Non-Brewster summer adventures

This is by no means a comprehensive overview of some of the madness, but...

Hey, check it - when you go to replace a tub faucet and the whole PIPE twists... that's a bad thing.

And a photo of Nauga that *almost* renders here semi-photogenic:

My life mink, at the Lake Waco Wetlands:

End-of-life dragonfly experiencing the kiss-of-death (hug-of-death?) from a robber fly, also at the Lake Waco Wetlands (not sure of ID on the ode, leaning female Eastern Pondhawk though).

I was not able to get a photo of the looong-legged robber fly that was a bright yellowish orange that was clearly a wasp mimic; at least two were slowly flying around, taunting me. One robber fly that did cooperate (but not for me) in College Station was a house fly mimic. Sneaky!

Speaking of College Station: the two folks in the center, Dr. Sharman Hoppes and Dr. Ian Tizard, are most wonderful people. I'm sure the rest of them are as well, else they'd not be doing the ground breaking for the new avian building at Texas A&M! It was an excellent crowd, with folks from AFA, NPRPF, and the Wildlife Rehab & Education Center - giant family reunion for me!

Oh, and home: the grape vine is huge, but the avocado tree (hulking beast on the left) is but a mere shell of what it used to be. A glorious, gorgeous, strong, vibrant shell of what it used to be. It once topped the roof line, but Hurricane Ike did a number on it - what you see there is too big for me to wrap my hands around (2-3 years of growth?!) but was a new shoot after it was cut back to the roots.

Excellent progress in 20 short years of work, my delicious little avocado friend. 

Mom and Sib. Aww.

Mom and Self. Aww. Think she was talking, whoops.

Base of avocado (2 of 3 pictured).

Orange Palps of Doom

Because Coleoptera need blog time, too...
2 Dec, 2011 - 10 miles north of Hwy 385/Hwy 90 junction. ID pending.

Houston, we have a Pupa!

Edit: this has now been blogged (with more pics!) at Big Bend Birds & Nature - when inch worms grow up.

I should be blogging this over at the other blog, but I managed to forget to take a picture of an inch-worm that adopted us. I harvested some mesquite nibbles for the hubbardi bunch and the little critter caught a ride and found itself in with a bunch of non-geometers. So while I forgot to take its picture, it thrived. Then it started to look pretty bad and I felt terrible and was certain that, along with ~40 other caterpillars this season, it had died. It turned this bizarre shade of teal blue on one end and darkened and instead of being a long, juicy inch-and-a-smidge long... it was barely half an inch long.

But then it turned into a pupa. How ridiculously awesome!

Busy, busy summer

As the title implies, we're up to our ears in... life. Between wrangling pups, pup-sitting for others, work, school, work and more work, we've managed to get a few photos worth sharing:

Family portrait: Matt, Nauga, Heidi and Anakin. Awww.

A Black Witch moth on the back wall while blacklighting.

The Chihuahua named Little.

Pepsis wasp. Oh yes, there's an Entomology class afoot this summer!

Recent bug life: Lyside Sulphur, Eyed Elater and an Opuntia Beetle (the 'longhorn')

The reason you don't go the speed limit out here. Ever. This was taken at 6:40 - long before dusk!

...and, FINALLY, our first dung beetles of the season. It only took until mid July to see them at Post Park. Still no sign of them in town. Maybe after a few real rains?

"It's a TRAP!"

"It's a trap!"

There's a little green plant with pretty white flowers that grows a few feet NW of our shade tarp.



We really didn't pay much attention to it until one day it ate a Pearl Crescent. Upon close inspection, it literally appeared that the butterfly was dead, stuck in between flowers and caught on a dead bloom. I had seen a butterfly in a similar situation in New Mexico almost a year ago, but the culprit had vanished. This time, the critter was still there. It was the dead bloom... also known as the Ambush Bug!



Technically a shrub is a woody plant around a meter in height. This plant is not a shrub. But I've affectionately started to call it the Ambush Shrub, Shrub of Doom, etc. On the first day that we saw the Pearl Crescent succumb to a tempting flower, only one Ambush Bug was noticed. That was the 16th. On the 18th, four were counted on four blossoms. On the 20th, there were six of them, still on four blossoms. And along with them, there were little flower spiders! So it wasn't too much of a surprise when a Reakirt's Blue was nectaring in an uncomfortable position...

How many threats to the butterfly can you find in the photo below?



It will be interesting to see how this menu diversifies over the next two months. Thankfully our Nysa Roadside Skipper hasn't fallen prey to the Ambush Plant yet, and hopefully our one Small Checkered Skipper at the site won't be the next, either. Granted, that may be the only way to get a cooperative photo of it!



Kind of looks like it wants a hug...



Our humble opinion:



Here's my awesome computer art skills answering the earlier question: 1 spider and 2 Ambush Bugs



Rest in peace, little Reakirt's!

needs practice

The Desert Ironclad Beetle, of Zopherus genus, is apparently also called the "Death Feigning Beetle" - the individual(s?) that loiter around our tarp apparently did not really take that name to heart. Note the stillness when this video starts. That's it. That's the 'feigning' that everyone is so proud of! Alas, I think I'd have called it a Desert Ironclad "Pause Feigning Beetle" instead...

teamwork

This video could mean one of two things - we either have really big ants here, or really small scorpions.



Or both!

*** Those of you reading this on the RSS feed, go to the actual page and check out the new header photo!!!

days go by

"The outstanding scientific discovery of the twentieth century is not television, or radio, but rather the complexity of the land organism. Only those who know the most about it can appreciate how little we know about it. The last word in ignorance is the man who says of an animal or plant: "What good is it?" If the land mechanism as a whole is good, then every part is good, whether we understand it or not. If the biota, in the course of aeons, has built something we like but do not understand, then who but a fool would discard seemingly useless parts? To keep every cog and wheel is the first precaution of intelligent tinkering." - Aldo Leopold

Apologies for the lag in posts - our babies have left the box! So we had a few days of waking up at 6 am and going to bed around 11, followed by more of the same.



Of 7 falcons released on the 10th, 5 are still accounted for. Of 7 falcons released on the 11th, 5 are accounted for. All 10 of those accounted for ate heartily this morning. One is even starting to chase beetles on the ground(!)

In other news:

The roads have yielded roadkill javelina, plenty of live gigantic red/yellow millipedes, the occasional tarantula, and on Friday night our first snake. It was tiny, fast moving, and gone by the time we turned around to look for it. For a rainy 67 degree evening, hopefully it found warmth and shelter quickly! Only two or three stereotypical desert toads have been seen, but tonight while unloading gear after our evening observation, Matt found and brought me a little spadefoot type toad (herp folks, we need your help! we have no herp guide!) ...that was the 9th. On the 10th, Matt found a crazy looking Vinegarroon (looks like a scorpion on the front, but has a looong pointy vinegar-shooting needle-like tail). On the 11th we were visited by a whiptail lizard of some sort and a teeeny little walking stick. On the 12th, we had a very cooperative [name withheld for photo quiz] butterfly. The 13th provided me with my "life" [Western] Mexican Hog-nosed Snake!



Mystery Toad!

We've had Mule Deer and crazy grasshoppers, a splendid abundance of different weevils, plenty of dragonflies that never land (orange shadowdragons?) and the heat-of-day hum of cicadas.



Vinegarroon - wiki link

The site has also provided ample Vesta Crescents, tiny orb weaver type spiders, two flyover Long-billed Curlews, one flyover Willet and one other flyover non-Killdeer wader that never cooperated. Add the teal (silhouetted, sadly) we saw on our way to work on the 10th and it's feels almost coastal! ...almost.



Tiny walking stick.

Today we had our first Texas Horned Lizard, first chance to update the blog for a while... the usual madness. Hopefully we'll get the lizard and some snake photos posted soonish. Until then, a few posts are scheduled to pop up in the next few days regardless of whether or not we have access, so enjoy!

Brace for 2 photo quizzes coming soon!

Pollinators between rain events

Alex-influenced rain followed Heidi and I all the way out here. I had lived out here for ~ 4 yrs and never had consistent rain, for so many consecutive days.

At the moment it is partly cloudy, and the wildlife is happy. Particularly at a shrub in the front yard. SO many wasp species, a few net-winged beetles, and some familiar butterflies.

One of my favorite members of the wasp order, Hymenoptera, is the Cicada Killer (Sphecius spp):



These are huge 2+ inches long insects. When one hears within the monotony of the "whining cicadas" summer-long buzz a cicada quickly and individually deviate its contribution, likely it's due to an attack from Sphecius species.

One particularly interesting wasp family is Scoliidae. They are largish, hairy insects that are parasitic to larvae of scarab beetles.



Females dig around to uncover scarab larvae, lay an egg on it, and peace on out of there.

So many other wasp species on that particular shrub, so little time.

A few butterflies found their way on to it, all of which are very familiar:


Western Pygmy-Blue (Brephidium exile), North America's smallest butterfly with a wingspan that may not even reach half an inch.


Reakirt's Blue (Echinargus isola)


Texan Crescent (Anthanassa texana)

We do have a porch light. As Heidi mentioned, there happens to be an active Barn Swallow (Hirundo rustica) nest using it as substrate. So we are going to have to come-up with another plan for attracting moths at least until that nest has fledged.

It is currently in incubation stage.
We've named the swallow Gladys. However, it has been observed that both parents share incubation duties.... how nice. So Gladys is female, and Gladys is male.

This is Gladys...., well, Sir Gladys I suppose:


Also, our first two groups of young Aplomado Falcons (Falco femoralis) arrive this afternoon!


We don't have internet at the house. We have to walk several blocks down slope to pirate wireless from a local business. With that in mind, plus once the falcons arrive we'll be going full-throttle, we aren't yet sure how regular our blog updates will become.
We will all just have to see.

after the storm

The motel in Study Butte had Cactus Wrens singing on territory, desert cottontail bunnies all over the place, plenty of Western Kingbirds, ravens and other creatures around...



Easter Egg Valley/Chisos Mining Co. Motel - fuzzy proof that Chair feels just as comfortable in the country as in the city. For other adventures with Chair, check out LovelyListing.com. It's a blog beyond words.



Our night baiting left only one tiny moth. Our afternoon attempts were foiled because the bait was left outside the room and cleared away before we got back. Heh, I'd hate to think what they thought it was. [see our bait post]



"Squail" = Scaled Quail (Callipepla squamata), a common sight/sound.



As best I can tell, this sad little squished friend is a Ten-lined June Beetle (Species decemlineata) of some sort - a remarkably huge bug. I'd love to work with a live one, since the flatness is a bit deceiving.

Also from the front porch, not only a foraging Cactus Wren, a Greater Roadrunner being followed by a very uncoordinated fledgling! The adult mostly ignored us and poked around for bugs, the young stayed a few feet behind, constantly making beggy noises while quivering the wings while hunched down. The adult at one point turned to face it and made a rattling beak clack that was reminiscent of wooden noise making toy. This parade of life along the porch came within 5 feet of us! And of course, my camera was inside the room at the time. Ah, life.

For a photo of a stumpy young roadrunner, check out this sad post over at The Fat Finch.