What is your Favorite Lifer from this week?

[Thunderhead]

There are NO ignorant questions here! We all start somewhere, and the lingo is particular to here!
And welcome to iNat forum

[amybirder]

I just saw my first Fawn Darner yesterday! Thrilling to find as it loves to hide in the bushes.
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/222951322

[egordon88]

Another 20ish lifers in the last week, so it’s tough to choose. Maybe this iNat first beetle https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/222576988 or this tiny spotted plant bug https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/222578742 or this new-to-new-mexico shiny moth https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/222570853.

Saw my second ever mantidfly last night!

[mothdragon]

Ended up visiting Daneway banks nature reserve yesterday to look for the once extinct in the UK large blue butterfly and ended up coming across a mating pair which were receiving some attention from a few other photographers, also endeed up seeing marbled whites,ringlets,meadow browns and common blues but no luck for dingy and grizzled skippers or green hairstreak. Also ended up seeing about 30 other lifer species including drab looper, wood sage plume, scarce silver y (annoyingly no photo since it evaded my camera) and about 4 slow worms under a fallen road sign and a lot of other enthusiastic naturalists

[danly]

And you got a great photo of it!

[amybirder]

Yes–and that’s pretty amazing in itself! ;)

[sullivanribbit]

I was excited to see what I thought was my first-ever mantidfly recently, but iNat taught me that it was actually just a particularly flighty type of mantis. Still looking for that mantidfly.

[shemac11]

very cool find and share

[robotpie]

Warning this is going to be a decently huge post covering select favorite lifers since the 2024 CNC:

1. This frog was very well camouflaged, but when I found it I got so excited I pointed it out to everyone who walked by. https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/212134368
   

   

2. I didn’t even realize there were two snakes at first. https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/211262094
   

   

3. This one was coined as “a strange looking Promalactis” until I realized its true identity. https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/219812061
   

   

4. This is a genus I have observed before but it is the first one I have seen in the USA so it probably is a lifer species. https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/219812055
   

   

The following four observations are all beetles:

5. https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/212789827
   

   

6. https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/222378503
   

   

7. https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/211278244
   

   

8. https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/222378504
   

   

9. No explanation needed as to why this is a lifer favorite: its red, its a jumper, what is not to like? https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/223189099
   

   

10. There were a number of this species both male and female. I think I was outstretched halfway across a small creek and trying not to get wet when getting this observation. Was successful https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/223189127
    

    

11. Well I was playing cat and mouse with a couple of dragonflies. Only this one stopped for a single shot. https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/223189186
    

    

12. Always love seeing solitary wasps out and about https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/222378478
    

    

BONUS: These following observations are not lifers, but I can’t help sharing.

13. This is a two-in-one. First time noticing an attempted mating between two different species. I took a peek and the male was deep in there! https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/219812098
    

    

14. After so many years of just occasionally finding the caterpillars, I finally have found a fresh adult of this genus https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/223681517
    

    

15. I mean, its an iridescent spider, I must share this https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/223189042
    

    

Thanks for making it to this end.

[caththalictroides]

After 8 years, I finally got my nemesis bird!! (The joys of rural living…)
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/222652043

[lj_l]

http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/223256893
(Possibly) Planorbella duryi, although it would unfortunately be an introduced species

Giant mayfly resting on side of building

Dimorphic jumping spider on porch

[huttonia]

Found my first large fishing spider:

Very cooperative and adorable!
She was trying to ambush some toads before I found her.

[tisli]

Life is such a wonderful experience and full of surprises! While sitting in the tram back home, suddenly there is my 720th species. Quite a challenge to photograph too, with all the changing light in a moving tram with a moving beetle! Even more surprising, the first observation of it in Amsterdam. Probably brought into the city through public transport then.

[mothdragon]

Had the much welcome and long awaited appearance of a privet hawkmoth in my moth trap marking the 7th garden hawkmoth species of 2024. just elephant, small elephant and hummingbird hawks which made a cameo in 2023 to complete the garden list of likely hawkmoth species to arrive (all others being either common- very rare migrants which would only really make an appearance if I trapped somewhere more coastal and the 2 local bee hawkmoths which are unlikely to ever visit the garden).

[chipperatl]

Have to post two, but could be 5. I had 4 possible first records of moths for my state in the past week.
This is one of the 4. https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/223678770

https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/223678771

[susanne-kasimir]

My favourite lifer are also two!

The hermit crab Diogenes curvimanus is an iNatFirst, because there was a species split in 2021. https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/224272007. I’m very grateful that there are specialists who occupy themselves with identifying. :-)
Its shell Euspira guilleminii has already 10 observations. https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/224272009
And all of that on the beach of Málaga city.
P.S. Both need confirmation - if anybody feels confident…

[Thunderhead]

WOW! Incredible!

[m_whitson]

These insect galls look like someone hot-glued cotton balls onto a grape leaf. I took a wild guess at what they might be (Genus Vitisiella, Grape Midge Galls), but regardless, they’re something I’ve never seen before.

For the observation see: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/224515496

[egordon88]

This tiny rare wasp https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/224762878

[JaneBP]

@jasonhernandez74

I’m noticing that, too. I’m beginning to wonder if there are any native lady beetles left. Did the Asian lady beetles wipe them all out? The Khanate of Lady Beetles?

Here in the Willamette Valley of Oregon I have photoed 3 species of ladybugs - the Asian, the seven-spotted (both introduced species) and the convergent ladybug, which is native. But mostly I see the seven-spotted.