I had a lot of help with identifying my observation (the CID is up to Family Erythraeidae) after I posted it, so I’ve just returned the favor for you. I also added some links as comments in my observation that might be interesting. One was to an observation in France (the only other one I found where the host was a beetle) and the other was to a figure from a scientific paper published in Brazil.
You didn’t happen to save one of those mites, did you? (I see one came loose from the host in your second photo.) There might be entomologists interested in examining that if you did!
The beetle in my observation crawled up and down my arm for a while after I picked it up, then got tired of the photography and flew away.
Looking under small strips of tree bark that fell yielded a fun surprise last year - Sminthurinus quadrimaculatus - Was also the first springtail that I had observed.
No, since sampling is prohibited here, I limit my nature collecting to occasionally picking a few wildflowers from my own garden to fill tiny jars, these for my daughter-in-law who delights in whimsy. I just measured it at 1 mm (so tiny!) and then continued on with my day.
I saw your comment and ID, thank you so much. I will apply myself to that observation anew and see what else I can discover perhaps in local resources.
edit to add: @Clip, can you post or message me a link to this obsv? Or @ me on iNat. (The Eastern Boxelder Bugs with mites) Thank you!
One it shows more teeny reddish mites and so I want to see how closely related they are to the ones we (@larry216 and I) have observed) if we make progress.
Two they reminded me a lot of the Oncopeltus nymphs I have seen but since you referred to them by their casual name in English, I didn’t know if that was a fair impression / how closely related they might be to those. When I see something new, I often look at taxonomy tree to try to place it and see how closely I have observed something similar, if that makes sense, so my initial impression was Oh! I bet this is most closely related to Oncopeltus! And I wanted to see if I was right. Womp-womp, I was not, which is often the case, because I am still learning. The closest I have observed is Jadera genus, which is same subfamily. I think I was thrown off by the nymph aspect.
I was photographing a spider in its web when I noticed a butterfly had laid eggs on one strand (on the right of the web photo). Looking closer, I found a tiny parasitoid wasp laying her eggs on the butterfly eggs.
“diving” is maybe not the right description. I’m snorkelling, rather floating with as little movement as possible. Without flippers of course. The first one looked like a little string of bright blue plastic, but once I knew about it I was actively looking for those “strings”. Taking a photo yet is another matter. It only works when there are absolutely no waves or surf. Steady myself with the left hand - so the finger was close anyway and take a photo with the right, prop the camera onto the rock. But my little Olympus Tough does quite a good job.
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/366797346
Here’s another bitty delicate mushroom growing at the foot of a tuliptree. I felt so bad when I knocked it over although I know the fungus will just grow another one.
