Here I am again. It is Tuesday July 12th, and I managed to find another lifer moth this afternoon in Central Park. That brings my moth species total for New York County (Manhattan and surrounding small islands) up to 100! So I am thrilled!
It is the Hollow-spotted Blepharomastic Moth – a big ugly name for a small pretty moth.
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/143484-Blepharomastix-ranalis
I’d guess because it has relatively small native area, and it is a rare species.
A couple days ago while visiting the beach, I saw sea urchins in person for the first time! Just seeing my first one (the one I ended up taking a photo of for my observation) was exciting, but it was even cooler finding dozens more on the beach later when I continued walking. Wish I took more photos of them now!
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/125853416
There were a lot of sea star finds too which was also new to me. I didn’t even expect to find one, so three was really cool.
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/125856893
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/125856902
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/125856922
Found a cute weevil Conorhynchus nigrivittis which has only 5 total observations (including this one) in the entire world! And mine is the first in the country. In the middle of a capital city!
There’s also this amazing Sium latifolium, a riverside plant in the Apiaceae (carrot) family. The leaves and roots are poisonous!
Nice one!!
How rare?
Pretty rare and numbers are going down as they don’t have enough host trees.
What are its host trees 
?
Old Acer tegmentosum forests and other old Acer.
Oooh. Hopefully you get to see one, they are absolutely gorgeous.
Moths from the last week:
Satin Lutestring, White-foot Bell, Meadow Longhorn, Scarce Water-veneer, Purple-bordered Gold, Yellow-barred Longhorn, Thistle Ermine, Thatch Pearl, Bud Moth.
Nice moths!
Yes, very nice!
Hey Marina, you might like to see the plume moth I found today:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/126375096
Only the second species of Plume Moth I have found since I started on iNat.
Susan
So lately I have been thinking back, remembering the way I could experience so much of nature as a kid, without even leaving my yard. I have been wanting to recapture that. Well, I didn’t stay in my backyard, but I did go for a short walk in town, on a familiar route where I have walked many times before, determined to find something new there. I made a point of stopping to look closely at each tree, instead of just noting its presence. By stopping to look at the Coastal Live Oaks, I noticed for the first time small tufts of dead branchlets, which my internest research suggests were the work of a Buprestid beetle, the Oak Twig Girdler (Agrilus angelicus). I was not able verify this or photograph them, but I have in mind to go back for another look.
Further on, I actually found three lifers, all of them tree parasites on the common tree species that I see every day. I would say that my favorite is Peach Leaf Curl. I had of course read about this fungus before; but to have found and identified it on my own, and to know for the first time what it really looks like was a real treat.
I saw it! We have lots of plume moths, of course mainly Pterophorus pentadactyla, but sometimes different species too!
This week is harder to report on because I focus on insects and there’s just too many. For some “new” species I have near or more than 10 observations already, and some aren’t even register as new for me. I stick to “first for Leningrad Oblast” or particularly beautiful ones.
So, new for region and me: The Gothic, Buff Cosmet, Scarce Brindle, Celypha siderana, Ash-coloured Crest, Nut Bud Moth, Apple Blossom Tineid which is not tineid, Gelechia jakovlevi, Hedya dimidiana, White-backed Marble, Blackneck, Scallop Shell Moth, Bright-line Brown-eye, Ecliptopera capitata, Chequered Pearl, non-moths: Tipula fulvipennis, Leptocerus tineiformis, Phylidorea fulvonervosa.
Then ones I liked, first is a moth I saw at age 12 maybe and never since, saw it two times this week: European Currant Moth, the most beautiful species I’ve seen this year: Eulithis pyropata, and huge robberfly Laphria gibbosa.
My friend David saw this one yesterday on the west side of Central Park after he and I had finished iNatting on the east side of the park:
It looks really close to one in my wishlist! https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/470566-Cnaemidophorus-rhododactyla
Yeah! A nice one!
