Ambush Bugs

The sky was ominous this afternoon, but the temperature was a very pleasant 66-degrees.  Other than the usual suspects (chickadees, Purple Finches and nuthatches), there wasn't much avian activity along the Lower Chippewa River State Trail. 

So I decided to take a close look at the few goldenrods still in flower.  They were a-buzz with insects.  I felt some of them before I got close - female mosquitoes, getting in their last licks before the snow flies.  I spotted a few paper wasps, and a pair of what appeared to be copulating bugs with forelegs that reminded me of praying mantis.

Ambush Bugs paired

I've seen them before, but haven't been able to get a photo that could help me with identification.  Determined to get one today, I plucked the couple off the goldenrod and held them in my hand for good look (and better photo).

Was it a male was riding on the back of a larger (and lighter colored) female?  I'd have to figure it out when I got home. 

Ambush Bug

An hour later, I found them on Plate 3 in the Peterson Insects Guide: abdomen wider toward the rear; antenna 4 segmented, last segment swollen:  ambush bugs.

Known for sitting camouflaged on flowers (usually yellow or white), they wait to ambush their prey - the other insects working the flowers:  bees, wasps, flies, bugs and lepidoptera.  These tiny bugs are reported to take arthropods 10 times their size.

How to they do it?  They grab their prey with their modified forelegs and then bite, injecting a chemical that first paralyzes them, then liquefies their insides.  

Next time I see an ambush bug on a flower, I'll look for the lifeless exoskeletons of their prey nearby - on the flower and on the ground below.

Were they mating?  Maybe not.   Male ambush bugs are known for hitching a ride on the female's back as he waits to share in her hunting success.  (When ambush bugs mate, the male is lateroventral, not ventral-dorsal.)

If the pair I photographed today copulate, the female will glue her eggs onto a nearby twig, where they will over-winter and hatch out in May.  

Are they dangerous to handle?  While some references say they don't bite people, others say they do.   Next time, I won't take any chances.  I'll be carrying a glove in my pocket.

Why did the Dung Beetle Cross the Trail?

female Purple Finch

When I walk the Chippewa River State Trail, I'm usually looking up - for birds. 

Today the familiar crunch, crunch of my shoes crushing the hackberry nipple galls attached to the now fallen yellow and brown leaves, made me look down.

Hackberry Nipple Galls

That's when I noticed this quarter-sized irridescent beetle scurrying across the trail, disappearing in the leaf litter.

I'm not afraid of beetles, but this one looked like a mini tank, and I wondered about those reddish-orange comb-like antennae.  It was moving too fast for me to photograph it on the ground, so I threw caution to the wind and picked it up.

I've never taken an entomology course, so I was clueless about how to hold one of these creatures safely (for it and me).  As I was working on getting my camera readied - and holding the beetle in the palm of my hand, it flipped upside-down.

phoretic mites on an earth boring beetle

That's when I noticed a dozen or so little transparent creatures clinging to the beetle's chest.  Hm.  What are they?

They weren't eggs.  They were moving round on that chest.
They weren't "baby" beetles.  Beetles go through complete metamorposis from egg to larvae to pupae to adult.
I found the answer later when I uplinked my photos at www.bugguide.com.

They're phoretic mites.  Phoresy is the term used to describe the relationship between two species where one attaches to the other for transportation.   Harmless to the beetle (and me), these arthropods feed on the eggs of the flies attracted to the same food that the beetle eats.  They hitch-hike on beetles to get from meal to meal.

This beetle, one of more than 600 species world-wide in the Geotrupe family, is one of the earth boring beetles.   Male Geotrupes are are known for dragging decaying and moldy leaf litter, fungi and occasionally dung, into their tunnels.  Then they wait for the females to show up.  After copulation, the female lays her eggs on the food the male has provisioned.

So, what was this beetle doing crossing the trail?

Maybe it was checking out the leaf litter or heading to its next meal.

An Ichneumon Wasp

I don't know what surprised me more today - the unseasonable string of warm days, the wildflowers still in bloom along rural roads in west-central Wisconsin coulees or spotting this black insect on a late flowering Queen Anne's Lace.

I photographed it because I thought it would be easy to identify - the white on the back, tail and antennae.

I was wrong.  I looked through the insect field guide.  I couldn't find it. 

I had to resort to BugGuide.net again.  And again, I got a quick response:  a male Vulgichneumon brevicinctor, one of the most common of the 5,000 or more species of ichneumon wasps in North America.  There may be as many as 100,000 species world-wide, making it the largest of animal families.

Once I got a name, I recalled that I actually had read something about them some time ago.

I'd read that they're not like other wasps.

They're not social.   The females have long ovipositors and use them to lay their eggs in caterpillars.  When the eggs hatch, the larvae of these wasps are parasites.  They convert their hosts into their own personal food factories.

Here's what I found out today:  Ichneumons are species-specific in their choice of hosts.  The female ichneumon uses her antennae to locate a host for her eggs.   (The word ichneumon comes from the Greek word for hunter.)

Because many of their hosts are agricultural pests (caterpillars and beetles) they are considered to be "beneficial" insects.   Some species of ichneumons however, parasitize harmless spiders and other wasps.  One specializes in the aquatic larvae of the caddisfly.  Another pierces wood to reach its host.

When the ichneumon eggs hatch, the larvae feed on the body of the host, keeping the host alive just long enough for them to pupate and for the adult wasp to eat its way out.  (Inspiration for the sci-fi horror film Alien).

The gruesome life cycle of the ichneumon wasp has troubled many naturalists and theologians, including Charles Darwin.   In 1860, Darwin wrote about it in a letter to Asa Gray:


There seems to me too much misery in the world. I cannot persuade myself that a beneficent and omnipotent God would have designedly created the Ichneumonidae with the express intention of their feeding within the living bodies of Caterpillars, or that a cat should play with mice.

You can read more about this in an essay on Nonmoral Nature by Stephen Jay Gould.

By the way, the feeding behavior of adult ichneumon wasps is less disturbing.   They feed on water and flower nectar.

Goldenrod Soldier Beetles

Looking for a breeze and cooler temperatures, I hopped in the Prius and took a spin through the coulees east of the Lower Chippewa River.

Great Lobelia

I didn't find respite from the heat, but I did spot Great Lobelia, several species of goldenrod and a new (for me) insect on the flower of a Cup Plant Silphium perfoliatum, a very tall (6-8 ft), plant that looks like a sunflower, named for the water-catching cup created at the stems where the perfoliate leaves meet.  Look for American Goldfinches getting a drink of water from these cups.

Cup Plant flower

Cup Plant "cup"

I could identify the flower from a distance, but not the insects.

At first glance the copulating insects looked like fireflies.  When I got close enough to take a photo, I didn't see the luminous abdomens of lightning bugs.  I'd need a good photo and some time with the Peterson Field Guide to the Insects.

When I got home, I went to the insect guide and looked up lightning bugs.  My mystery insect was right there - on the same page, one beetle to the right:  a Goldenrod Soldier Beetle, Chauliognathus pennsylvanicus.

While I've never noticed them before, according to Extension entomologists they're common this time of year.

There are more than 1,000 species of Soldier Beetles world-wide, less than 200 in the US.  Also known as Pennsylvania Leatherwings, their soft wings are leather-like.  The name "soldiers" comes from their color patterns which resemble a military uniform.  Look for them on goldenrod flowers.

The adults are omnivorous, they feed on pollen, nectar, grasshopper eggs, maggots, small caterpillars and aphids. 

They overwinter as larvae.  Like Box Elder Bugs, they can be a nuisance when they end up in your basement looking for a place to over-winter.

Spittlebugs

I noticed the first spittlebugs of the season yesterday when I was checking bluebird nest boxes over on Kings Highway.   I recognized the "spit," but I didn't know anything about the animal that made it.

Here's what I discovered:

The familiar "spit" is created by the nymphs of the Froghopper Bug (Cercopidae) of which there are more than 20,000 species world-wide.  It's been reported that the name "froghopper" comes from their resemblance to a frog.  I took a close look at a couple of nymphs in the spittle, but didn't see the "frog face."  (I'll have to find an adult to see if they're the source of the frog-like reference). 

The name might also have something to do with this bug's jumping prowess.   A neurobiologist in England recently discovered that the froghopper bug accelerates from the ground with a force of 400 times greater than gravity, making it the world's greatest leaper.

But back to the spittle.   The bubble froth only looks like spit - it's actually secreted from the other end.

So... what does crawling around in spit do for them?

The wingless nymphs hide in it.  (Ants are their major predator).  The fluid may also keep them hydrated and insulated while they feed on plant sap.

But like tent caterpillars, it's their "look" that gets some people worried.  They are, however, harmless to humans and don't cause any major damage to plants.  If you find them on your strawberries, flowers and trees - resist the temptation to pull out the pesticides.  If you feel you have to do something - just pull out the hose and spray them away.

A Day of Firsts

The sun came out and the sky turned blue around noon.   The temperature hit a record 66º.

After a week of chilly gray weather, it was as though someone flipped the "What Season Is It?" switch from "winter" to "spring."  Ironic we should have such great weather on the day we set the clocks ahead one hour.

A wonderful welcome to daylight savings time!

The sky was full of bugling Sandhill Cranes, aerial duets of Bald Eagles, and the conk-ker-ees of Red-winged Blackbirds.

I spotted a huge turtle, looking dazed as it pushed through the muck along the Chippewa River State Trail a mile north of Tarrant Park in Durand.  

Willow buds were bursting full of silvery pussy toes and wine-red skunk cabbage flowers pushed though the muck on both sides of the trail.

Winter Crane Flies were swarming all over the Little Bear Creek bridge.  These harmless diptera (true flies) are often seen on warm, sunny winter days.  The short-lived adults live to breed.  They're snack food for birds, amphibians, spiders and other insects.  The larvae live in the leaf litter and help break it down into soil.

On the way back to the parking lot, a surprise find...

A dead mouse, just down the trail from where I turned around.  How I missed it was a mystery.  It wasn't "fresh," but it hadn't been mauled.  Maybe a fox or a raptor dropped it?

Later in the afternoon, we headed over to Silver Birch County Park to check out the tree buds.  I slammed on the brakes when I spotted my first of the year mourning cloak butterfly flitting along side the still-frozen lake.

No doubt about, today was the first day of spring 2010.

Identity Theft

I bought a "serious" insect "sweep net" a couple of years ago.  I use it to catch butterflies and other insects so I can identify and photograph them.

I went on line and found the net I wanted at BioQuip Products, an entomology equipment supplier I found on the Entomological Society of America's website.  Everything was fine until last Friday.   The bad news came in the mail.

I almost tossed the letter without opening it.   It looked like "junk" mail.  But my curiosity got the better of me.  Good thing it did.

The letter, dated October 19 was addressed:  Dear BioQuip Customer.

Re: Compromise of Credit Card Information.

(Yikes!  And to think, I almost tossed it.)

"We are contacting you about a recent incident at BioQuip.  We have learned that our computer web server, which contains records of customer purchases, was breached by someone outside the United States, on or about September 14, 2009... as a result, the person... gained access to your name address, phone number, email address, credit card number ... and credit card expiration date...  Upon discovering the breach, BioQuip immediately implemented additional security measures..."

This happened two months ago (and probably explains all the junk emails I've been getting in Russian).

The rest of the letter explained what BioQuip is doing, and what I should do (call my card issuer and add a 90-day fraud alert to my credit files at Experian, Equifax and TransUnion - then check my credit reports regularly).

I guess I've been lucky - so far.