she’s so cute, i can’t imagine how adorable the little babies will be!
I managed to get a lot of lifers this week, so picking between them was difficult. However I think my favorite was this Neoerysiphe galeopsidis , a powdery mildew that I found growing on Lamium purpureum.
I found this in the woods and didn’t know what it is. It appears to be an umbrella tree, which is a species of magnolia I didn’t know exists.
I observed my first polygon, mullein, and geranium at Hickory Nut Gap Farm, one of the farms where I buy pasture-raised chicken, during the IDB project. (The type genus Polygonum is stressed on “ly”; the geometric figure polygōnum is stressed on “go”. The second parts of the words are different.)
My first Perilampid wasp. Weird little hyperparasitoid. https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/369222135
Isn’t it, well… weird, how the meaning of the word ‘weird’ changes so subjectively to nature observers, over time?
As for non-observers, almost any arthropod outside of a couple dozen species or so, seems to earn that label so freely.
Curiosity question: is your phone a waterproof model, or do you use any kind of special case?
My first thought: What a great photo!
My second thought: That really does look weird, like a science fiction artist’s impression of an alien wasp.
My third thought: What’s a hyperparasitoid? So I went to Wikipedia for an answer.
A hyperparasite, also known as a metaparasite, is a parasite whose host is itself a parasite, often specifically a parasitoid.
Yep, weird.
I think what struck me as weird when I looked up the life cycle is that the newly hatched larvae are free living and crawl around looking for an insect that is infected by another parasite and then crawls inside and attacks the parasite. Seemed unnecessarily complicated :D
This reminds me of a poem, which many of you know, but I will share it here for our younger viewers:
Great fleas have little fleas upon their backs to bite 'em,
And little fleas have lesser fleas, and so ad infinitum.
And the great fleas themselves, in turn, have greater fleas to go on;
While these again have greater still, and greater still, and so on.
From Augustus De Morgan, 1872. The poem was released after his death in 1871. De Morgan was actually doing a “cover song” (a remake in his own style) of Jonathan Swift’s poem from 1733 (almost 140 years earlier!):
So, naturalists observe, a flea
Hath smaller fleas that on him prey;
And these have smaller still to bite 'em,
And so proceed ad infinitum.
I found a black-and-gold flat millipede with my best friend today!! I was so happy because I’ve always wanted to see one. It was the highlight of a rather unpleasant iNatting experience. I fell into a muddy body of water up to my waist, so I was covered in mud and decaying plant matter and bacteria. Then, my friend pulled me out and the only way out was to go straight through a bunch of spiky dead reeds and thorny plants. I have cuts on my arms and legs. Then, we walked through some spider webs and had to walk over a bunch of fallen trees. Then, I got three mosquito bites on my legs. I also pulled a muscle in my foot and had to limp all the way back home, still covered in mud and bites. It was not fun in the moment, but a funny memory looking back, one that we will both remember.
Yes! I’m sorry, but I laughed a little bit when I read your account. It sounds truly miserable, but makes a great story and will be a funny memory over time, as you said. And also, that millipede is gorgeous!
Haha yeah we had many laughs over it on the way home, no need to be sorry
I never heard this poem before, but it’s so cool! Thanks for sharing to those of us who haven’t heard it
I first saw one of these on a local trail a few years ago. But there was no digging or anything. It was just boldly sitting there, still, on a boulder. And then… I noticed more. Like at least twenty or so. And all in this same area, and all on a rock, or a tree trunk and all – dead!
There’s a few fungi (in my area, it’s Arthrophaga myriapodina) that infect these guys and it can hit massively, and quickly. Over the next few weeks I discovered hundreds of more corpses. The slugs and other scavengers were having a field day. It made me wonder about the protection these millipedes have of secreting cyanide-laden fluids (I think I would not risk handling these live with bare hands).
I eventually did find a handful of survivors. But it truly was a ‘killing field’ in one little area, maybe 50 meters in diameter.
Here’s a shot from my observation (https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/246834861) that I entered for the fungus. An indication of the scale of the die-off.
It’s one observation I don’t think I’ll ever forget.
:O that is actually crazy, wow… yeah I actually didn’t know about their cyanide protection until after I saw it but thankfully I didn’t touch it.
They are really cool looking though and I like their yellow legs