Arizona: Beetles, Bugs, Birds and more

Bush Katydid, Scudderia sp., nymph,

Leaf Beetle, Griburius montezuma

Metallic Wood Boring Beetle, Acmaeodera griffithi

Wide Mouth Weevil, Ophryastes sordidus

Mesquite Longhorn Beetle, Aethecerinus latecinctus

Ironcross Beetle Tegrodera aloga

Blister Beetle, Nemognath sp.

Mating Treehoppers, Vanduzea laeta

When I think of spider wasps, usually the big Tarantula Hawk (Pepsis or Hemipepsis) comes to mind first. They are the most impressive members of the family Pompilidae or Spider Wasps. Huge, colorful, rating three out of four on Justin O. Schmitd's pain index scale ...and we have many more species of the same family here in Arizona. I am finally learning to recognize them by their sturdy shape and the spurs on their hind tibiae, even when they are not dragging their name-giving prey around.

When caught and stung, the spider is paralyzed by the wasp's venom. The adult wasp will not feed from its prey but store it in a hole, dug by the wasp or often even by the spider itself if she was ground-dwelling. The solitary wasp will lay one egg on the spider and over time the wasp larva will develop, slowly eating the paralyzed spider alive. The wasp larva will then pupate and later emerge from the burrow as an adult.

Most primitive Hymenoptera follow this pattern. Provisioning the larvae with a nectar/pollen mix as practised by bees and some wasps is considered a phylogenetically higher development, as is the cooperative raising of the brood by several or many related females in the social wasp, bee and ant species.
.

Isodontia elegans with a katidid

Like the Pompilidae, wasp in the family Sphecidae (Thread-wasted Wasps) also provision their brood with paralyzed prey. Every species in this family targets its own very narrow range of prey species. In an earlier blog I have described the two closely related Chlorion spp., the Steel-blue Cricket Hunter and the Cyaneus Roach Hunter that are easier to identify by their prey preferences than by their looks.

Ammophila sp., I imagine that the long abdomen serves as a counter-weight for the long-bodied caterpillars that the members of this genus have to transport

As a family Sphecides (Tread-waisted Wasps) can be easily recognized by the extremely elongate and thin waste, or petiolate abdomen, that all member-species have in common. It provides the wasp with the flexibilty to bring the stinger at the end of the abdomen forward to sting the prey insect that she is holding with her long legs.

While some Sphecids like Ammophila build rather simple ground nests that they close by pushing sand over the opening with their foreheads, others, like Isodontia (Gass Carrier Wasps) close the entrance with a plug of specially collected grass cuttings.

Other family members build far more elaborate structures. Last winter, Randy and our friend Frank watched a wasp flying repeatedly into the water heater cabinet on the side of Frank's house. When they finally told me, the wasp was gone but a cluster of mud cylinders, one of them still open, was attached to a waterline. To my relief it was the line that feeds the swamp cooler, so the young wasps were in no danger of being cooked alive when Lyn and Frank were taking a hot shower.
I kept visiting the nest ever now and then, planning to eventually wrap it in gauze to catch at least one of the inhabitants.
From December to March nothing happened.

In mid April (yesterday), there was suddenly a second hole in the clump of hardened mud, and something seemed to be going on in the cylinder that was always open. When a slender black and yellow wasps suddenly emerged I wasn't prepared and only got a very blurry photo before he disappeared. By now I sensed that things would quickly begin to happen in the other chambers, too, so I removed the whole nest carefully and brought it home (to our bedroom where the light is best).

Black and Yellow Mud Dauber, Sceliphron caementarium, emerging

I heard buzzing from at least two chambers. I now see that I positioned the nest up-side down, that may have aggravated the kids. The noise made me wonder: to buzz like that, they must be already clad in a well-hardened exoskeleton. No wonder Number One had made such a fast exit. But now I was ready.
Soon moist spots appeared where two cylinders were plugged with concrete-hard mud. Next a pair of mandibles pushed through and cut out a circular area which then fell outward. The head showed, the front legs, and seconds later the whole wasp emerged: A Black and Yellow Mud Dauber,
Sceliphron caementarium.This one took off right away, too.

The next one allowed me to get my little camera ready for a short birthday video:

Here is a link to the flickr version of the same video. I think the quality there is somewhat better than the blogger-direct-upload and not as cluttered as u-tube

Empty cocoon left in the chamber, spider leg top left side

Removing the sidewall from the now empty chambers I found the empty, parchment like pupal cocoon and a single spider leg. A female Black and Yellow Mud Dauber catches spiders of many different species to stock the nursery before she lays one egg in each cylinder. There is another, related Mud Dauber that preys manly on Black Widow Spiders. Our healthy young wasps had finished all their provisions before they pupated. So I am very grateful to Gary R. McClellan for allowing me to use his images of a Black and Yellow Mud Dauber nest that he opened before the wasp larvae had eaten the spiders. The photos clearly show the variaty of spider species in the wasp nest.


Prey assembled in the nest of Sceliphron caementarium (Black and Yellow Mud Dauber) Photos by Gary R McClellan

Sceliphron caementarium

Atkins versus High Glucose diet:
While the growing larvae needed to build up their bodies and hence lived on a high protein diet, adult Mud Daubers need fast burning calories for their high energy flight muscles. Their live now centers on finding a partner, building a mud house, and hunting. To support this lifestyle they are nectaring on flowers, especially on those easily accessable ones of the parsley and carrot type (Umbelifera). For lack of any wildflowers I offered Lantana to our kids, but they didn't like it at all and buzzed off. There are always our hummingbird feeders...

Sceliphron caementarium

Classification: Hymenoptera (Ants, Bees, Wasps and Sawflies)» Aculeata - Bees, Ants, and Stinging Wasps» Apoid Wasps (Apoidea)- traditional Sphecidae» Sphecidae (Thread-waisted Wasps)» Sceliphrinae» Sceliphrini» Sceliphron» Sceliphron caementarium (Black and Yellow Mud Dauber)

Yes, I know. The first of May is a funny date to start this attempt to record some phenological data for our area in SE Arizona. I think there is still enough of my northern European upbringing in me to feel that this date is special. I will try to begin every month with a little summary of the season's best observations that haven't made it into a blog of their own.

So here goes:

Iron Cross Beetles, Tegrodera aloga, in Sabino Canyon, April 27 2013, Photo by Ned Harris

All week in Sabino Canyon we found big groups of mating and feeding Iron Cross Beetles. Most of them congregated around nearly dried up Whooly Star plants.

Gambel's Quail, Callipepla gambelii, with chicks

Yesterday, April 30, the first very tiny baby Gambel's Quail. The parents made such a ruckus that I actually went and checked whether it was a snake alarm. But eventually they coaxed some very young chicks out of the brush, so I knew what the excitement was about.

Centris pallida on Ironwood and Centris rhodopus on White Ratanay

The first Saguaros bloom and the first Ironwoods are covered in pink. The deep humm of Centris bees can be heard from a distance. Centri pallida visits the leguminous trees, the flowers of the White Ratany and Creosote are attracting the darker Centris rhodopus.

Mesquite flowers in Saguaro National Park West are covered in mating Netwing Beetles of the genus Lucaina, and the first Lycus sanguinea showed up, too. No group leks for this species.

Creosote Bush Katydid, Insara covilleae, nymph

I also found a very camouflaged last instar nymph of the Creosote Bush Katydid, Insara covilleae, feeding, as it should, on creosote leaves.

Enallagma civile (Familiar Bluet)

At a pond at the Desert Museum, another nymph had just left its old skin and its former element behind to spread its wings as a Damsel Fly. But first it had to patiently wait until its teneral paleness transformed itself into the beautiful color of an adult Bluet.

Today: May 1, the first Lesser Nighthawk swooped out of his hiding spot in a Palo Verde in the State Land. In the evening they were courting, a pair gracefully dancing over our backyard while continuously making a sound like a melodious purr.

White-throated Swifts Aeronautes saxatalis) adapted from a photo by Alexander Viduetski

In the morning four White-throated Swifts were also very active over our yard, but their shrill, twittering calls drove the dogs crazy and their ballet soon deteriorated into a wing-on-wing battle, with two of them (a couple, two males??) tumbling repeatedly all the way to the ground. I had never before seen them do anything but catch bugs so high above that they seemed to belong to another reality...not earthbound as they suddenly seemed. The things we do for sex...

Prickly Pear Cacti and Chollas are in full bloom. The flowers are full of Diadasia bees, the digger bees that are specialised on cactus flowers.

Little swarm of feral, Africanized Honey Bees. The wandering swarm (left) is very peaceful and approachable. The one that found a cavity in the saguaro will build a hive there and then may get aggressively territorial

This year we seem to have fewer feral Honey Bees than usual. Our Africanized version is not as freeze tolerant as the European stock (that's why they never became a problem in Europe and further north in the US, just here in the Southwest where the winters are usually warm). The species is otherwise very robust and there are enough bees left to increasetheir population again to compete with our native bees.

Male Black-tailed Gnatcatcher

From my studio window I'm watching the antics of four or five fledgling Black-tailed Gnatcatchers. They are probably learning to glean the Palo Verde tree for small caterpillars of the Palo Verde Looper.

Palo Verde Looper, Faculta inequalis

The adult moths are coming to my black-light at night where they are eagerly awaited by several small Red-spotted Toads who were joined last night by the first huge Sonoran Desert Toad.

Western Banded Gecko, Coleonyx variegatus

I have never seen a Banded Gecko this big and colorful. I think he must be in his mating-season best!

Western Corsair, Rasahus biguttatus

The Western Corsair is an impressive Assassin Bug. He is fast, nicely marked, night-active, and a hunter of other insects. He runs them down, paralyzes them with his poisonous bite and sucks up their liquified tissues.

But there is something else in the picture that is at least as important as this predator for the ecosystem that we call desert: the cryptobiotic soil crust, those dark green specks he is walking on.

The spots are communities of cyanobacteria, green algae, lichens, mosses, liverworts, and other microorganisms that colonize the surface of bare soil. "Cryptobiotic" means "hidden life." This crusts in our backyard goes mostly unnoticed. and does not even look alive when it is very dry (as it usually is). When it rains enough, though, the crust looks greener and more three-dimensional, like many little mounds of moss. There are more impressive and well studied examples in moister shaded areas in many national parks. But this unassuming variaty that covers the drier desert habitats may be of special importance and is probably the most fragile.

Haboob over Eloy AZ

The crust is vital to the health of soils and ecosystems.
It holds the soil in place and protects underlying sediments from erosion. Lately we have seen our mountains disappear behind dust clouds that were blown in all the way from the Californian desert were agricultural use has laid the soil bare. Last year haboob clouds rose up horrifyingly from the Phoenix area. The thin living layer that covers undisturbed desert soil can prevent many of these events, but it is very fragile. Agriculture, development, motor vehicles, even grazing cattle will destroy it. Also, I am not sure how the current ongoing drought conditions will impact it. Once disturbed it may take decades for the fragile system to grow back to its former productivity, even under 'normal' weather conditions.

Where the layer is intact it can be the first start of organic soil development on bare inorganic sediments, absorbing water and, through photosynthesis and fixation of atmospheric nitrogen, enriching the surface with nutrients and organic matter. This in turn creates a favorable environment for seeds to germinate and for insects and other soil organisms to live. For more info and great photos go to this link.

Here in the arid Southwest we are learning the hard way that this fragile, living component of our soil deserves diligent protection. As a kid in Germany I would not have thought that I would ever come to value this kind of ground cover so much. I remember that there was a particularly shady area in the yard behind my grandmother's house where we were not supposed to play because the ground was slimy and green and to our mothers 'full of germs' (these were the sixties). But I did see my first liverworts (probably Marchantia sp.) there and marveled at their shapeless not-quite-floral not-quite-fungal existence that sometimes did give hints of a higher organization. Even at four years old (the house was sold when I was five) it peaked my curiosity.

I'm going to be out of the country for a short while without access to my blog, I expect. So this is an opportunity to publish a few short blogs that were planned but not executed before. For example, when I found those big Bot Flies in Sabino Canyon they exited me and a very select few of my entomologist friends to the point, that a much more popular monster was left by the wayside. Literally: just watch him walking along.

Our Gila Monsters were unusually visible this year, at least in Sabino Canyon. For several weeks the Group of the Friends of Sabino Canyon met on or two on each of their Wednesday hikes. No idea whether it was the same individual that took a liking to the group? I think the monsters are rather oblivious of people. Mostly they want food at this time. After all, they spend most of the year under ground, hiding from drought and food shortage between the rainy seasons.
When they are out, they gobble up whole clutches of quail eggs, whole litters of rat pinkies...I once surprised one that was chewing down a whole rather grown-up pack rat. This venomous lizard (the only in the US) has to chew with their formidable jaws to release venom along a grove in their teeth.

On the lower jaw of my friend here you can see the big, bulging glands. Although I didn't get my nose too close to him, after all, Gila Monsters are said to suddenly lunge, bite, and then hold on for good, I noticed a peculiar chemical smell - ok, all smells are chemical, but his perfume seemed nearly inorganic: a little like chlorine in a pool... A pheromone? It is mating season.

The smell of his poisonous droolings? But he wasn't drooling. He was only testing the air with his forked purple tongue. He was certainly not interested in me or my hiking boot standing between him and whatever he had to do before going into hiding once more.

So I'm finally back to blog-writing after an excellent, exciting, 8 day trip to Costa Rica. For the following week I was busy trying to identify my hundreds of Costa Rican bug photos and posting them on Flickr. Right then Yahoo decided to really make things difficult for those of us who value information as much as pretty pictures...Oh, well, there is no way I can move my 17 000 pictures with all their ids and collection info, so I'm staying with Flickr.
Last week, my last art show for the season, the Phippen Museum Western Art Show and Sale in Prescott required a lot of preparation - and it (the sales) turned out so much better than expected! It was great fun, too, with beautiful art, artist friends from all over the country, warm hospitality of the Phippen Family and a greatly expanded Museum...more about it on my Watercolor Blog.

But now a big shout-out for the people who organized my Costa Rica adventure, Mark Deering (US) and Ernesto Rodriguez (CR).
Mark had advertised this tour on Facebook. According to his own background it was geared towards ecologists with special interest in insects. (In fact, most of the participants were managers of American and European butterfly houses) The proceeds would go partly to the butterfly farm El Bosque Nuevo in Guanacaste whose manager Ernesto was our other competent guide.

Palo Verde National Park

This was Mark and Ernesto's first attempt at organizing eco-tours. While they certainly didn't lack professionalism where it was needed, they handled the whole trip more like an adventure among good friends or a family outing than a business venture. From the time we set foot on CR soil to the time our planes took off again, we were all taken care of so completely that I never got around to exchanging and using any of my spending money.
On arrival and departure days Mark was constantly shuttling between hotel and Liberia Airport because we all arrived at different times. Still, he even filled every minute of the waiting time for early arrivals with trips to nature parks and beach...
Mark was joined on this trip by his mother who very much enjoyed herself. She had brought along a step-counter and found out that the bouncy dirt roads that we were traveling by car added many miles to her daily activity count.

During the entire trip there was no down time. Excursions covered different habitats, from riparian areas with waterfalls, to dry forest, cloud forest, places that reminded of deserts, the beach, volcanoes ... always interspersed by opportunities to take a refreshing dip in a hot spring or a clear creek between fern trees and mossy rocks where basilisks were staring at us.

The diversity of the natural world was breath taking. All participants were accomplished naturalists and so many trained eyes were spotting White Witches, iguanas, army ants, monkeys, Puff Birds, Motmots and Trogons in nearly every tree. Cameras were clicking constantly, the collecting of specimens is mostly prohibited in CR.
So Mark and Ernesto kept us busy. From early morning bird walks to nightly (!) bug-lighting there was a constant stream of interesting activities and we only sat down to travel to new destinations and for scrumptious meals. The delicious Costa Rican cuisine consists of fresh fruit, rice and beans, freshly caught fish and grass-fed beef, did I mention rice and beans?

El Bosque Nuevo, Butterfly Farm

The warmest hospitality greeted us at the Butterfly Farm El Bosque Nuevo itself. In the beautiful airy building constructed of homegrown teak we felt at home within hours. The people living and working there seemed a great community and took us in like old friends. They showed us their intricate work with beautiful butterflies, caterpillars and their host plants, and fragile pupae that were prepared for shipment to butterfly houses all over the world.
Ernesto shared the difficult history of a farm struggling to be ecologically sustainable but yet profitable enough to nurture the little community that depends on it. After little success with teak production, butterfly farming seems to be a profitable solution that is easy on the environment and in fact allows the owners to return much of the plantation area to a natural state and even buy surrounding areas to be protected as a preserve.

After three nights at the farm we spent two nights at a hotel at the foot of the active volcano Rincon de la Vieja. The mountain sides are covered in beautiful old-growth cloud forest. Smelly gases bubble from mud pools and hot springs. I hope I get around to detailed descriptions of our hike there. But I also very much enjoyed the gardens of the hotel shaded by flame trees, where trogons greeted us in the morning, parrots screamed in the canopy and jacanas stalked around a pond full of mating Cane Toads (I know, ecologically disastrous, but fascinating). Some of the best beetles showed up at the black light there.

The last two days took us to a very nice beach for snorkling (wear t-shirts in the water, most of us got sun burned, because one ALWAYS forgets the time when the puffer fish are being really cute!) and to a new, posh resort in a desert-like dry area. Close by, lush jungle in a deep-cut canyon provided a most striking contrast, complete with Howler Monkeys and Anolis.
So during our trip we were introduced to many extremely different habitats even though it all happened within only one state, Guanacaste, so we never entered the true rainforest on the Atlantic side of the country.

Overall, I find it difficult to chose what I liked best. Black lighting in three incredibly rich habitats with fellow insect enthusiasts like Mark Deering and Marty Feathers was definitely among the highlights (especially since Mark sacrificed himself to absorb most of the stings of those hyper-night-active Costa Rican wasps and bees.) Hours of riding with Ernesto in his truck, watching old Costa Rican cowboys (every Costa Rican boy once wanted to be one), learning about the huge Brahman cattle ranches, butterfly breeding on small family farms, citrus orchards, rice fields, volcanic ash layers, endemic grasses that were mostly just roughage for the cattle and should be replaced by more nutritious grasses- which reminded me vividly of our AZ buffel grass problem - made the whole experience very real and personal.

What I didn't like: how fast the time flew by. I guess I just have to go back next year.

Artistic freedom: the ptarmigan covey is flushed. A good bird dog would NOT do that, he'd just freeze on point

In the late eighties I studied circulatory adaptations in the brood patch of Ptarmigan in Norway. To find these secretive birds, I often relied on the sensitive noses and natural pointing instinct of bird dogs. Every family in Trondheim seemed to own a couple of Setters or Pointers.

Pointing Gambel's Quail family click for better video quality

To my surprise, I recently observed very similar pointing behavior not in dogs, but in Gambel's Quail. Coincidentally, these birds are close relatives of the northern Ptarmigan. Both species are galliformes, chicken like ground dwellers with short wings, strong running legs, and strong family bonds that outlast the breeding season so you find them all year round in their typical coveys.

This morning I watched a couple with two fairly grown chicks at the feeding station in front of my studio window. They were long and thin with excitement, their necks stretched and their beaks pointing. They held this pose and focused on a spot on the ground that from my view point was obscured by a rock and an agave. Clearly the chicks were learning to fine tune their maybe instinctive pointing by this concerted effort. In social animals, learning and memory are facilitated by highly-emotional situations. These chicks were learning their lesson well.
But what was triggering the excitement? Different from most bird mobs these guys were quiet and the other bird species were not drawn into the melee. The Mourning Dove seems hardly interested, the Thrasher keeps eating, only a sparrow seems ready to chime in.

Diamondback Rattler

But I got up from my desk and got my snake stick knowing exactly what was hiding under the agave. A Diamondback Rattler was tightly curled, absorbing heat from the warm sand and the morning sun. It is now so hot during the day that he is most likely night-active. The feeding station is visited at night by rodents, so this is a popular spot for rattlers.

This one was a small guy and his rattle didn't make any sounds. The small ones tend to wander straight west from that location, right into our dog run. So we decided to move him several hundred meters north. When he resumes his journey next night, he will hopefully bypass our house and the dog beds.

This year the insect enthusiasts and members of the BugGuide community will hold their annual get together at the Santa Rita Experimental Range (SRER) in Arizona on July 25 to 28, 2013.

View into Florida Canyon from the SRER

The SRER is located in Florida Canyon in the Santa Rita Mountains, in the heart of SE Arizona, one of the most arthropod-species rich areas of the United States. Located in the juniper-oak belt of this sky island the station provides easy access Florida, Madera and Montosa Canyon and to habitats ranging from dry grasslands to high elevation mixed conifer stands. SRER not only provides us wirh affordable bunk style housing, but also with great meeting facilities and electricity and space for black lighting. The station is part of the experimental range of the University of Arizona.

Caterpillars from a night hike at the SRER

U of A Professor Wendy Moore, curator of the Insect Collection of the University of Arizona (UAIC), functions as our official host who made the use of the station possible.

Since it was conceived in 2005 by Troy Bartlett, Mike Boone, and Pat Coin, BugGuide has developed from an on-line identification help into a citizen science project par excellence. It is now hosted by John K. VanDyk at Iowa State University. Daily thousands of contributions come in from all over the US and Canada, a devoted team of volunteer experts works tirelessly on identifications, and the collected data are easily accessable for lay people and experts alike. I know a number of scientists who value BugGuide as a source of first hand distribution information, links to collectors, and identified on-line images that can be licensed from the individual photographers.

Wendy Moore at the U of A (a land grant university) has been promoting the local insect collection (UAIC) as a museum for the public and has made many efforts to further public interest in insects, their ecology, and their natural history. She has been instrumental in the creation of the very popular Arizona Insect Festival and is actively supporting many citizen science projects like for example the BioBlitz in the local Saguaro National Park and the online Encyclopedia of Life. So when the BugGuide community needed a sponsor in the U of A faculty to be able to use the SRER, Wendy was the obvious person to turn to and she graciously agreed.

The BugGuide Gathering 2013 in Arizona will be an opportunity for established BugGguide members to finally meet each other or see each other again in an environment full of opportunity to find bugs, hike, black light, get sun burned, and mostly to enjoy each others company. With Troy Barlett and Patrick Coin we will have two of the founding members of BugGuide at the meeting!
But we also hope that many newer BugGuide members can take the opportunity to get into the field with a lot of the experts who have been identifying so many of their entries over the years. We will let them in on the secrets of finding our favorite bugs in desert and mountains and let them watch how we get puzzeled by new unexpected finds. It should be great fun! BugGuide members, please sign up by going to the BG home page, column on the left, Gathering in AZ 2013, then click on 'My Account' to input your info and choices, which will appear under 'Who is coming' (make sure you are logged into your account).

Eric Eaton, Robyn Waayers, Art Evans, and I - all looking forward to the BugGuide meeting at the SRER in July

This is also a chance for local bug enthusiasts and entomologists to take part in the trips we will be organizing and to meet some interesting people. We don't have a fixed program yet but on Friday afternoon both Art Evans (Author of 'An Inordinate Fondness for Beetles and several other insect books) and Eric Eaton (Author of Kaufman's Insect Guide for North America) will be at the SRER where we will set up several black lights and mercury vapor lights to attract beetles, moths and more.
Charles O'Brien, our world renown weevil expert, his wife Lois, equally accomplished fulgorid scholar, and Chip A. Hedgecock a great photographer and connoisseur of the local insect fauna will also join us at the meeting. Warren Savary will be able to help with our questions about scorpions.

Oh, and the gathering is also registered as a National Moth Week event!

I hope to see many of you in July

Margarethe Brummermann
reluctant organizer but excited participant of the BugGuide gathering 2013

Blister beetle Epicauta liebecki, Sap-feeding beetle Carpophilus sp., and Net-winged beetle Lucaina discoidalis all found on Wait-a-Minute Acacia

It's June, and Tucson and the lower desert are parched. No rain, and none to be expected till July, and temperatures daily above one hundred. So I took a ride up Mt Lemmon yesterday. Surprisingly, not very high up, around Molino Basin, the insect world was buzzing with activity around blooming acacias, and I had to tear myself away to make it all the way up into the conifer area (over 8000 feet) that was my target.

Iphthiminus sp. (Tenebrionidae) and Ealaterid pupa

At Middle Bear I ripped loose bark off a fallen Ponderosa Pine to collect some big Tenebs that I knew would be there. They are for Alejandro Castro Tovar from Spain. The same piece of bark reveiled a huge pupa of an Elaterid. I hope it will hatch. I have collected Chalcolepidius apachianus there before.

View fro Meadow Trail, Mt. Lemmon over Tucson to Mts Wrighston and Hopkins in the Sta Ritas

I always drive all the way up and park high above the ski area to hike the Meadow Trail, even though it leads soon into a jumble of fallen trees from the last big fires that hit the area. Most of the beetles I found were old acquaintances, but one can always get better photos!

Magdalis lecontei, a well hidden Orimodema protracta, and on a Robinia leaf two Tachygonus centralis

On the blooming pines there are always weevils, and a very special, tiny species, Tachygonus centralis, can be found on the Locust trees (Robinia neomexicana) that are colonizing burned spots on sunny slopes a little further down.

Enoclerus moestus and Gibbifer californicus

Freshly dead Pine trees are always a great source of Clerids that are hunting for wood boring insects. I had seen Enoclerus moestus in the Chiricahuas last year and recognized him right away when he was rolling around in my beating sheet with his read abdomen flashing. That's of course hidden when he's posing upright with his wings closed. I also found my first-of-the-year Gibbifer californicus, the pleasing fungus beetle that breeds on shelf fungi on dead or dying trees.

Cosmosalia chrysocoma

A gorgeous specimen of Cosmosalia chrysocoma fell out of a blooming pine branch. As it was getting late in the afternoon the beetle was inactive and content to pose for my camera.

After the short hike on top I still couldn't make up my mind to descend back into the heat of the valley, so I stopped in Summerhaven. The big Heracleum along the creek was in full bloom. I hung around there so long that my favorite pizza and brownies cottage closed in the meantime. Too bad!

Strophiona laeta

But I did find another Cerambycid also in the tribe Lepturini. Several of my friends had described a big wasp-mimicking longhorn beetle from the wildflower meadows of the Huachucas and the Chricahuas, but they were all just 'lep people' or they couldn't find their notes...so I had been curious what they were talking about. The only black and yellow Lepturine that I found so far, Judolia instabilis, didn't qualify as big. But I think this Strophiona laeta might be it. The id is by Vassili Belov who calls it tentative, but checking A Photographic Catalog of the Cerambycidae of the New World by by Larry G. Bezark I find that of the three species in the genus S. laeta is the only one to occur this far east. Surprisingly there is only one other BugGuide entry for the species, from Miller Canyon, Huachucas, by Charles Melton. Charles always seems to be just one step ahead of me.

Our rattlesnake count for 2013 is finally going up. After several months without any visitors we first had the little one that the quail family pointed out. Then two nights ago, Randy, barefoot in sandals, stepped on a Diamondback that was concealed among some garden hoses on the brick terrace in front of the house. My husband is now turning on his flash light, not just carrying it. The rattler hid in a thicket of barrio petunias and could not be convinced to come out.

This morning a big rattler struck at Frodo on the steps of the back patio. It happened so fast, I heard a hiss but at first no rattle. Frodo has finally learned to fear rattlers (after 7 or 8 bites) and he backed off unharmed, only to let Cody take over the snake-barking duty. That rattler (photo) we carried out to the old lime stone quarry. When we crossed our fence to the state land the horses heard the rattle from the transport bin which has great accoustics. They threw up their heads and spooked with Cody in deliriously happy persuit.

When released from the bin, the snake recoiled and rattled. Trying to encourage him to move on, I threw some dry horse manure and sticks, not hitting him but very close. He didn't react at all to the flying objects, just kept his head turned toward me ready to strike. Maybe the heat-sensing "pits" on his face read my thermal radiation and told him where the living threat was, or he could smell me. Looking at the photo I think his eyes look filmed over, so he may have been temporarily blind because he's close to shedding his skin. I'm wondering: what information do the heat sensors provide when the environmental temperature raises above the core temperature of an endotherm bird or mammal? Of course the rattlers are mainly night active in summer.

On the way home I was speculating how to test my theory (the one about the ignored inanimate clods of horse manure) on a non-viper, when Randy said "Like this one? Camera??"
A four to five foot Gophersnake was beginning his day with a dip in our bird bath. He was lying quietly, and as I watched him breathing while all of his body remained submersed, I found another physiological problem to ponder: He seemed to pump the air rythmically from his gular and neck region into his elongated lung (click to see video). The entire rest of the body was lying completely motionless. I had never noticed this 'air gulping' in snakes before, just in amphibians. When the snakes left the water, its breathing movement became invisible.
Answer: the lungs of a snake are usually ventilated almost exclusively by its axial musculature. That is the same musculature that is used for locomotion. What I saw in my 'water snake' was buccal pumping which is indeed a form of swallowing air (into the lungs, not the digestive tract). It is used in situations where axial breathing is not feasable.

Gophersnake swallowing a rabbit. This is after the strangle hold is released

Another question: how do these constrictors breathe while they are squeezing the life out of a squirrel or bunny? How do they manage not to suffocate themselves? Buccal pumping doesn't seem possible then either, because the mouth is open. Maybe snakes, being heterotherm, just need so much less oxigen than their warmblooded prey that they can afford not to breath during this act. But what if the prey is a lizard?

Above Turkey Flats on Mt Graham

Last week a friend urgently needed some life insects from the Pinaleno Mountains. I know that at above 7000 feet elevation my old truck has even less power than usual, so I asked Fred Skillman whether he didn't need to collect Cerambycids up there, and of course he did, and so he drove us up in his stronger vehicle. We camped at in the mixed conifer region above Turkey Creek. Tall pines, beautiful blue spruce and fresh green fir trees form a dense canopy and keep the undergrowth sparse. Where fire or windbreak had toppled the giant trees, white blooming, fragrant Ceanothus greggii was blooming and Manzanita bushes and Cliffrose were already setting fruit.

Ceanothus greggii, Manzanita,and Cliffrose

At one point the dirt road crossed a deep gully that may have been hiding a permanent trickle of water in it's depth. There were Alders, Cherries, Sambucus, and Emory Oaks sprouting from the steep slopes. Here I found my first Giant Ladybugs! The are really much bigger than all of their North American and European cousins, close to the size of a copper penny.

Anatis lecontei, Giant Lady Beetle

At dusk we set up our sheets Mercury Vapor and Ultra Violet lights to attract night-flying insects. While Fred, hoping for bycids, stayed in the campground close to a windbreak with a lot of dead trees, I chose the little riparian area about a third of a mile down the road.

The most numerous visitors on both sheets were Dichelonyx sp. This genus in the family Scarabaeidae that is not very well represented in Arizona. In fact the only other Arizona entry on BugGuide is my own record from Oak Canyon, Sedona. But the species on Mt Graham is bigger and I hope Bill Warner will id it for me.

Here is a sample of the many species of moths that I photographed. Maury Heiman did most of the identifications. To see all my Mt Graham moths, please click here.
To see all my beetles from this trip, please click this link.

Vaejovis electrum Hughes 2011

During the hours that our sheets were up, I walked several miles along the road and several times to the campground and back, searching with my flashlight for night active critters that don't fly to lights. I found Darkling Beetles and Ground Beetles, Camel Crickets and little dark scorpions with small chelicerae. When Warren Savary identified them as Vaejovis electrum, Hughes 2011 I realized that I had actually been on Mt. Graham with Garret Hughes when he found the first specimens of this species that he described in 2011.

Nomius pygmaeus (Stink Beetle) (2)

Fred picked up a tiny ground beetle that turned out to be the most odoriferous thing I have smelled in my life. Its odor reminded me of the Common Stinkhorn, Phallus impudicus (Mushroom), but it was much, much stronger. It filled the vial the beetle was in, the space around the black lighting sheet, the campground, now my studio... I can smell it everywhere. Did I mention that the beetle is barely 5 mm long?

In the morning I was up early to watch for some moth and beetle species that fly during the cooler day light hours. Along the road I found Silverspotted Skippers already positioned to attack everything from slow flying blue Pleasing Fungus Beetles to darting big Aeshnidae. Several kinds of Lycids and their mimics where also on the wing or nectaring on Ceoanothus flowers.

The road and the roadside vegetation were dusty. Luckily there was no traffic as we had had the place completely to ourselves since the early evening. When I reached deeply carved riparian area my eye caught tracks of a big animal that had climbed up onto the road. Repeatedly, it seemed. I found clear marks: rounded, four-toed with no claw marks where it hadn't been climbing, the pad with three lobes in back. Bigger than my fist, bigger than my wolf-dog's tracks (of course, Laika does have very dainty feet). This was a big cat, no bobcat but a mountain lion.

I saw that the puma's tracks overlapped mine from the night before. So he had strolled along the road after I left my sheet around 10:30 PM? Then I found a spot where my foot prints covered those of the cat. I also saw paw prints close to my sheet. Then a row of them, leading towards the campground. And again, my own footprints crossing the paw prints, and in some places the paw prints were on top. At a very soft, dusty spot there were clearly much smaller tracks next to the big ones. At least one cub! It seems that I had had a lot of company last night. I hadn't heard a thing.

But by now I was listening to any pebble that fell off the cliffs along the road and any rustling in the bushes. Believe me, there were shadows moving under the overhanging branches of a big blue spruce and on the cliff above fawn colored rocks moved and turned into crouching lions staring down at me.

But then all I found were some lizards and more skippers bashing each other noisily with their wings. Mysterious little clicks and crackles were identified as the 'song' of Platypedia putnami, the small cicada associated in many places with Ponderosa Pines. I resumed chasing bugs with my net and beating branches over my beating sheet.

Mother Puma was probably relaxing somewhere with her cubs, laughing at those human antics ...

Following in Dragonfly Woman's footsteps, and missing her alliteration by a day this week, here I am presenting five midsummer-nightly co-inhabitants of our backyard. This is just before the monsoon begins (we hope).

These little scarabs, Acoma sp. come to my porch light every year, but only the males. I have yet to find one of the flightless females. As with many other desert spp., the numbers are dwindling.

Temnochscheila sp. are predators of wood-boring beetles and usually associated with conifers. We had an old pine tree which I thought was the source of these beetles, but some years ago it died and was completely removed while the beetles are still going strong. Of course, the idea that our one pine tree, far removed from its normal habitat, would support this secondary guest (a predator of the tree's pests) was a little naive to begin with. This species seems to be a true desert inhabitant and quite independent of conifers.

This little wingless wasp had me wonder whether it was a mutillid or bradynobaenid but in fact its family Chyphotidae is not related to any of those. They just share the features that there females are wingless and their winged stin-gless males come into our house to buzz around the reading lights. This species impressed me because it is suspected to be a brood parasite of Solifugae, sun scorpions

Kissing Bugs, the blood-sucking cone-noses Triatoma rubida, are the only bugs that I always kill when I find them in our house. This year at least, they go into the freezer to be shipped off to a collector in Spain. Kissing bugs probably grow up in Packrat nests, but I have found nymphs in our dogs' beds, too. The adults are good fliers who are attracted to lights. Luckily their activity ends with the onset of the monsoon. Arizona has at least three species of Kissing Bugs but T. rubida is the only one I have collected around our house.

Midsummer night brought a tiny new moth, very delicate and pretty: Hileithia magualis, in the family Crambidae. I don't know its host plant. Its distribution is mostly southeastern with very few records west of Texas. (New Mexico and Arizona) A true Southern Belle.

This year around Midsummer the largest, most beautiful moon graced our clear desert sky. Randy and I hiked up Sabino Canyon, the mountains on both sides of the road actually benefitting us with the impression of several spectacular moon rises during one evening.

By 10 pm the moon had cleared the mountains and, hanging close to the zenith, was bright enough to read the small symbols on my camera's dial.

Queen of the Night (Peniocereus greggii)

Last night more magic happened. Our first, and this year only, Queen of the Night (Peniocereus greggii) flower opened. Delicate and fragrant it survived into the early morning hours, so I could capture the first rays of sunshine just reaching it. As beautiful as this seems, there is a scary reason for this longevity: right now pollinators are virtually absent. It has been nearly a month that I saw the last Manduca or Whitelined Sphings, and even local feral bees that often do early morning duty have completely disappeared.

So unpollinated and still hopeful, the Virgin Queen lasts into the late morning hours, until the merciless heat of another 108 degree day will brake her spirit and she will die unfulfilled.

There is still hope, though. While in other years all Peniocereus plants in the area seemed synchronized to bloom during the same single night, this year there are still buds that are only about an inch long and will not open before this incredible heat spell ends, the rains begin, and the insects eager to break their estivation pause will awake ... and life will go on. Or so we hope

All insects staring in this blog entry are less than 5 mm long. A reasonably good macro lens reveals amazing textural detail and colorful patterns even in these smaller bugs. I am using a 50 mm 1:2 Macro Zuiko Digital on an E-500 Olympus SLR body. This is an inexpensive hand-held set-up and far superior solutions are available. All the images are taken at night at my black lights which are hanging on out slump block garage wall and on the wall of our neighbors wooden weekend cottage. I support the built-in flash of the camera with a strong LED flashlight to help the camera focus and to brighten up the cast shadow.

I try to orient the camera so that the flash hits the insect from front to back. Depending on its position this can be difficult. A secondary flash would be ideal, but I am trying to keep things simple.

Cymatodera aegra-complex

So here are 7 species that are common at the light right now: Adults of this genus Cymatodera in the family of theCheckered Beetles (Cleridae) are predaceous, some feeding on the larvae of gall wasps, others hunting fruit tree lepidoptera and wood-boring beetles. Identification to species is very difficult.But Cymatodera aegra is one of the smallest around here

Anoplocurius canotiae

This little Cerambycid is a family member of the largest of beetles. Tropical species can be as long as my lower arm, but even the Palo Verde Rootborer (Derobrachus hovorei) that is emerging right now in Arizona can be up to 4 inches long. This little guy is about as long as a Derobrachus foot.

Adelina sp.

The 3.5mm long Adelina sp. is a darkling beetle and as such related to the big, black Pinacate or stink beetles that cruise the desert floor at dusk and stop to stand on their heads when they are disturbed.

Enchenopa permutata - Female

In this species of Membracidae (Treehoppers), the female wears the horn, the male just has a rounded forehead. Maybe she needs the thorn mimicry more than he while she deposits her eggs on something thorny (?) Just about all plants here qualify...

Lomamyia sp.

Eggs of this little Beaded Lacewing are stalked, and can be found on wood surfaces near termite nests. The larvae live with and prey on termites, using an immobilizing gas (containing an allomone) discharged from their anus.

The little Rove Beetle was running around, always ready to take wing again. At rest his membranous fore wings can be folded tidily and stored under the short elytra. This little predator is a member of the Staphylinidae, the largest family in the animal kingdom with 55,440 recognized species worldwide.

Aristotelia corallina

This little one is a Gelechiidae (Twirler Moths). The larval habits in this group vary widely: it includes leaf miners, leaf folders and tiers, gall makers, and fruit & seed feeders. The species A. corallina constructs larval webs near the tips of the host plant, the Sweet Acacia.

As a preparation for the BugGuide gathering 2013 in Arizona, I pulled BugGuide's data for Assassin Bugs in Arizona. I found that my own photos are the basis for many of the existing species pages. I also found that I had taken white background photos of all but one of the AZ species that are represented on BugGuide. The one missing was Pseudozelurus arizonicus photographed by D.R. Swanny from a museum (UMMC) specimen. D.R. Swanny also did most of the identifications and I gave him many of my specimens, so I'm sure that he doesn't mind that I included his photo in the tableaux below.

1 Stenolemoides arizonensis; 2 Emesaya sp.; 3 Zelus tetracanthus ; 4 Zelus renardii; 5 Castolus ferox; 6 Apiomerus cazieri; 7 Apiomerus flaviventris; 8 Apiomerus sissipes; 9 Apiomerus longispinis, 10 Fitchia aptera; 11 Heza similis; 12 Pselliopus marmorosus ; 13 Pselliopus zebra; 14 Rasahus thoracicus; 15 Melanolestes picipes; 16 Rhynocoris ventralis; 17 Homalocoris erythrogaster; 18 Sinea rileyi; 19 Sinea diadema

1 Macrocephalus dorannae; 2 Lophoscutus sp.; 3 Phymata sp.; 4 Pseudozelurus arizonicus; 5 Narvesus carolinensis; 6 Oncocephalus geniculatus; 7 Reduvius sonoraensis; 8 Rhiginia cinctiventris; 9 Triatomaprotracta; 10 Triatoma recurva; 11 Triatoma indictiva, 12 Triatoma rubida, 12a Triatoma rubida nymph

There is a lot of work in these tableaux. Since I composed similar collages of other Arizona insect families, I have learned several things: to always store my work as png files so I can go back and move the elements around. To keep the species names in the legend instead as part of the image file - it's easier to correct mistakes and to follow changes in taxonomy that are inevitable. Last, but not least, to post only a small watermarked version on the internet. My ladybug plate showed all intentions to go viral after it was posted on pintrest, turned up in an African language blog, and on several gardening web sites, but by then it had lost all connections to my name and copyright.

Prints of these and other insect plates are available. Please contact me at mbrummermann@comcast.net

Today's Sunday Seven are all photographed on the garage wall where I keep my black light when it's not raining or to windy. Over time you will probably come to recognize that slump block background. I think it looks better than my dirty white collecting sheet and also doesn't flap in the wind as much.

Euscirrhopterus cosyra (Staghorn Cholla Moth)

Staghorn Cholla Moths are back. Soon we will find groups of their caterpillars feeding on cholla branches. I'm amazed how closely these Owlet Moths resemble the Mesquite Stinger Moths in the Flannel Moth family.

Ligurotettix coquilletti, Desert Clicker Grasshopper

Day and night our creosote bushes seem to emit little clicking noises. A small grasshopper with a lot of attitude is producing them by rubbing his hind tibia against its abdomen. The sounds seem to be territorial markers as the males do not appear to be randomly distributed over the desert but to keep strict distances from each others calling perches.

Cylindera lemniscata, White-striped Tiger Beetle

Diminutive Tiger Beetles are running along the wall catching his small prey close to the black light. They seem to come out only during the warmest time of the summer, maybe they need the heat to keep up their high activity level and speed.

Hogna carolinensis, Carolina Wolf Spider

Speaking of speed, the records at my wall are certainly held by spiders and relatives. Running Crab spiders, the depicted huge Wolf Spiders and a number of Windscorpions (Solifugae) are taking advantage of my nightly bug parties under UV light.

Anomala arida

Defenseless soft Anomala scarabs and moths are the favorite prey of the predators.

Epicauta tenella, Blister Beetle

Blister beetles are better left alone. Their hemolymph (circulatory fluid) contains toxic cantharidine and the beetles react by 'reflex bleeding' to attacks and inadvertent squeezing. I very carefully keep them out of my shirt collar and so far never developed any blisters.

Dermestes marmoratus

Here is another one that I carefully stay away from. I believe that I can actually smell his dietary preferences from a distance of several meters, probably because I have seen whole aggregations of these guys feeding on cow carcasses. Forensic labs use larvae of this species to quickly and thoroughly clean skeletons.

Female Eretes sticticus, Predatory Diving Beetle

We are living in a very dry part of the Sonoran Desert. But even so, Some water beetles show up regularly at my lights, and curiously, this was the case even before our neighbor installed their cattle tanks. So there's either water around that I don't know about or these guys can fly very far.

Ooops, ....and then there were eight... I don't think you would have noticed :)

It turns out that the few flowers of Peniocereus greggii that were seen around here nearly two weeks ago were by no means the main event for this summer. The real show happened two nights ago and last night. I had kept an eye on some buds on our neighbors' property to keep up with the timing. Yesterday at sunset they looked like little Chinese lanterns, all puffed up but still closed.

When I checked my black light around 10 pm I was greeted by sweet fragrance and my flashlight reflected from two small white flowers on one plant and 4 on another.

Queen of the Night (Peniocereus greggii)

The diameter of many cactus flowers varies from year to year, probably dependent on the available water.
Last night, I was sure that I smelled more open flowers maybe from across the dirt road, but I couldn't find them in the dark.

So this morning, Randy and the dogs helped me look for more queens. It's not quite like searching for Easter eggs because the stems can be quite tall so the white beacons are visible from the distance as soon as you have formed your search image. Remembering where they bloomed in years before is only helpful to a degree because the cacti tend to take years off between productive seasons, at least here in the wild. I'm sure that the irrigated, shaded specimens at Tohono Chul Park perform reliably year after year.

It was already warm and muggy right after sunrise, so we didn't search all 480 acres of state land. We still came up with a record 19 blooming plants, with anywhere from 1 to 7 flowers. Those were already beginning to wilt but they still attracted some bees. We also saw 5 resting plants, but only because we knew their locations. They are so thin and gray that they are nearly impossible to find.

On Wednesday I wanted to work my way up through the grassland into Madera Canyon. There was an impressive thunderstorm hanging under Mt. Hopkins and I ended up staying a little further north in Florida Canyon instead. It anyway seemed a good idea to check out the Santa Rita Research Range (SRER) where we'll hold our BugGuide gathering in less than a couple of weeks.

Left: Termite shedding its wings: middle: male following female: right: ant attack

Of course, the rain got me soon anyway. A fast and furious thunderstorm lasted only a few minutes, not even long enough to cool down the air. While the thick drops were falling I noticed a familiar phenomenon: hundreds of lithe, long-winged insects were drifting through the moist air. One swipe of my net caught over a dozen: Winged reproductive members (alates) of a nearby termite colony, probably the ground dwelling desert encrusters. In those colonies the workers actually build little structures in the rainy season. From there, they push out the alates that are ready and waiting as soon as a storm hits. I've watched those flights before: they seem to last only minutes. After that, the wings are shed and the termites are milling around on the ground. Many have found a partner: a male following on the heels of a female who seems to be frantically searching for something. I never saw an actual mating. Maybe she's leading him to the privacy of an underground future nest site for that. Their little journey in tandem is dangerous: birds and whiptail lizards were picking the termites up by dozens and the attacks by several ant species were especially vicious. But if they make it, the pair can look forward to a long married life: they may live and stay together as queen and king of a new colony for decades, mating repeatedly and generating all the offspring to populate it.

Along the dirt road towards SRER yellow grasses told of months of draught. But recently the area had received a fair amount of precipitation: The Desert Broom bushes (Baccharis sarothroides) were oozing: sugary phloem juice leaked from every scrape or cut to the bark. Scores of big insects were at work improving those sources of sweet rewards by chewing and licking.

I watched the big wasps: While the Tarantula Hawk was by for the biggest, the agile Cricket Hunter had the advantage of huge mandibles and much more intense aggression and won the best spot every time. It was still a little early for the bigger Longhorn Beetles, I saw only a single Stenaspis, but the Giant Agave Bugs were out in force. I think this is a promising begin of our rainy season and the BugGuide group has a lot to look forward to.

The SRER station was closed and abandoned, but I took a look around anyway. Here are some photos of the facilities: A building for meetings, bunk house and cottages, work sheds and the managers house are all nestled along a permanently trickling creek under lush trees. The Santa Rita Mountains raise on both sides and several paths allow access - climbing continuously but never really steeply.

Hanging Thief, Robber Fly, Bee Assassin

In spite of the stormy weather there were still insects out around the trail, most of the obvious ones were large predatory species.

Black lighting sheet with mostly Scarabs

Monsoon storms usually do not last very long. After a couple of hours the afternoon sun broke through and promised a productive evening for black lighting when I finally made my way to the upper parking lot in Madera Canyon.

Strategus cessus

It stayed a little bit on the cool side at 72 Degrees Fahrenheit. Some insect species prefer warmer night time temps. I saw only one big Prionus heroicus at a light that I had placed in a very protected spot in the forest. Out in the open, this was the night for Strategus cessus that I had never seen in such numbers. Most S. cessus are smaller than Strategus aloeus and they are all black on top. They have the pronotal depression typical for the genus, but no horns. So I'm not quite sure how to tell males and females apart.

Eacles oslari found its own camouflaged spot on one of the interpretative signs that were installed by the forest service

Lots of Chrysina beyeri, but no C. lecontei at all, many nice shpingids, but only one big saturniid moth, Eacles oslari. Over all, a good collecting night that ended eventually when another thunderstorm rolled over the mountains.

Lophocampa argentata (Silver-spotted Tiger Moth

As every summer, the Arizona Sonoran Desert Museum is offering again its popular Saturday Night events. This Saturday evening will be all about insects. There will be talks in the Theater and exhibits of life bugs in the Baldwin Building next door. There will be huge moths, shiny beetles, endless millipedes and attractive centipedes.

Here is the program for Saturday evening:

6:00 p.m. Macro Photography with Jay Pierstorff and Rhonda Spencer

Learn how to take extreme close-up photos of bugs, coins, stamps, flowers and more. If it is tiny, there is a way to make great images with almost any kind of camera. Jay and Rhonda show you how it's done in this 45 minute class for photography enthusiasts of all skill levels.

7:00 and 8:00 p.m. The Bugman!

Learn new facts and dispel myths about Sonoran Desert insects. Join the "Bugman", University of Arizona Entomologist Dr. Carl Olson as he gives two presentations about the 6, 8, and more-legged creatures of our desert.

6:00 to 9:30 p.m. Insect Insanity

Get a bugs-eye view of many of the arthropods that live in the Sonoran Desert. Experts will be on-hand to answer all your arthropod questions.

See you there!

No, not a British slur thrown at a Texan law officer. A flowering bush, Leucophyllum frutescens, imported to our garden from the Chihuahuan Desert. It doesn't belong here, we are in the Sonoran Desert, but it is one of the few deviations from local vegetation that we included. It blooms reliably and profusely for a couple of days about a week after every heavy rain storm, hence its other name, Texan Rain Sage.

Desert Leafcutter Ant - Acromyrmex versicolor

Today I was alerted to its bloom by a line of busy leaf-cutter ants loaded with purple flowers. These ants can schlepp! They removed buds and flowers from the bush, carried them high above their heads along a path and across our brick terrasse, up a three foot wall and then 6 feet down again on the other side to one of their nest entrances.

There they stored their bounty, maybe to dry or at least wilt the material, before tomorrow it will all be carried into one of the subterranean fungus gardens. The gardens provide the only nourishment to these highly organized ants.

The blooming Rangers also finally attracted bees back to the yard. Mostly just feral honey bees that can be flying in from anywhere in a 2 mile radius. A very hungry Bee Assassin, a female probably needing nutrients to lay a clutch of eggs soon, was stalking the bees.

Apiomerus flaviventris (Yellow-bellied Bee Assassin)

She spread her fore legs and just about jumped a bee. She immediately bit the bee wit her proboscis and injected her paralyzing digestive juice into the victim. The bee made several attempts to sting but couldn't penetrate the exoskeleton of the Assassin. When I checked several hours later, the assassin was still holding its prey, sucking the liquified contents.

Insects at Sabino Canyon

The other Spider Wasp

First sightings for this year

The background is most important

Monstrous!

La Pura Vida!

Bird Pointers

BugGuide Gathering 2013 in Arizona

June Beetles on Mt. Lemmon (sorry, no June Bugs!)

Yard Snakes in June

Lions on (in?) my Mind

Saturday Five

June Nights

Sunday Seven

Assassin Bugs of Arizona

Sunday Seven

Queen of the Night Bloom 2013, the real thing

Monsoon in the Santa Ritas, Florida and Madera Canyon

Insect Insanity at the Arizona Sonoran Desert Museum

Here is the program for Saturday evening:

Blooming Texas Rangers