I don’t care what you say, I actually like turkey vultures.

A dragonfly…

…and its eye

And this cute little hymenopteran (not sure which one specifically):

I think that if this photo could have a caption it would be “Grrr!”

This is probably the earliest I have seen tiger beetles out and about…but they were out hunting this weekend in my backyard and I got a couple pictures of them.

Well if sticky traps don’t fancy you…you can always invite a handsome jumping spider to the party.

But someone’s got to warn her that she can’t take the lazy way out and go for the flies already caught in the traps…

No worries though…she got out just fine.

Gosh, been a little busy as of late, so haven’t had the chance for an update. I am anxiously awaiting spring’s arrival, but unfortunately mother nature hates me and dumped 5 inches of snow on us last night. UGH! The deer are getting a little anxious about this too, I think. Food for them has been scarce since its been buried by the darn white stuff.

Migrating birds started coming back. A ton of red tail have made their way through…

..and the Common Grackles have been ravaging my bird feeder. Although a lot of people tend not to like grackles, I actually have a fondness for them that I can’t really explain.

And lastly, I found a nice little silverfish (Thysanura) that let me take its photo.

Silverfish are a wingless insect that get their name from the scale-like appearance on their body. They are one of the most primitive insect orders that date back some 300 million years.

There is one thing that drives me crazy when it comes to my plants and thats finding stupid scale insects on them. I found the little buggers on one of my ferns today

As an entomologist, and one with a nice new camera, scale insects aren’t that bad because for one, they don’t move on you when trying to take a photo, and for two, they are actually kind of cool.

They secrete a wax coat for defense. Females don’t have wings and actually keep a lot of their juvenile external morphology (the fancy word for this is neoteny). Males do have wings, but only one pair, which is more like the Diptera (true flies). And males only live for about a day or so, only living long enough to mate.

What a difference a real macro lens can make! A year ago I photographed snow fleas. My former graduate adviser recently asked me for some good snow flea photos and now that I have my fancy Nikon and lenses I decided to take the challenge.

They are a dark blue color, and the flash really makes a difference in the color projected in the photos. They are a tiny springtail (1-2mm) that can often be found in the snow. They have an organ called a furcula that “springs” or catapults them in the air…which obviously adds some difficulty in trying to get close to them for a photograph. You can really see the furcula well in the second photo, its the structure sticking up near the posterior end.

For more information on snow fleas see this wikipedia page.

I’m not the only one who thought spring was right around the corner until this latest winter storm hit…

I was out in the woods today for work and found this little fella still alive, literally “chillin” on a tree, despite the foot of snow that was just dumped on us. Its not really ‘collecting jar season’ yet, but when an entomologist wants a bug bad enough they manage to make anything into a jar. For me, I dumped a whole pack of tic tacs out in the snow so that I could bring home this lacewing for a photo op. I’m a nerd, but I think it was worth it.

Lacewings are comprised of the family Chrysopidae in the order Neuroptera. The larvae are crazy-aggressive and feed on other insects. In fact, they are often reared for the biological control of mites, aphids, and other crop pests. The adults vibrate on the substrate for courtship communication.

…Ladybird beetle, that is. This particular beetle made a good subject last night for practicing with my new flash

Ladybird beetles are also commonly referred to as Lady Bugs…except that they are not a true bug but a beetle in the Coccinellidae family. They are a good insect to have in your garden because they feed on common pests like aphids and scales (which is another insect).

Just like the blister beetles, ladybird beetles practice reflex bleeding from their joints when trying to defend themselves.

Another interesting tidbit about ladybirds…the female lays infertile eggs with her fertile eggs so that the hatching larvae have something to eat in case there is a scarcity of food.