![]() Sphinx perelegans occurs from southern British Columbia to Baja California. The beautiful larvae feeds on arbutus, snowberry, manzanita and can be a pest on plum or apple trees. I've never seen the larvae but there are some honkin' big chunks out of some of the arbutus leaves that look as though this guy could have done. I was a bit distracted while trying to get a photograph of this twitchy moth - not only had it come in through the open window to light in the bedroom, but so had a bat which was swooping around the room at the same time. I didn't get a photo of it!
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![]() This big (~10 cm) floppy, uncoordinated insect surprised me as it threw itself at the window one night along with the much more coordinated moths! Another joined it and then another came in through another open window...the first time that either of us had seen this creature. Dobsonfly was what popped into my head-at least I got the Order correct (Megalopteran). There are no dobsonflies in BC, but there are three species of the fishfly subfamily, Chauliodinae. This species, Dysmicohermes disjunctus, is found through Vancouver Island, lower mainland and just into the interior. The other two are much rarer. The adults live up to seven days and only fly at night. Most of a fishfly's life (2-5 years) is as a voracious predatory larvae in freshwater. Apparently they like fast flowing streams, however there are few of those near Leaning Oaks and I am not sure how far the adults will fly. My brief observations would indicate that long distance flight would be a challenge! Thanks to Dr. Rob Cannings (@DrCannings) for ID help. You rock! ![]() Tonight's dinner entertainment was a life and death drama with the role of the protagonist being played by a Bald-faced Hornet. She had been attracted to the wasp traps we had set out, which had managed to gather quite a crop of flies. The hornet spent quite a bit of the time trying to catch the flies she could see crawling on the inside of the plastic container. As we watched she was joined by a second Bald-faced Hornet and there was an immediate fight, both of the rolling around on the deck until eventually one of them left. A few minutes later a wasp arrived and the Bald-faced Hornet quickly jumped on it, there was another roll-around scuffle on the deck that resulted in the hornet flying off with the corpse of the wasp. Later that evening I watched a Bald-faced Hornet walking around on the planter of Pitcher Plants, coming dangerously close to entering the pitcher, possibly attracted to the other insects already in the pitchers. Dolichovespula maculata makes round paper nests, that can contain up to 700 workers. Active hunters they also feed on nectar. It is hard to believe that we had never seen this long-horn beetle at Leaning Oaks (or anywhere for that matter) until it came crashing into the sliding glass doors the other night. Mind you, the adults only live for 10-20 days and don't feed, their focus on finding a mate and then the female will lay up to 200 eggs. The rest of the life cycle can take three to five years, mainly in the larval stage. Prionus californicus larvae will burrow in the roots of deciduous or coniferous trees and can become a serious in orchards. They will kill the host plant either by directly killing the root, or bacteria or fungal pathogens will attack the tree through the damaged roots.
The Prionus Root Borer is found from Mexico to Alaska and emerges as in adult usually in July. The maggots or larvae can grow to 11.5 cm and are edible. No thanks. ![]() The Painted Lady (Vanessa cardui ) is likely the most numerous species of butterfly in the world, and one of the most widespread. It inhabits both the new and old worlds, most of the northern hemisphere and some of the southern. In North America it is a regular breeder in the deserts of the southwest and Mexico. In some years there is a migration northward and millions of Painted Ladies are on the move. Included in these are the ones that reach B.C. - usually in the early spring and looking quite ragged. Here they breed, and their offspring emerge as butterflies in July, often larger than the migrants that were their parents. It is thought that these butterflies seldom are able to overwinter and do not migrate back southward, so it is a dead-end for the population and we rely on a new wave of immigrants for our next crop of Painted Ladies. This is an early date for a 'fresh' Painted Lady for us, July 1 - no doubt the result of record high June temperatures on southern Vancouver Island this year. ![]() The Long-haired June Beetle is a large (up to 3 cm) beetle that I associate with very warm summer nights. This beetle spends most of its life as an underground grub feeding on roots. In sandy soils they can be a pest on orchards, and here they can do some damage to strawberry patches. Adults are leaf feeders, although they seldom consume enough to become pests. The genus name (Polyphylla ) means many-leaf , referring to the peculiar antennae of the male. When stressed the male folds the separate "leaves" of the antennae together, as shown in this picture. When relaxed (he didn't get to the relaxed state during the photography session), they separate into a series of leaves, like the slats of a venetian blind. These structures are used to detect female pheromones. Larvae can take as long as four years to reach the adult form. This species (P. crinita) looks very similar to the Ten-striped June Beetle (P. decemlineata), but that species is rarely, if ever, found on Vancouver Island. This introduced species of wasp is from the western US States. The galls are tiny, pin head sized round galls that form the house and shouldn't be confused with the other species of gall often found on Garry Oak (#24). On Vancouver Island it was first found in 1986, and it is assumed to have been introduced here. Inside the gall, the larvae of the wasp is curled into a "C" shape, eventually reaching 1.5 mm long. The larvae lives inside the gall feeding on the interior of the gall wall. The jumping gall wasp (Neuroterus saltatorius) completes two generations each year. The first generation is "gamic", consisting of both males and females, while the second generation is made up of only females. The first generation is started by the females emerging from underground and laying up to 150 eggs in the swelling buds of Garry Oak in the second half of March. Adults emerge from these galls in the first half of May. Some clumps of galls produce males and other females, but not both. Females are darker, with more rounded abdomens than males. After mating, a gamic female lays up to 70 eggs one at a time, on the underside of the leaf, preferring the most recently formed unhardened leaves at the end of the branches. In early June the "agamic" generation have hatched and tiny galls begin to form on the lower surface of the leaf and by mid-June many of these galls have matured into mustard seed-like galls, 1.0–1.5 mm in diameter. The galls start to fall off the leaf in late June to mid July with a small number dropping off in August and September. Once on the ground the curled larvae flexed and the flexible walls of the round gall move. The purpose of this movement is to work the gall into the soil to overwinter there. Often however, the gall jumps from this flexing motion, hence the name. On dry July days you can hear the noise of jumping galls as they move and land on the dry leaf litter. The "jumping period" can last for 8 weeks. The wasp pupates in the gall, underground and is fully adult inside the gall by October, but stays inside until spring. Heavily infested trees can have a scorched appearance by mid summer, and it can cause leaf drop. An excellent extenion pamphlet on the life history of this species can be found by clicking here. ![]() This behemoth of a beetle buzzed past like a wee helicopter before landing on my chest. All three centimeters barely fit in the collecting jar that just happened to be in my pocket (and at the same time releasing another beetle that was going to be way harder to identify!) The larvae of Chalcophora angulicollis feed on the dead wood of coniferous trees, including Douglas-fir. They start when the tree has just died or dying and though they may not be killing the tree, they will lower the value of the timber. When trying to find out any information that I could on this spectacular and heavy beetle I came across this great T-shirt with a beautiful illustration of the pine borer in flight. Nice eh ? The taxonomy of this species has been in flux with a similar one that occurs in the east (C. virginiensis) however it seems to have been reconciled using morphological characteristics and a distribution that has a big gap between them. ![]() This bug is a "true bug" (order Hemiptera) and to make it even more straight forward, it is in the family "Miridae", the Plant Bugs. Stenotus binotatus was introduced from Europe in the late 1800's. The first North American records are from Massachusetts and they have spread across the continent since then. They can be a serious pest on wheat and other cereal crops, causing them to collapse. It produces an enzyme which will degrade the gluten and the dough produced from this wheat has a sticky characteristic. (Every, D., J.A. Farell and M. Stufkens 1992). The older the individual, the darker the colour will be. Looking at the photographs of this grass bug on Bug guide I'd say this was a younger one. It was about 5-6 mm long and came in to a sheet that we had a light focused on for attracting moths. It was so small that there was no way we could see the beautiful colours until the photograph was taken! Every, D., J.A. Farrell and M.W. Stufkens. 1992. Bug damage in New Zealand wheat grain: the role of various heteropterous insects. NZ J of Hort and Crop Sci. 50. 305-312. ![]() Ladona julia is not common at Leaning Oaks and my suspicion is that this fellow is a visitor from a larger or boggier piece of water somewhere nearby. The English name comes from the two distinct stripes on the thorax -stripes of a corporal. These are more distinct in younger ones. And of course the "chalk -fronted" refers to the pruinosity on the abdomen. Pruinosity in dragonflies is a waxy deposit - like what you get on Italian prune plums. I learned this as Libellula julia, but some DNA sequencing (Kambhampati and Charlton 2002) determined that this skimmer was indeed a separate genera within the Libellulidae family. You will see these chunky dragonflies sunning themselves on sticks facing the sun (like the photo), perching on vegetation over the water or flat on the ground when away from the water. This tendency to land on the ground distinguishes from the other big skimmers found in BC which seem to rarely do that. |
AuthorsTwo biologists on a beautiful property armed with cameras, smart phones and a marginal knowledge of websites took up the challenge of documenting one species a day on that property. Join along! Posts and photographs by Leah Ramsay and David Fraser (unless otherwise stated); started January 1, 2014. Categories
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