Io Moth

Crane Fly

Female Eastern Dobsonfly

Frog

Frog Eye

White-Tailed Buck

White-Tailed Buck and Foxgloves

We’ve had some midnight visitors to our porch light this past week, here are a few glimpses:

Luna Moth

A close up of the antenna. Lunas only live for a couple days and the males use those huge antennae to locate females (which release a pheromone cue) to mate  with.

And a polyphemus moth, which actually remind me of a floppy-eared rabbit:

And a One-Eyed Sphinx moth

We have been pretty busy at work lately, but I have started getting in the habit of taking that camera out of the case again and carrying it with me in the woods. Turns out it does no good in its bag all day, duh.

Next is my all time favorite, the horse fly. I dream of working on them again…sigh.

I totally pancaked a snapping turtle on the way to work last week…but then found another one in the woods laying eggs in the sand and figured I would redeem myself with a nice picture of it:

And just in case you thought that turtle picture was not “buggy” enough for this post, I dare you to take a closer look above the right eye….

Thats right, while the female was busy laying her eggs another female (mosquito) was getting a quick bite because without a blood meal she cannot lay her eggs either. Bet you didn’t know some blood-feeders could get a meal from a reptile.

Hopefully this will be the start of a good season of buggin’.

Josh and I picked up a new baby last weekend….another german shorthaired pointer. Say hello to Wes (or “Dude” as my coworkers have all been calling him).

More pictures of the squirt to come…

Ok, not a bug…but a baby kangaroo:

The kangaroo is one of the most bizarre looking mammals and its reproductive process appears equally peculiar. Its tiny fetus compelled to make an unaided march from womb to pouch after only weeks of existence. Here, a 2 week old red kangaroo joey in the pouch. (Photo credit © Hannah James / Pioneer Productions)

As you may know, National Geographic has been doing a series lately called “Inside the Womb”. The series has previously looked at fetal development of human babies, cats and dogs. They have another episode airing in time for Mother’s Day (5/10/2009 @ 9PM ET/PT) profiling a shark, penguin, kangaroo, and parasitic wasp.

From Nat. Geo:

“In The Womb: Extreme Animals explores the extraordinary methods of reproduction and gestation of four different animals: fish, bird, mammal and insect.  Using real-time 4-D ultrasound images, specially created visual effects and fetal imaging techniques, the two-hour special follows unusual developmental challenges in utero: the shark embryos’ nutrient supply transforms into a placenta; the penguins find an ingenious way to keep their eggs from freezing in the Antarctic; the kangaroo fetuses actually leave the womb to finish growing in the pouch; and the larvae of parasitic wasps invade the bodies of other creatures.”

Check out this short, but very cool, video trailer for the parasitic wasp part of the episode:

– Body Invaders” – A parasitic wasp has injected her eggs into a caterpillar — and now they’re ready to hatch: http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/channel/videos/feeds/cv-seo/Animals–Nature/All-Videos/Caterpillars-Host-Wasp-Larvae.html

Its not every day that you get the chance to go inside of the host and see what the parasitoids are actually doing in there…so check out the link and watch the show this Sunday.

I got to dust off the ol’ bug net today and it got its first use of the season…

For the last couple nights Josh and I have been hearing some noises after we have gone to bed. The other night I told Josh that it sounded like a bat. I was right.

He decided to join us for some pizza and tv tonight. Maya proved that she is more versatile than just a “bird” dog, and she almost got him a couple times. The cat on the other hand, could not be bothered to get off his perch after checking out what was going on during the initial ruckus. He’s useless and definitely not pullin’ his weight around here, but I digress.

Now I am no mammalogist, but I think it is the garden variety Little Brown Bat. Correct me if I am wrong…

Josh, being the normal person he is, instinctually grabbed his coat thinking he was going to catch the bat with it…me on the other hand, we entomologists try to find any way possible to inundate our insect nets into every situation. I am planning on fighting crime with it one day.

Anyway, just for the record, I won.

Yes, this is what an entomologist does on a Friday night.

The snow is finally gone and hopefully wont return for another couple months. I can’t tell you how much I have needed some sun and green…

Photos from my backyard:

Black-Capped Chicadee

Yellow-Rumped Warbler

Pileated Woodpecker

A friend and colleague of mine, Huai-Ti,  just started a new blog following his research as a PhD candidate at Tufts University. He has been working on insect locomotion for the last 3 years, specifically focused on the Tobacco Hornworm (Manduca sexta) as the model system for learning about soft-bodied locomotion.

Check out his blog and I am sure he would love to answer questions and get some feedback on what he is up to. He is at: http://morphingmorphology.blogspot.com/