Bugfolks

Reduviidae, Phymata sp. I most often see this very common Ambush bug sitting motionless on flowers like goldenrod and tansy. The well developed musculature of the raptorial forelegs creates enlarged femora with which it is able to quickly seize its prey. It is capable of catching insects larger than itself, and favorites are bumble and honey bees, solitary bees, wasps and flies.

Cercopidae: Spittlebug on pine. There are many species of Spittlebugs, which produce the frothy substance from abdominal and anal secretions. One or more nymphs are concealed beneath the spittle while they feed on plant juices. It protects them from predators while they mature, and after the last nymphal molt, adults emerge from the spittle and actively crawl & fly about.

Spittlebug nymph on pine exposed

Cercopidae adult, froghopper

Spittlebug mass on leaves

Spittlebug nymph partially exposed

Spittlebug nymph exposed

Margot Monson

St. Paul, MN

This parasitoid is a female Braconid wasp, Agathis malvacearum, searching for the larva of the Gelechiid moth, Metzneria lapella, which feeds in the seedheads of Common Burdock.  Note her long ovipositor.

This A. malvacearum female has located the larva within the seedhead and now positions her ovipositor vertically and deposits her egg.  When the egg hatches, the wasp larva completes its development by feeding on the still living Gelechiid larva, but by the time it is ready to pupate, the larva is dead.

Sphecid wasp, Ammophila sp. gathering pollen & nectar.  They dig underground nests and provision them with insects such as Notodontid moth larvae, which they have paralyzed and on which they lay their eggs.  The wasp larvae feed on the living moth larvae until they are ready to pupate and finish their development, and by which time the moth larva is dead.

This is the first time I have observed this Ichneumonid wasp, Trogus pennator, which is parasitoid of swallowtail butterflies.  I found it rapidly searching within the dill and fennel of my herb garden in September, most likely for the Black Swallowtail larvae that may be feeding there.  The orange and black coloring were spectacular, almost iridescent in the sunlight.

This large Sphecid wasp, was often seen flying rapidly about my garden and frequently feeding on the pollen and nectar of Gooseneck Loosestrife and Butterflyweed.  In late fall, there were many flying about the Butterflyweed outside the Science Museum in St. Paul. These wasps are commonly parasitoids of large insects such as grasshoppers and also spiders, with which they provision their nests and lay their eggs.

Another large Sphecid wasp, Sphex pensylvanicus,  commonly seen exclusively gathering pollen and nectar on my Gooseneck Loosestrife.  They are also spider and grasshopper parasitoids, with which they provision their nests and lay a single egg.   Interestingly, when the large black wasp with the white patch on the thorax (shown above) entered the garden, the Sphex wasps quickly left.  When the black and white wasps left, the Sphex returned.

Margot Monson

St. Paul, MN

This is a post for those of you who are dreaming about spring.  Mike and I visited southern Texas at the end of January, and though it wasn't the best time for butterflies there, we saw lots of them - mostly species I had never seen before.  It was fun to see so many new species, and to see them in January!

These are butterflies from the NABA Butterfly Park in Mission, TX and several state parks in the Mission area. (I'll do another - smaller - post with species we saw in Big Bend National Park.)

This first one was the best butterfly of the trip - as large as a Tiger Swallowtail and brilliantly colored.   It's a Malachite - Siproeta stelenes

Crimson Patch - Chlosyne janais

The caterpillar of a Crimson Patch Butterfly

The caterpillar's food plant - Smallflower Wrightwort (Carlowrightia parvifolia)

Dusky Blue Groundstreak - Calycopis isobeon

Carolina Satyr - Hermeuptychia sosybius (Thanks to Dave Hanson for the ID)

Gulf Fritillary - Agraulis vanillae

Lantana Scrub-Hairstreak - Strymon bazochii

Top side of the Lantana Scrub-Hairstreak

Large Orange Sulphur - Phoebis agarithe

Laviana White Skipper - Heliopetes laviana

Mimosa Yellow - Eurema nise

Queen - Danaus gilippus

Mating Queens

Reakirt's Blue - Hemiargus isola

Texan Crescent - Phyciodes texana

Tropical Checkered Skipper - Pyrgus oileus

Common Checkered Skipper (Pyrgus communis)

Whirlabout - Polites vibex

White Peacock - Anartia jatrophae

There were several skippers that I couldn't identify - some that looked like dark grass skippers, and others that had long tails.

I saw one beautiful little moth - it's one of the wave moths - Idaea sp.

A Six-spotted Milkweed Bug - Oncopeltus sexmaculatus

American Snout

Empress Leilia

Mallow Scrub-Hairstreak - Strymon istapa

Monarch - Danaus plexippus
I didn't know any of them spent the winter in Texas.

Little Yellow (Pyrisitia lisa)

Phaon Crescent (Phyciodes phaon)

Southern Dogface (Zerene cesonia)

Red Admiral (Vanessa atalanta) - the most familiar butterfly I saw.

This is a Robber Fly (Efferia sp.) - a weird looking creature. It was sitting still in the sand - probably waiting for some prey to come along.

Marcie O'Connor

back in Buffalo County, Wisconsin

It's spring up here in Wisconsin - for the moment, anyway.  It was 65 degrees for two days in a row, and the overwintering butterflies have come out here at the farm.

This is the first one I saw - sunning itself on a patch of snow - an Eastern Comma.

Polygonia comma

and the first moth - The Infant - a bright colored day-flying moth whose caterpillars eat birch.

Archiearis infans

The next day I found 3 Mourning Cloaks battling over a small woodland opening - it seemed like they were having a territorial dispute.

Nymphalis antiopa

Nymphalis antiopa

Marcie O'Connor

Buffalo County, Wisconsin

I've been working hard on a new web site - so I thought I'd put the link here so you can check it out.  It's BugLifeCycles.com.

It's a site where people can learn more about the lives of insects.  So many insects are only familiar to us in just one of their many life stages.  Some insects we know very little about, and we know nothing at all about other stages in their lives.

I've met several people over the last few months who have been observing and recording the life stages of some of the insects they see.  Their life cycle series are here, as well as some series that I've been working on.

I'd like to get more people involved in this project!  If you'd like us to link to some of your photos, or you'd like to write a life cycle series on the site, let me know.  And please tell other people who might be interested - we'd love to hear from them too.

Marcie

 Mating Saturnidae:

Here is a rare occasion, an unmated female promethea moth had a male cecropia attatch to it one evening. The female promethea must have been to close to a scenting female cecropia and the male just found the promie more attracting.

Here is another picture of Callosamia promethea pairings from my house. In this photo I used 1/2 cage wire and originally had made it for a bird trap but that was short lived. Now it is my universal silk moth mating cage!

Mating Saturniidae:

Here are some neat pictures to look at of some native silk moths mating!

The fishing basket once again with a female and male promethea moth

A wild found female Polyphemus that called in a small wild male.

Mating Saturniidae

Another method I will use if a female hasn't mated for the first couple nights is to tie some string around her hind wings and forwings to make a leash around the moth. I secure the opposite end of the line to an anchor point such a branch or screening. I am very gently and dont hurt the moth but I tie it tight enough so it cant slip out of it.  This technique works very well if the males are having a hard time mating through the cages.  The only thing you have to look out for is birds getting their next meal.

You can see that the female is an older one and the male she called in was a giant!

Here are some other photos to look at of silk moths!

Automeris io female

Callosamia promethea female

Hyalophora cecropia male

Antheraea polyphemus female

Actias luna male

2008-2009 Cocooning Update

By: Ian Miller

This has been my best year yet for finding silk moth cocoons.  I have been taking hikes with my lovley girl friend (Bailee) and driving around out in the country in search of promethea cocoons.  Today we came across a tree that had 6 cocoons hanging from it!!!  And then we came across another tree with 3 cocoons on it!  So far finding 6 cocoons on one tree is my record. I have only found 4 on one tree up until today.

The larger cocoons are female while the smaller ones are males

All cocoons sound and feel alive so I am pretty excited about that. Its funny because just last sunday we( Bailee and I) had found 7 cocoons and only one was alive, the rest had hatched or been diseased, so I guess we got repaid today with a find of 9 healthy sounding cocoons!  All cocoons this year have been found on White ash, Wild Black cherry, and one large cocoon on a small Elm. The majority have been spun on Black Cherry trees and im suspiscious that the one on elm had wondered from its host ( ash) because there were several smaller ash trees in the area.

I also Noticed while walking along the Chippewa River a cecropia  way up at the top of a 15 foot high Red Maple tree. So being my very monkey like self I scaled the tree ,( the tree was unharmed) and gentley peeled the cocoon away from the branch it was on and shimmyed down with one hand and jumped the remaining few feet to the ground.  Usually when i find cocoons up that high the are parasitized but to my luck this one had some weight to it and also makes a nice thud when I shake it.  So far for the 2008-2009 collecting season i have found 34 promethea cocoons, 9 cecropia cocoons, and 8 polyphemus cocoons.  Hopefully there are plenty more to come.  I will be venturing out once this warmer weather starts to melt some snow.

Please bear with me as this post may be a bit heavy on photos.  In the last entry, I described my rearing setup and the first two caterpillars which I released to pupate.  The caterpillars shown below are all over-wintering in the "bug cage" I assembled out of a wire trash can and an aluminum mesh lid cut from an old window screen:

The lid is held in place with twist ties; so far it has kept the raccoons and other critters at bay.  There is a raised platform in the bottom to keep the cocoons elevated, and the paper towels provide protection from the elements.  I keep the whole setup under a bench so it doesn't get waterlogged every time it rains (and also to make it inconspicuous to a couple of neighbor kids who kill bugs for amusement.)  I mist the cocoons with distilled water about twice a week.

I found this Polyphemus caterpillar toward the beginning of September while I was looking for slug caterpillars...  I actually thought it was a slug caterpillar at first glance, but its head wasn't drawn into the body.  The host plant is Water oak, Quercus nigra.

He/she didn't change as dramatically as the Hickory Horned Devil between molts.  Even so, the progression is quite apparent.  This photo was taken 9 days later...

And 2 weeks after that...

Within just a few days, he had spun a cocoon amongst the leaves of his food plant...

The next caterpillar I brought home to raise really was a slug caterpillar: a Smaller Parasa.  I told my husband I wouldn't keep any stinging 'pillars, but it was just too neat to resist!    This one was discovered in early October and ate American hornbeam, Carpinus caroliniana.

After 4 days...

Another week later...

He only molted once after I acquired him.  When the time came to form a cocoon, he spun it against the lid of the container.  You can see the green lid inside the "cage" in the first photo.

In mid-October, I came across some Giant Swallowtail caterpillars on Common Hoptree, Ptelea trifoliata.  Since I've never seen the adult butterfly, I decided to add one to my growing menagerie.

It only took 2 days to start pupating...

I started to worry that something had gone wrong when it stayed like this for another 48 hours; however, on the third day, it became a proper chrysalis...

I found the final caterpillar in late October: a Frosted Dagger moth.  As far as I can tell, these guys only eat Hazel Alder, Alnus serrulata, and there are no photos of the adult anywhere on the internet.  The larva looks like this...

I had read in David L. Wagner's book Caterpillars of Eastern North America that most dagger moths require "soft (dead) wood in which to tunnel," and that "some make a hardened cocoon by adding bits of chewed wood to the wall of the cocoon as it is being spun."  That is exactly what this one did...

Hopefully they will all emerge successfully when they're ready, and I'll be able to add images of the adults!

Carmen Champagne

I've been a major bug enthusiast for a while, but this year was my first attempt at rearing. It started with a Hickory Horned Devil... I'd been practically obsessed with finding one ever since I first heard about them, and in mid-August I discovered two on a persimmon tree. I was thrilled, but these caterpillars were newly hatched/first instar. What I had always envisioned was a hot-dog-sized behemoth of a caterpillar, so I decided to take one home and raise it.

The setup I put together was fairly simple: an old plastic fish bowl with some sheer fabric over the top secured by a rubber band. Later on, I acquired (and in some cases improvised) other rearing containers including the ones in the photos below. I would line the bottom of the container with some moist paper towels. Besides providing food, maintenance consisted of removing frass and lightly misting the 'pillars with distilled water every couple of days.

In order to keep the foodplant clippings fresh, I bought some little plastic bottles for fifty cents at a craft store and filled them with water. After removing the screw-on caps, I carefully sealed off the tops with duct tape. This works well; however, the caterpillar can get stuck if the corners of the tape start to lift... I always add an extra strip around the rim to keep that from happening. The clippings are inserted through a hole poked in the duct tape.

Watching the Hickory Horned Devil grow and change was an amazing experience.  To give you some idea of the progression, here is how he (or she) looked when I found him...

5 days later...

Another 5 days...

9 more days (just before a molt)...

A week later...

On the 36th day, he was finally ready to pupate...

By this time, I was also keeping an Imperial moth caterpillar.  This one was eating boxelder; I've never been able to persuade any of these guys to switch host plants.  This photo is from the beginning of September, his/her first molt...

8 days later...

And shortly before pupation, 17 days after that...

Since both Imperial moths and HHD pupae pass the winter underground, I eventually decided that releasing them would be the best thing to do.  As much as I wanted to see their adult forms, I knew I would feel awful if I bungled their care.  When it was time (caterpillar wandering off the foodplant/ emptying its digestive tract,) I took each of them out into the woods and waited for them to start burrowing.  Neither took long to choose a spot, but the digging was a very slow process.

I did end up keeping cocoons from a few other species I was more comfortable trying to over-winter.  I'll try to post photos of them soon, but I think I've taken up enough space for one day. 

Carmen Champagne

Promethea and polyphemus cocoon

Went walking down by the chippewa river on sunday to look for silk moth cocoons and didnt come back empty handed!  It was neat to see huge flocks of geese moving all around along with hundreds of mallards trying to find a spot on the river with no ice.  I had all my luck right up close to the water where in the spring the cocoons would be submerged for a few weeks as the snow melts.  My first cocoon came on a paper birch sapling followed by another one right next to it that had been subjected to disease or parasites. A few birch trees down the bank i found a cecropia but it looked faded and had holes in it so i just left it.  I kept walking along the banks and stumbled across 2 promethea cocoons hanging on a sapling ash tree( not to common to find them on ash around here usually cherries).

After that i was cold and headed back to my girlfriends house to drive deer for her father.  Saw one buck but he didnt get a shot and during the drive i stumbled across a large almost circular shaped cecropia cocoon.  I have found cecropia cocoons like this before but they have all been dead.  I grabbed it and pulled it off the willow branch and gave it a shake and to my surprise sounded promising.  It also had a decent amount of weight to it.

Left: loose baggy wild cocoon.Right: wild compact cocoon

Ian Miller