My wonderful fiance got me the best birthday present…a new Nikon D40x. That makes for a very happy Kelley Now I just have to learn how to use it.

So, we tested it out today with a day of birding off the tip of the Cape (Race Point in Provincetown).

A Common Loon

A Belted Kingfisher

And my favorite…osprey

He got me a macro lens for the camera as well, so stay tuned for hopefully pretty cool insect images…

Lisa:

I have ants in my house that (A) I can’t get rid of, they almost laugh at those litle plastic traps, and (B) when I smush them, I smell this cleaner smell. Why is that? I noticed it when squished one kind of close and thought I was crazy so the 3rd time I just smelled the dead ant and it was pretty potent. I know this sounds weird but my husband thought I was crazy when I told him what I smelled. So I smelled it. What is it that makes them smell like that?

Getting rid of ants can be tricky. Ants communicate using three main methods, (a) tactile, (b) auditory, and (c) olfactory. Ants use pheromones and odors to identify fellow members of the colony and to identify trails to and from the nest. If your plastic traps are not in the right areas they could be less effective in attracting the ants to them. I actually have never used those plastic traps, but instead have tried to identify the main pathways or trails the ants are using (especially if there are points of entry into your house) and have lined a wall of dish soap along the path. Ok, so actually I have 2 ant stories where I have used soap. One was in an apt and I noticed the ants coming through a crack between the door and kitchen and they were coming up to the kitchen sink for whatever they could get of leftovers. So, I put a line of the soap on the ground by the door (like a baracade) and lined the side of the sink with dish soap. At the end of the day when I cleaned up the kitchen I washed the sink area up, usually having to clean up dead ant bodies, and then would repeat with the soap treatment the next day. I only had to do this for a couple days before the ants got the hint and left. Now if the colony is actually nesting in your home (like carpenter ants) then you would have a much bigger problem on your hands and may have to call an exterminator. It might help to identify what kind of ants you have in order to best combat them. The second time I battled ants was while in grad school, during winter. A bunch of crazy ants got the crazy idea to invade my blow fly colony and steal their sugar water. In the process they also killed many-a-fly…and that was no good for someone who was using those flies for experiments. Unfortunately I couldn’t find any main trail, they were everywhere, literally in the thousands. So in this case I filled a spray bottle with soap and water and sprayed the ants that were outside of the blow fly cage and just put a line of soap around the outside of the cage to prevent new ones from going in. After a couple of days of spraying soap water around the floor and cabinets of the lab and killing the ants I could see they finally went away.

For the second part of your question about the smell, well, you are not crazy. Ants belong to the insect family “Formicidae”. That odor you smell is a chemical from their poison gland called formic acid. Formic acid smells like vinegar, I think, its been a while since I have smelled a crushed ant. Its also the same chemical in stinging nettle, if you have ever come into contact with that plant. Ants use the chemical for defence against other ants and predators.

Good luck

A female Northern Harrier (aka marsh hawk)

A Great Egret

Patti:

I am preparing slides for an exhibit and was hoping to do a dragonfly eye can you tell me the process of dissecting the eye?

Hmm, can’t say that I have ever removed a dragonfly eye before. I have, however, removed a blow fly’s eye before and it is definitely a little messy.

First of all, you have to know a little something about an insect’s eye. Insects have compound eyes that are made up of units called ommatidia. I haven’t personally counted, but it is said that some dragonflies can have as many as 10,000 ommatidia. An ommatidium is a bundle of cells that contains the corneal lens and crystalline cone. Next to the cone are the retinular cells, which are in turn arranged around the rhabdom (the axial structure)…together, the retinular cells and rhabdom are called the retinula. Why is dissecting the eye messy? Because surrounding the retinula is a sheath of pigment cells. Each cell is full of red, yellow or brown granules of pigment. Rupturing these pigment cells while trying to remove the eye is what causes it to be messy. Next, axons of the retinula enter into the optic lobes of the brain.

I think in order to get the cleanest dissection, or removal of the eye, you would want to pick open (with forceps) and remove the cuticle of the head capsule away from the compound eye…and ideally, you would want to expose the brain, gentlly pull apart the optic lobe from the brain, and then use a forcep to gently grasp the entire compound eye + optic lobe. You may even want to just try pulling the eye away from the head capsule just by the optic lobe. Don’t try to pull at the compound eye from directly on with the forcep because you will more than likely rupture those pigment cells.

So with all of that, some of you may be wondering how they actually see? All those ommatidia…are they seeing thousands of the same picture? No. Johannes Muller in 1826 and Sigmund Exner in 1891 developed the classic theory on how insects form images, called the ‘mosaic theory of insect vision’. Basically, each ommatidium is sensitive to light that enters at a small angle. As light enters the ommatidia a dot-like pattern is formed. The entire image of what the insect sees is contructed from a ‘mosaic’ of information that is relayed from each ommatidia.

Let me know how the dissection goes

Many:

Would you please tell me about the camera and lenses that you use to take all of your amazing pictures? I am looking to buy a digital SLR that is capable of both macro and telephoto photography - any advice would be greatly appreciated.

The camera I use is a Canon Powershot S2 1S (6.0-72.0mm). For what it is, I like the maco capabilities. The telephoto ability on the other hand is not so great, at least in my opinion. I have bought a couple of the lenses that are available for the camera but haven’t had much luck with using them.

I can’t give a whole lot of advice on what kind of digital SLR to buy because I haven’t done a whole lot of looking into it…aside from just knowing I want to upgrade

There are several people though that could give you advice that read this blog…so hopefully they will chime in.

Hint hint…

Peregrine Falcon

Ruddy Duck

Smew

Not quite…but did go to a local zoo today.

Can’t forget the insects…a pair of dung beetles

Found this WAY cute moth in the woods today.

Its called “the joker” or Jocose Sallow. The latin name is Ferlia jocosa. You can click here to read more about distinguishing between the Sallow species. As larvae they defoliate spruce and hemlock.

Pat:

We collected a black beetle that is 3.2 cm long and 1.5 cm in maxium width. It is lens shaped in the top view and its ends are pointed, especially the rear. It was found on a tennis court in Pleasant Hill, Ca.

Photo credit: Pat V.B.

You must live by water because your little beetle friend is a predaceous diving beetle. They eat other aquatic insects and even small fish. What’s cool about these guys is that in order to breath they form an air bubble at their rear underneath the tips of their wings (elytra).

Cool find