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Blog Archives
Black-Dotted Ruddy / Holly Looper
Being National Moth Week, I have every excuse to post about one of my favorite subjects. Admittedly, I get more excited about caterpillars, but I enjoy seeing the moths that most of them become.
Back at the end of April, I was distracted by something while going to check the mailbox. Actually, I’m often distracted any time I venture into my yard, but that’s kind of the point of having one for me. Anyway, some large hollies form a hedge along part of my driveway. I spotted a caterpillar dropping from from the holly to the ivy beneath it. I grabbed it for a closer look and started scanning the holly for others. I quickly found another one and brought them inside for rearing. Less than a month later, I was rewarded with a Black-Dotted Ruddy, Ilecta intractata.
Posted in Featured Creatures
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Tapinoma Ant Observations
April 13, 2012 | Twelvestones, Roswell, GA, USA
For several days I had noticed ants racing along the bricks at the base of one of my garage doors. I finally took a closer look to see what could be keeping them so busy for so long. They were streaming between a hole in my house and somewhere out in the front yard. I tried following, but these ants are tiny, only a few millimeters long. I quickly lost them in some pine straw.
Moving out
Turns out they were moving out of my house. The ones heading toward the yard were carrying eggs, larvae, and pupae. As I watched them though, I noticed something else leaving with them that didn’t look quite right.
Posted in Featured Photos
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Leafrolling Mystery Caterpillar
20mm | April 5, 2012 | Twelvestones, Roswell, GA, USA
Earlier this month I was checking for anything interesting in my backyard when I came across this caterpillar in a rolled up leaf on viburnum. I decided to try and rear it to get an identification.
It turns out it was a final instar because it pupated beneath its leaf within a week, sometime around the 9th.
Pupa within leaf shelter
I removed the pupa from its webbing for some cleaner shots.
11mm | Underside of pupa
Dorsolateral view
I checked daily for the adult, but sadly it eclosed while I was away on vacation, sometime around the 20th give or take a few days. When I got back I found a dead and beat up adult. I prefer live images of a fresh adult that I can release later, but I’ll take what I can get here I guess.
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Parasitic Wasp Cocoon
6mm long | July 8, 2011 | Victorio Siqueroli Park, Uberlandia, Minas Gerais, Brazil
These attractively patterned little cocoons seem to be a common sight no matter where I travel. Each one holds the pupa of a parasitic wasp. I’ll often find what’s left of a caterpillar host nearby. The ones I notice are usually suspended by a thread, as here. That’s not always the case though.
Posted in Featured Photos
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Parasitized Brush-footed Butterfly Chrysalis
17mm long | July 5, 2011 | Victorio Siqueroli Park, Uberlandia, Minas Gerais, Brazil
Metamorphosis for this butterfly appears to have been interrupted by a parasite, a small wasp perhaps. You can see the hole where the parasite chewed its way out. Oddly, there’s a similar hole on the other side. Maybe it abandoned this other exit since it looks incomplete. Or maybe there were actually multiple parasites.
Another exit hole?
I know this is the chrysalis of a brush-footed butterfly in the family Nymphalidae because other butterfly families use a a small silken thread around the thorax to help secure it. Here’s an example from an earlier post.
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Chrysalis Surprise
10mm | July 4, 2011 | Tupaciguara, Minas Gerais, Brazil
I collected this little chrysalis while I was in the field the day before I took this photo. I didn’t think I’d be able to get a good photo at the time, and I was curious to see what might emerge. Strangely, looking at this with my own eye, it appears opaque with a silvery and gold surface. With the camera and flash, it appears as above, somewhat transparent and showing what looks like a wing inside. I figured it would only be a short time to see the butterfly that might emerge. Well, I was half right.
Posted in Featured Photos
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Concealed Pupa
23mm | January 20, 2011 | Armonia Nature Preserve, Limon Province, Costa Rica
I noticed a plant whose large leaves had been eaten right down to the leaf ribs. Curiously, portions near the tips had been folded over. I couldn’t resist opening one of those up.
The pupa shown above is what I found inside. The caterpillar’s last head capsule is still attached. The pupa is flipped in the photo above because I opened up the leaf. Normally it would be suspended inside by that thread.
For some reason, the head end of the pupa reminds me of a walrus’s head.
There were quite a few other folded-over leaves, but I was too late to find a caterpillar still fattening itself up.
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Mass Pupation
January 27, 2010 | Caraça Natural Park, Minas Gerais, Brazil
I found one other grouping of exuviae in the area where I found the one above. I’ve never seen anything like this locally. I believe these are from lepidopterans. There is a slight layer of silk on the bark. Up close, I saw some cast off head capsules. Look closely above, and you’ll notice a leg that must have broken off while struggling free.
I know some caterpillars are gregarious as early instars, but I thought they generally went their separate ways as final instars. I thought this was interesting evidence that in at least one species, they pupate and perhaps eclose together.
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Identification Challenge #4
October 8, 2009
Twelvestones, Roswell, GA, USA
I spotted this chrysalis on a tree trunk (looks like some sort of cherry). You can see in the first photo that it blends in pretty well. I took it home to see what would emerge. Something did, late the following April. Any ideas what it was?
This probably won’t help, but I couldn’t resist posting a closeup.
Closeup of spiracles
Posted in Identification Challenges
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Some Army Ant Observations
January 27, 2010 | Caraça Natural Park, Minas Gerais, Brazil
That’s the general scene. I encountered these army ants on the side of the trail towards the end of the afternoon. The odd thing is that I didn’t see much more than what’s shown here. There were a couple of holes in the ground, outside the shot above, but roughly in the upper left and lower right. Despite some searching in the nearby vicinity, I didn’t find any other ant trails. But there were ants streaming in and out of the two holes, forming roughly two paths. The bottom path was moving to the right and the top to the left.
Posted in Featured Photos
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