Day 297: Will-o-the-Wasp

 Backyard Nature, Insects, Piney Woods Church Road 365 Project, Sense of Place  No Responses »
Oct 242014
 

As autumn proceeds, insect life gets more scarce along Piney Woods Church Road.  Lately, I have been craving an encounter with some sort of creature making its rounds along the road.  This afternoon, I encountered two:  a wasp and a grasshopper (the latter the topic of another post).

I found this bright yellow wasp buzzing along near the ground, moving into and out of the leaf litter. It rested for a moment on a a leaf, but took off quickly when I pointed the camera its way.  I waited again for it to make landfall, only for the same thing to happen again.  On maybe the fourth try, she perched on a Hoary Mountainmint leaf and stayed put, occupied with grooming her antennae.  I took quite a few photographs, most of which ended up a bit blurry.  This one did not.  According to the BugGuide experts, she is most likely the Ichneumon wasp, Neotheronia septentrionalis.

 

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Street Walker

 Insects  No Responses »
Oct 062014
 

Late this afternoon, as I was walking along the asphalt edge of Rico Rd., I noticed what I thought at first was a leaf that had fallen out of the trees in the wind and landed near my feet on the road surface.  I glanced closer, and noticed that this leaf had legs!  I took several photographs of this charming mantid on the roadway, probably wondering how it got there in the first place.  Then I used some loblolly pine needles to herd the mantid gently across the asphalt and beyond the white line, to relative safety in the roadside grass.

 

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Day 276: Portraits of an Assassin

 Backyard Nature, Insects, Piney Woods Church Road 365 Project, Sense of Place  No Responses »
Oct 032014
 

I set out down Piney Woods Church Road at mid-afternoon today, after the early morning rain but well before the promised cold front passed through.  A short way down the road, I saw this assassin bug nymph (Zelus luridus) perched on a muscadine leaf.  I suspected it was an assassin bug after observing its impressive shnozz (to use the complicated scientific term) which betokened a life to be spent sucking the vital fluids out of other insects.

 

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Day 269: Katydid Triangles

 Backyard Nature, Insects, Piney Woods Church Road 365 Project  No Responses »
Sep 262014
 

In a hurry this afternoon (with a Mellow Mushroom pizza awaiting me at home), I jumped out of the car at the intersection of Piney Woods Church Road and Rico Road, walked over to an American Burnweed growing close by, and immediately found this katydid.  I love how the katydid’s legs make nearly perfect equilateral triangles.

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Fellow Pilgrim

 Backyard Nature, Insects  4 Responses »
Sep 252014
 

Walking down Piney Woods Church Road this evening, I chanced upon a fellow pilgrim in the middle of the road, headed, like me, toward Hutcheson Ferry Road.  He (or she) was an Orangestriped Oakworm (Anisota senatoria) with a long way to go.  I took a few photographs, then an approaching car prompted me to scoop up the pilgrim and relocate him (or her) to the side of the road.  Safe journeys, traveler.

 

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Day 267: September Planthopper

 Backyard Nature, Insects, Piney Woods Church Road 365 Project, Sense of Place  No Responses »
Sep 242014
 

The days race by, and now it is autumn.  I snatch a few minutes away from a long slough of desk work to amble down Piney Woods Church Road.  I take a few shots of some brilliant red sassafras leaves, and a mother cow licking her calf.  Early on my journey, I encounter another planthopper on a roadside weed — this time, the Citrus Flatid Planthopper, Metcalfa pruinosa.  In my imagination, he (or she) glances furtively and suspiciously at the photographer as he takes this picture.

 

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Day 261: Roadside Zoo

 Agriculture and Husbandry, Backyard Nature, Insects, Natural History, Piney Woods Church Road 365 Project, Sense of Place  No Responses »
Sep 182014
 

On my morning Piney Woods Church walk today, I wandered to the edge of a patch of weeds in search of a flower, and ended up discovering a roadside zoo.  I walked from one end of the road to the other, the intersection with Hutcheson Ferry Road.  Looking down the road, I saw a brilliant red trumpet-shaped flower vining up a sweetgum sampling in the road bank.  I waked down the road to examine it; then, turning to look back, I noticed the same flower scattered throughout the patch of weeds.  I strolled into the grass-lined gully beside Piney Woods Church Road, to get a couple of close-ups of the lovely blooms.  They turned out to belong to the Small Red Morning Glory (Ipomoea coccinea), a native of tropical America that has become naturalized to moist soil and waste places throughout the Southeast.

 

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I had just finished a series of photographs when I felt something on my leg.  I glanced down, and saw a black beetle, about an inch in length.  I am proud to say that I did not react right away to flick it away, but instead started taking pictures.  It seemed quite inquisitive and almost “cute”, in a beetle-ish sort of way.  After half a dozen pictures, I gently flicked the top of my sock to send him (or her) onto the grass.  There, I took another few photographs.  This quite charming beetle turned out to be none other than the Margined Blister Beetle (Epicauta funebris).  Evidently I was wise not to perturb it; as Bill Bixby used to remark on the 1980s TV show, “The Incredible Hulk”, “Don’t make me angry.  You wouldn’t like me when I’m angry.”  In this case, the blister beetle evidently secretes a caustic chemical that, not surprisingly, can cause skin irritation and blisters. The substance is even more toxic to horses.  A handful of crushed beetles, mixed in with a meal of alfalfa hay, can be fatal.  Still, I find this beetle quite endearing.

 

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Glancing through the weeds along the roadbank, I noticed a thin katydid perched on a stem.  It was most likely the Slender Meadow Katydid (Conocephalus fasciatus).  

 

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A nearby stem held an even more impressive specimen — a large Differential Grasshopper (Melanoplus differentialis).  How stunning!

 

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Nearby was yet another singing insect of late summer:  a Fork-Tailed Bush Katydid (Scudderia furcata).

 

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As I left this site of so many new discoveries, I glanced back and took a photograph.  This roadside zoo might not have a neon sign, gift shop, or parking lot, but it is well worth the visit!

 

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Day 257: Appreciating a Native Ant

 Backyard Nature, Insects, Piney Woods Church Road 365 Project, Sense of Place  No Responses »
Sep 142014
 

On my Piney Woods Church Road walk early this afternoon, I encountered a large ant, perhaps half an inch in length, on a blossom of American burnweed (Erechtites hieracifolia).  So far this year, I have mostly avoided ants on my daily encounters, partly because most of the ones I see are tiny and very difficult to photograph, and partly because the word “ants’ here in Georgia tends to trigger images of fire ants and their vicious bites.  This ant was quite placid, allowing me to take quite a few photographs.  Its black head and amber body are distinctive enough that I was even able to make a tentative identification:  Camponotus americanus, a species of Carpenter Ant native to the Southeast.

 

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