I got a Lapland Longspur yesterday, which was a fun surprise as well as a rare fall migrant in western Washington!
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I finally got my first Five-lined Skink. I had known they could be found in certain areas in my county, but I had never been fortunate enough to happen upon one. I explored the local fish hatchery today, and the manager there said they are EVERYWHERE. He took me to a spot and we found one within a couple minutes.
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Today is going to be a good day. I found a Ross’s Goose
Waterloo, ON
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Loving this pic I just took of a Grass Spider (Agelenopsis) I helped move from my arachnophobic besties ceiling! It came out really nice considering some of my pictures lol!
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An unassuming bump on a log is actually a slime mold!
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We met under rather sad circumstances, but today was the first time I saw a scolopendra in the wild. They’re such adorable little critters, with their pretty wriggly antennae and gentle scurry feetsies TwT
I hope I’ll get to hold a healthy little lady one day. So precious QwQ
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Difficult to choose one this week, but there are two highlights that are interrelated in a rather remarkable way. Last weekend I went on an excursion with a couple of other local iNatters to a former military training area that is now a nature protection area. They wanted to look for a rare spider (Eresus kollari); adult males are quite attractive and have a conspicuously red abdomen, which theoretically should make it easier to spot them when they go out wandering in late summer in search of nests of females.
There is a lot of heather at the site, so I also hoped that maybe it would not be too late to find heather cellophane bees (Colletes succinctus), which I have been searching for unsuccessfully at a couple of sites in town.
My companions had planned a route based on the locations of past finds of the spider on iNat. We ended up spending a good two hours on the first 500 meters or so and then rushed a bit through the rest in order to make sure we got the last train back home. It was cloudy when we started out and while the heather was in full bloom, they weren’t abuzz with many insect visitors, so I had resigned myself to probably not finding my heather bees until I noticed someone landing on a bit of exposed soil. I only caught a glimpse but it was enough to tell it had to be her. So I positioned myself by a group of promising-looking heather and waited patiently – and sure enough, within a couple of minutes my bee showed up. We found a number of other interesting species during the rest of our outing, several of which were new to me, but we had no luck spotting the spider.
Today, feeling optimistic after having found heather bees once, I decided to revisit the local site that I have been checking one more time to see if they might be present. Once again, no bees to be found, and I was nearly ready to leave when I looked down and saw someone bright red trundling around at the edge of the footpath. After a moment of confusion trying to place it – experience would lead me to expect a ladybeetle or a firebug, but it clearly wasn’t either – and then I realized what I was looking at: yep, the spider we had taken a one-and-a-half hour train ride last week in hopes of finding, was right here running around practically at my doorstep.
Moral of the story: apparently the best way to find something is not to look for it.
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I’ve been birding seriously for about 11 years. This week I saw my first Whimbrel, although they pass through this territory twice every year. It searched for grubs for a week, happily, on the cricket field, even through cricket matches.
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Did the whimbrel find any crickets in the cricket field?
I found this arrowhead orbweaver at my old house. I’ve observed other orbweavers before (my first-submitted ob was an orbweaver in my bedroom), but this one is unusual in that she stands head-up in her web.
I don’t know what this is, but I’m pretty sure I haven’t seen one before.
It’s a complete set of wings of some tetrapterous insect. Two of them look like a bee fly I’ve observed, but bee flies don’t have four full-sized wings.
Here’s my first crow, though I’ve heard jays before.
This umbellifer hasn’t been identified to species yet, but I’m pretty sure it’s my first observation of the species. The other umbellifer is much smaller and looks like a wild carrot; this one looks like fennel.
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Tiger moth, although I couldn’t say what species.
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I was at a mothing-event on Friday at a wetland nature reserve, where I’ve never been before - so quite a few lifers.
Maybe my favourite lifer is Grammodes bifasciata.
The rarest is Labdia semicoccinea, which is originally from India, Japan, etc. and has been cited from Spain for the first time in 2021 from that same nature reserve.
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This Imperial Moth caterpillar brought me so much joy–it was ginormous, big enough to leave footprints, and so plump that it kept randomly falling over. I’m sure it’s on its way to becoming a moth by now!
This Swainson’s Hawk was totally unexpected – I lived in Minnesota for 12 years and never saw one, because they are so scarce, but they can show up during migration, and that’s what this one did, just showed up right when I was coming out from under the trees.
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I looked up the adult form of the woolly bear, which I have observed before, and it’s different, so it still stands as a lifer.
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Perhaps virgin tiger moth?
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I saw my first Steller Sea Lion a few days ago and it was so big I thought it was a whale of some sort at first!
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I went down to Disneyland this past weekend and on Saturday at the Rivers of America by Hungry Bear BBQ I got a shot of a Mexican amberwing. I had seen this species at Disneyland before but never got a shot so this was an iNat lifer. Mexican amberwing
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I saw one swimming around in Kachemak Bay this spring that I mistook as a whale at first. They are a lot bigger than they look when you see them out basking on rocks from a tour boat!
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Well not this week but just today, observed the first inaturalist observation of Striped Wintergreen, Mealy Pixie Cup, Silverrod, Small Pussytoes, Bleeding Fairy Helmet, Blue Mistflower, Wavy Leafed Moss, Turban Cap Lichen, Indian Tobacco, Speckled Sharpshooter, Ebony Spleenwort in Greene County, PA.
This week though, my favorite new observation was probably a whole wet cliff full of Seal Salamanders at New River Gorge National Park this past Sunday.
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