shaw nature reserve – A Thousand Acres of Silphiums

Pollinators of Spicebush

bill duncan, macro, Uncategorized, wildlife photography

Sawfly – Tenthredinidae – *Dolerus neoagcistus*

With some extra nature time last week, I hit the trails at Shaw Nature Reserve hoping to get some shots of Claytonia virginica (spring beauty) being visited by its pollinators – particularly the small solitary Halactid bees. The problem I had on this day is that these bees don’t typically like to be very active on cloudy, grey days. There were a few flies visiting the spring ephemerals, but they were much to flighty to bother with. So, I decided to give some attention to the Lindera benzoin (spicebush) that were blooming in abundance along the river bottom trails. My goal then became to document the pollinators that visit this early-blooming bush.

One of the more obvious of these pollinators that I found was this sawfly. This is my best guess on identification. This sawfly was quite small and by the looks of it, is quite an efficient pollinator.

Probably the most abundant pollinator I came across were these Tachinid flies (again, flies are difficult and I could be wrong).

The hair-like setae that probably serve to aid the fly in responding to changing air pressures also serve as nice holders to move pollen from flower to flower.

I also found a number of multicolored asian lady beetles (Harmonia axyridis). Typically predators of aphids, these beetles are also known to feed on pollen. This is what I figure was going on in the image below. Since there are probably few aphids to be found during the early spring, with few leaves being available, pollen is the next best protein source. I suppose there could be aphids to be found hiding within the flowers, but did not inspect closely enough.

Multicolored Asian Lady Beetle – Coccinellidae – *Harmonia axyridis*

Probably my favorite find of the day were several flies of the family Empididae. These are fascinating flies that are primarily predatory, but a few taxa will visit flowers to feed on nectar or pollen.

Dagger fly – Empididae – *Empis* or *Hilara* genus

Within this family are at least a few where the females will not hunt themselves, instead relying on a “nuptial gift” of a prey item from a male. Males of some species will wrap their gift in a silk wrapper. In these taxa the sex roles will often be reversed – the females courting the males to get these gifts and the opportunity to mate. In at least one species, the females will inflate themselves grossly with air to give herself the appearance of being bound with eggs and fecund, to trick the male into thinking she is a prime candidate to provide his gift and have the opportunity to mate with.

At least one species has taken this system a step further. The males no longer provide a prey wrapped in its decorative covering, but simply provide the silken covering, or balloon, giving them the name “balloon flies”. The photo below provides a good look at the dagger-like moth parts that give these guys another of their common names. Another overlooked beneficial fly. Not only do these guys prey on mosquitoes and other potential pest insect species, but their larvae are also predatory, feeding on insects in the soil and leaf litter.

I’ll leave you with one final image. This one isn’t a pollinator of the spicebush, but potentially feeds on its leaves in summer. What I believe this to be is a (Camptonotus carolinensis) Carolina leaf roller that was parasitized by one of the “zombie fungi”, potentially Cordyceps sometime last summer or early fall. This poor cricket was infected with this fungi that took control of its “mind”, forcing it it to climb high up on a branch of the spicebush. Once there, the fungi used the cricket’s resources to fruit and spread its spores from this higher location in order to reinfect others.

Until next time…
-OZB

From the Network that Brought You Tiny House Nation…

macro, Species Spotlight, Uncategorized, wildlife photography

…comes the newest in reality based, sustainable living instructional programming: Corruption Construction!

In a previous post I wrote a bit about the Warty Leaf Beetle (Neochlamisus gibbosus), a member of the Cryptocephalinae subfamily. Fascinating due to the fact that the adult form seems to be a perfect mimic of caterpillar frass, this species is much more interesting than I had imagined.

Warty Leaf Beetle - Chrysomelidae - Neochlamisus gibbosus. Adult hotographed at Shaw Nature Reserve — Warty Leaf Beetle – Chrysomelidae – Neochlamisus gibbosus. Adult photographed at Shaw Nature Reserve, MO.

This species is highly, if not solely, associated with blackberry as a host plant. While watching these guys and looking for other insects on these plants I kept noticing gall-like structures, usually on the undersides of the leaves.

Warty Leaf Beetle - Chrysomelidae - Neochlamisus gibbosus. Larval scatoshell. Photographed at Shaw Nature Reserve, MO. — Warty Leaf Beetle – Chrysomelidae – Neochlamisus gibbosus. Larval scatoshell. Photographed at Shaw Nature Reserve, MO.

Paying closer attention, I noticed that these structures were not galls, nor were they attached directly to the plant tissue – they moved. On closer inspection, I could sometimes see the legs of the creature that resided within the house.

Warty Leaf Beetle - Chrysomelidae - Neochlamisus gibbosus — Warty Leaf Beetle – Chrysomelidae – Neochlamisus gibbosus. Larval scatoshell. Photographed at Shaw Nature Reserve, MO.

I had to crack one open to see if I could get an idea of what sort of organism built and resided within. As you can see in the photograph below, the animal appeared to be a beetle larvae.

It took me a while to put it together, but eventually I confirmed that the larvae belonged to the same species as the adult beetles that I observed all over the blackberries. My next question was, on what materials did the larvae use to build its shelter? Usually, an insect will use detritus or perhaps fresh plant tissue that it processes to make a protective enclosure like this. These guys do it a bit differently.

It starts with mom. As she oviposits, she encases each egg with a layer of her own feces and some rectal secretions. As the larvae hatches and grows, it continues to expand its home by building with its own feces to accommodate its increasing bulk. Here is a photo of an adult and larvae close together.

References and Further Reading

Shiny Flea Beetle

macro

While investigating a patch of Maypop (Passiflora incarnata) I could not find my goal of the Passion Flower Flea Beetle, but I was still happy to find a number of Shiny Flea Beetles – Chrysomelidae – Asphaera lustrans.

IMG_6358 - Shiny Flea Beetle - Chrysomelidae - Asphaera lustrans — Shiny Flea Beetle – Chrysomelidae – Asphaera lustrans, Shaw Nature Reserve, MO

IMG_6343 - Shiny Flea Beetle - Chrysomelidae - Asphaera lustrans — Shiny Flea Beetle – Chrysomelidae – Asphaera lustrans, Shaw Nature Reserve, MO

Ruby-crowned Kinglet – The Self-winding Music Box

birds, wildlife photography

Beginning in the first few days of April, Ruby-crowned Kinglets move northward through the St. Louis region on their way up to their eventual nesting grounds of the Canadian boreal forests.

Moving through our area this early allows for nice opportunities for watching and photography before our deciduous trees have begun leafing out. Although described by Pete Dunne as “A bird that moves like spit on a skillet”, if patient, the nature photographer can find brief periods where even these birds will stop and have a look around.

When flitting through the branches looking for their insect prey, the intense scarlet-colored crown patch can be difficult to spot. But with camera and patience, this spot that the birds use to aggressively communicate with other Kinglets, can be seen.

The song of the RCKI I find to be quite special. These guys typically start with a couple or three wind-up notes that lead to a wren-like jumble of rapidly progressing complexity. A welcome sound of spring.

See you in the fall... — See you in the fall…

The Kinglets have mostly removed themselves from the Show-Me State by now. They will return this fall following their nesting season and there will be folks with lenses of all sorts looking to find that ruby-red crown.

-OZB

Winter has Finally Come!

birds, wildlife

No, I’m not referring to that no account, poor excuse of a season we witnessed a few months back. What I was finally able to do was capture a few pics of a Winter Wren. I have never been able to get more than a fleeting glance at this skulking bird as it somehow is able to hide by rarely moving more than a few feet off the ground. This spring, however, I was in the right place (Shaw Nature Reserve) and was lucky to find a few of these birds and follow them long enough to get a few poor quality images.

With more than 35 recognized subspecies, the Winter Wren has an enormous range and is the only member of the wren family to be found outside of the Americas.

According to NatGeo, “Per unit weight the Winter Wren delivers its song with 10 times more power than a crowing rooster”. I was able to hear the quite complex and rapid musical songs as I watched one or two of these birds foraging. I could tell they were merely partial songs and not delivered with full attention and voice as is often the case of migrating birds, but I was still awed by the sounds.

The photo above focuses on the quite short tail of the Winter Wren, a distinguishing and obvious field mark.

Although the next photo is quite poor, I like that it captured the typical squat, egg-like shape of the bird.

Finally, I thought I would add an image of a House Wren that I took on the same day, the first of this species that I found this spring. Notice the much longer tail and the lack of any barring pattern on the flanks forward of the legs. A generally paler bird.

-OZB

Fragrant Water Lilies

Uncategorized

Here is a series of the freshly blooming Fragrant Water Lilies (Nymphaeaceae – Nymphaea odorata) taken at Shaw Nature Reserve this past summer. I converted these to look like oil paintings using Photoshop CS6.

Fragrant Water Lilies - 2 — Fragrant Water Lilies – 2

This plant uses an interesting pollination strategy. Insects are attracted to the flower and land on the concave tip of the ovary which contains a small amount of liquid. If the insect has visited another lily flower previously, then the pollen it is carrying gets washed off in this fluid and pollinates the flower. Often, the insect pollinator (usually small, native bees) will not be able to escape this small pool before the flower closes for the night and will therefore drown. See Steyermark’s Flora of Missouri by George Yatskievych for more details on these interesting wetland plants.

Water Lilies - 3 — Fragrant Water Lilies – 3

Thanks for visiting…
-OZB

A Straight-snouted Weevil

macro, wildlife

Almost reflexively, I pull the baby rattle-shaped seed pod from the stately White Wild Indigo (Baptisia alba) as I meander through Shaw Nature Reserve’s prairie trails. I can’t help it. I make sure the pods are always black, mature and any seeds left unravaged I simply help to disperse along my walk. But in doing this so often in the late summer and autumn for so many years I have come to notice that this common forb cannot disperse many seed. Because, inside the seed pods, like the one pictured above, I usually find multiple seed predators – the short-snouted weevils, Trichapion rostrum (Family Brentidae).

Baptisia seed are favored among other insects as well, but what they may lose in this stage of life, they pick up as they grow, for the false indigo are long-lived, drought-tolerant perennials that contain large amounts of secondary compounds that make them absolutely unpalatable to grazing mammals. The photo below shows these tiny beetles (3.0 – 3.5 mm) among the husks of a number of seeds. I have not been able to find a source that suggests if both larvae and adults feed on these seeds, or just one of the growth stages.

Here is an image of a couple, shortly after I split their double-wide…

It's the Visitors, Martha! — It’s the Visitors, Martha!

These little one have been a source of fascination for me. I hope to learn more about them someday.

-OZB