spiders by Lorus and Marjory Milne so you can find out what you’re looking at.  Bring Donald W. Stokes’ excellent A Guide to Observing Insect Lives so you can find out what they’re doing there.  You have time – one inscrutable species of goldenrod follows the next, from mid-August through the end of September (botanist Asa Gray once said that the 12 pages devoted to goldenrod taxonomy were the most boring in his book).  Each critter has its own story, and it is in understanding the small stories that we start to get a handle on the big picture.

The BugLady enjoys the challenge of photographing these jumpy beauties – standing out in the field on a hot, breezy day, sweat trickling down her back, hoping for that Worried about pain?  The BugLady has been photographing insects for 35 years, and she really, really gets in bugs’ faces, but she has never been bitten or stung in the process (well, except for some peripheral ants, but ants have been lying in wait for the BugLady all of her life). 

Worried about allergies? The pollen of goldenrod is large and is not spread through the air, but its showy flowers take the rap for the very airborne pollen produced by inconspicuous, green ragweed flowers.

What will you see? 

HONEYBEES who, if they start the day on a yellow flower, continue to visit yellow flowers (a phenomenon called flower constancy); 

Worker BUMBLE BEES who can “buzz pollinate” some flowers – set up a vibration that loosens the pollen so they can collect it and carry it to an underground nest to nourish their queen and siblings – with no inkling that when goldenrods bloom, bumblebee days are almost over; 

PENNSYLVANIA LEATHERWING (Soldier) beetles, seldom alone, who visit the flower tops to feed and frolic (count the antennae) and who discourage predators with poisonous chemicals that drip from the bases of their legs;

SOLITARY WASPS catching a light snack of pollen or nectar for themselves while hoping to catch a fellow arthropod to provision their offspring’s egg chamber;

BUTTERFLIES, the most graceful among us, who surround us with magic;

LADYBIRD BEETLES grazing on herds of aphids;

AMBUSH BUG – Insects that are sitting way too still, who may still be in the clutches of a well-camouflaged predator like the ambush bug (here with a Syrphid fly), who grabs and immobilizes them, injects a meat tenderizer, slurps out their innards, and discards the empties;

MOTHS – small, amorous, plain and fancy;

SPIDERS, who catch their prey using tools (an orb-weaver’s web) or ambush (jumping spiders);

BLISTER BEETLES, whose velvety, black coat contains an itch-and-lump-producing chemical that will bug you for a week.  Like the Pennsylvania, they are August specialties;

SYRPHID (HOVER, FLOWER) FLIES that come in sizes so small that their flight doesn’t even rustle the pollen grains;

GRASSHOPPERS AND KATYDIDS, who see us coming and launch themselves into the air with a thrust of legs and wings;

TACHINID FLIES, they of the bristly butts, who lay their eggs on flowers so that their young can climb aboard an unwary insect and eat it from the inside, out.

TIPHIID WASPS, whose larvae prey on soil-dwelling larvae of some scarab beetles like June beetles.  The female doesn’t bring food to her egg; she brings her egg to food.  When the female wasp locates a grub in the ground), she lays an egg on/near it

They’re all there, and more.  Pollinators and predators.  The drama of life and death playing out hundreds of times against the buttery backdrop of goldenrod, whose Ojibwe name means “sun medicine.” 

Carpe diem,

Kate Redmond, The BugLady

Bug of the Week archives:
http://uwm.edu/field-station/category/bug-of-the-week/

Bug o’the Week – The Pennants Redux

Bug o’the Week
by Kate Redmond

The Pennants Redux

Howdy, BugFans,

Here’s a rerun from 2010, with a few new words and pictures.

The BugLady would like to state up front that this episode is about “pennants” (as in “small flags”), not about “penance,” which is between BugFans and their deities.

After the awesome Slaty Skimmer, some of the BugLady’s (many) favorite dragonflies are the Calico and the Halloween Pennants.  The Pennants are the stuff that tattoos are made of (someday).  The internet agrees; it’s light on Pennant information and heavy on Pennant pictures, but they are eye candy!

The BugLady enjoys the challenge of photographing these jumpy beauties – standing out in the field on a hot, breezy day, sweat trickling down her back, hoping for that moment of calm as the Pennants wave back and forth on the grass tops (the reason for the “pennant” part of their name is that they resemble tiny flags streaming off the weeds).  Good times.  In Dragonflies and Damselflies of the East, Dennis Paulson writes that, “their disproportionately long hind legs are “probably an adaptation for keeping the abdomen horizontal while tip-perching.”   

Pennants are smallish dragonflies in the genus Celithemis, in the Skimmer family (Libellulidae) and there are just eight species in the genus.  Most members of the genus are southeastern, but the ranges of the Calico and the Halloween Pennants take them into the Great Plains.  The Halloween and the Calico have spots in their wings and reddish eyes.  The Halloween’s wings are tinted an orange-ish-yellow; the un-tinted wings of the Calico have fewer spots, but males have a spot at the base of each hind wing.  Both are found near water for egg-laying but may stray far from water to forage. 

When naturalists explain the differences between dragonflies and damselflies, we tell people that damselflies can fold their wings over their bodies or hold them in a backwards-pointing “V” along their sides (the Spreadwings, genus Lestes), but dragonflies must hold their wings straight out to the side.  The Pennants didn’t get the memo – perched, they often hold their front wings at a different angle than their hind wings, with their wings in several planes. 

They are found near/lay their eggs in slow-moving to still waters https://bugguide.net/node/view/1261348/bgimage.  Several sources said that the young/naiads https://bugguide.net/node/view/227987/bgimage of these Pennants are not very competitive, and as such they are more successful in newer waters (borrow pits, ditches, etc.) than in waters with lots of established predators.  The naiads are great vegetation climbers and not-so-great swimmers.

Insects are cold-blooded, their internal temperature similar to the temperature of the air or water that surrounds them, and they appreciate a jump-start from the sun to get the juices flowing.  But, cold-blooded or not, too much sun is too much sun.  It is thought that the Pennants’ wing spots cast some much-needed shade on the thorax of this open-country percher.  An alternate suggestion for the spots at the base of the Calico’s hind wings is that the dark color absorbs heat and warms the insect’s thorax (and, by extension, its wing muscles).  Several sources mentioned that the thorax of the pennants is “reduced” without elaborating on what that means for the dragonfly.  Is there a connection between a smaller thorax and the need to heat it?  Don’t know. Do they have reduced wing muscles?  Unlikely, when you consider their activities. 

To minimize the amount of sun that hits their body, some kinds of dragonflies (about 10% of species, including the Calico and especially the Halloween Pennants) perch in a “tail-up” posture called the “obelisk position” (https://bugguide.net/node/view/1704521/bgimage).  They will rotate their body to maintain the correct angle as the sun moves.  But, a dragonfly with its abdomen raised may also be assuming a threat position, or if the sun is waning, may be trying for more sun exposure. 

Dragonflies are unapologetic carnivores as aquatic naiads (catching with their extendable mandibles anything in the water that is smaller than they are), and as adults (catching with their spiny legs anything airborne that is smaller than they are).

CALICO PENNANTS (Celithemis elisa) are called “Elisa Skimmers” in some books.  They are small dragonflies (less than 1 ¼” long), locally common in shallow water and slow streams with emergent plants east of the Great Plains.  Females and juveniles are decorated with a yellow face, yellow stigmas (the solid, pigmented spot toward the tip of the wing), and yellow, heart-shaped spots along the top of the abdomen.  Where the female is yellow, the male is red.  Male Calicos also have the afore-mentioned dark patch on the hind wing, near the body, like a saddlebags dragonfly.

Male Calicos are not particularly territorial, though they will chase intruding males.  They may patrol a pond, flying a few feet above its surface, or they may search for a mate by perching on vegetation near the water, facing away from the pond in order to spot females as they fly in.  After she mates, the female lays eggs for a few minutes in the shallow water of a pond’s edge, flying in tandem with the male.  He departs and she continues to lay eggs solo, tapping her abdomen on the water’s surface, breaking through the surface film so the eggs can be washed off of the tip of her abdomen.  She may deposit as many as 800 eggs.

HALLOWEEN PENNANTS (Celithemis eponina) are also called the “Brown-spotted yellow-wings” (though the BugLady has no idea why anyone would hang that prosaic name on this creature!).  They were named “Halloween” for their orange-tinted, black-patterned wings, and they are considered the most colorful pennant.  Like the Calicos, female Halloween Pennants sport a yellowish face, elongated yellow “hearts” along the top of the abdomen, and yellow stigmas, and males are more intensely colored.  Many sources refer to them as “butterfly-like” because of their bouncy flight and colorful wings.  They are slightly larger than the Calico. 

Much of their business is conducted in the morning.  Mating generally occurs well before lunch, and the mating pair may ascend to 50’ in the air before getting down to tandem egg-laying in open water.  Males are not territorial.  The BugLady has seen Halloween Pennants over the water but not Calico Pennants (yet).  

Halloween Pennants seem more unconcerned about weather than other dragonflies are.  They are more likely to “obeslik;” they fly and lay eggs on windier and cooler days than other dragonflies; and they are out and about even in a light rain, shaking the water from their wings as they hunt. 

Check out a field near you next summer! 

Kate Redmond, The BugLady

Bug of the Week archives:
http://uwm.edu/field-station/category/bug-of-the-week/

Bug o’the Week – Dewdrop Spider

Bug o’the Week
by Kate Redmond

Dewdrop Spider

Greetings, BugFans,

In honor of Halloween, we’re ending the month with a spider.  A very cool little spider with a big story.

The Dewdrop spider Argyrodes elevatus (Argyrodes means “silver-like), in the Cobweb/Comb-footed/Tangle-web spider family Theridiidae, doesn’t live around here, though other genera of Dewdrop spiders do, like https://bugguide.net/node/view/940747/bgimage and the awesome lizard spider https://bugguide.net/node/view/664010/bgimage.  Theridiids are found in North America, indoors and out, in an almost infinite variety of habitats, from border to border and from sea to shining sea (and around the world).  Thanks, as always, to BugFan Tom for sharing his pictures.

Argyrodes spiders are also called Robber spiders (more about that in a sec), and there are three genus members in the US, and more elsewhere.  Argyrodes elevates is found in California and in much of a swath of Southern/mid-Southern states from Texas to Ohio to Delaware, the Carolinas, and Florida.  Their silvery abdomens give them their “dewdrop” name, and they’re seriously small – females are a shade smaller than ¼ inch, and males are smaller still.

Dewdrop spiders are inquilines – animals that exploit the living space of other animals (sometimes passively and sometimes impactfully).  These tiny spiders can and do spin their own silk, but they prefer to live at the outskirts of larger spiders’ webs.  A host’s web may contain a lot of them – so small that she may not even notice them.  For scale, here’s one in a web with another spider and a partly-wrapped, inch-long green June beetle https://bugguide.net/node/view/316493/bgimage.   

When a male goes a’courtin,’ possibly attracted by a female’s pheromones, he arrives bearing a gift – prey wrapped in silk – and he doesn’t approach closely until she has accepted it.  Giving nuptial gifts is uncommon in spiders.  He also vibrates the web to identify himself, spider love being a chancy thing.  A day after she mates (an act that, contrary to the brief encounters of other spiders, may take two to eight hours, during which she’ll eat his gift), the female will tuck one or two egg sacs onto threads at the periphery of her host’s web.  Although she continues to live on the web, her egg sacs are on their own. 

The big story about Dewdrop spiders is how they get their food.  They’re “kleptoparasites” (triple word score) – animals that rob food from other animals.  They eat wrapped prey that the host spider has stored in the web (and they can tackle wrapped prey that’s quite a bit larger than they are if the host spider has already injected tenderizing enzymes), freshly caught prey that the host hasn’t detected yet, the host spider’s egg sacs, the host’s protein-rich silk web (especially when prey is scarce), and sometimes, the host spider herself, if there are a large number of “guests” to gang up on her (Tom has observed Dewdrop spiders feeding on Gastracantha spiders https://bugguide.net/node/view/129627 in his yard).  Theridiids aren’t the only spider family that has food robbers, but they are the family with the most kleptoparasitic species.  

They stay hidden, and they may alter parts of their host’s web so they can remove prey without causing the telltale vibrations that might alert the bigger spider.  They’re very good at it – one study assigned them a 67% success rate – and they can liberate a bit of their host’s food in as little as 12 seconds.

To support their lifestyle, Dewdrop spidershave developed some interesting behaviors.  Here are some highlights from a paper called “Notes on the behavior of the kleptoparasitic  spider Argyrodes Elevatus (Yheridiidae, Araneae)” by Marco Cesar Silveira and Hilton F. Japyassú (https://pepsic.bvsalud.org/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S1517-28052012000100007).

  • A Dewdrop spider will take advantage when the host’s attention is diverted, grabbing a wrapped insect while she’s busy subduing a new prey item.
  • Sometimes, briefly, a Dewdrop spider and its host may share a meal, until the host chases it away.  If the host is distracted, the Dewdrop spider will make off with the partially-eaten prey. 
  • A Dewdrop spider alters the host’s web by replacing parts of the original web with finer threads so that the host can’t detect its vibrations, but it can detect the host’s movements.  It also minimizes the signals it sends by moving very slowly.
  • During a heist, the Dewdrop spider spins silk that secures the prey to itself, cuts the bits of the host’s web that are attached to the prey, and then escapes to the edge of the web along a dragline that it laid down.
  • Host spiders may catch on and search for missing prey – and may chase the thief.  The Dewdrop spider uses a dragline to get away. 
  • When the host spider is active, the Dewdrop spider stays still, and vice versa.  If the host spider is diurnal, the Dewdrop spider becomes nocturnal.
  • When a Dewdrop spider returns to the edge of the web after a successful raid, it will spin a mini “web within the web,” attaching the prey preparatory to eating it.  Before it digs in, it tests the waters by shaking the web to make sure the larger spider can’t detect it. 
  • In his bugeric blog, entomologist Eric Eaton writes that a study of Nephila spiders showed that host spiders don’t gain as much weight as those whose webs have no Dewdrop spiders, and that they relocate their webs more frequently.

Ain’t Nature Grand!

No BOTW next week – the BugLady is taking time off to get yet another body part replaced. 

Kate Redmond, The BugLady

Bug of the Week archives:
http://uwm.edu/field-station/category/bug-of-the-week/

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