Jeremiah Fargo’s wife Maria reprises her role as “the pink bit” in this photo. It’s probably also the same fly, I guess. The new cast member “green bit” is played by grass.
I twofered this pic because it gives a better view of the fly’s face; the previous picture was just too horrifying to skip. Though now that you’ve seen it you know what that proboscis is for.
Mwah!
This is simultaneously one of the cutest and creepiest spider pictures I’ve received to date. It’s such an adorable little juvenile Phidippus audax, it’s so cuuuuute!
And it wants you bite you in the eyeball.
You see the dilemma here, right? Right? I mean, on the one hand, “Awww, it’s so cute!” But on the other hand, even if it doesn’t bite you in the eyeball, you go to see who’s at the door and BIG FREAKING SPIDER, that’s what’s at the door.
Gyahhhh.
Thanks, Andrew!
P.S. Get the door. It’s GYAHHHH.
Jeremiah Fargo sends in this picture of his wife Maria. She’s the pink bit. Also, there’s a fly–it’s the black bit. No, not that black bit, that’s the logo. The other black bit. Yeah. That’s the one.
So, would now be a bad time to mention that flies eat by vomiting digestive juices onto their food, letting it dissolve, and then sucking the slurry back up? Think of it as sort of a meat smoothie.
You know what the best part of running insectpod is? It’s knowing that, the next time you get a smoothie at Jamba Juice, you’re going to think of fly vomit.
The paper wasps have been out in force the past couple of weeks, and I’m surprised I haven’t seen any thriving nests. Most queens should have popped their first generation of workers by now, but this nest and another outside my front door are still in the Phase 1 building plan.
I’ve watched these two queens, and their behavior is fascinating. For one thing, they hide behind their nest for much of the day. This seemed odd to me because in the fall you can’t get near a nest without a couple of wasps flicking up their wings and staring you down aggressively. I suppose this makes sense, however. If you stumble across the nest, the queen can fly away and start another one, but if the queen picks a fight with you and loses, her entire generation is lost. It’s a matter of colony survival that makes the queens behave, at least at this point, slightly docile.
I have not tested this theory by approaching the nest and seeing if she’ll sting me or flee, mind you.
Cool thing about this picture: Can you see the eggs? You may need to check out the larger version.
For those of you who like the geometric pattern here, I made wallpaper. Enjoy!
It’s official: I should have been filing carpet beetles under “flying” this whole time. Jason Peters sends in this photo of a carpet beetle initiating its preflight check. I like the wing capture here, but also the detail on the patchwork colors. Given that these bugs are about 2mm long, this is a fantastic shot.
Thanks Jason!
Today’s picture comes to us from our own Jeremiah, and…
Hmm. Now that we have two Jeremiah’s we may need to distinguish them. I see Jeremiah just registered the nick JFargo, so perhaps I can distinguish them thusly. Anyway, today’s picture comes to us from our own Jeremiah Fargo. I love the lurid green in this photo. Awesome.
For those who want even more lurid green, check out the widescreen wallpaper.
Jim Phillips sent in this stinkbug picture last Winter when I first put out the call for images. I’m not sure how it got shuffled to the bottom of the pile, but I found it again, so here it is.
Jim titled this picture “Yule Log Bug”, and I like it because it really shows the diversity of stinkbugs. We’ve seen green stinkbugs, and brown ones… and now one that’s both.
I also like the flash reflection here from its eyes… and I still can’t get over the way stinkbugs’ eyes are clear back on their shoulders like that.
Thanks, Jim!
Steve Allen makes his debut here with a caterpillar. He took this photo in Seattle, and says it’s about 2.5cm long.
Any takers on an ID?
Thanks, Steve!
Jeremiah has gotten totally out of control with the whole “sending awesome pictures to InsectPOD” thing. This is a rather decent picture of a jumping spider. I include it here in part because the picture is good, but also because the story behind it is my favorite spider story so far this year.
I’ll Jeremiah tell it in his own words:
I was taking pictures of a spider… Said spider was awesome, and VERY reactive to me. (Unfortunately, most of its reaction shots were too out of focus to send on.) It fell off the roof where I was taking pictures of it, onto the ground, where I snapped that picture. I got up on it, the flash flashed, and suddenly it came at me.
Through the viewscreen I saw it lunge, super fast, moving for blood. The flash had scared it, angered it, something, and it decided to kill.
It went right for my camera lens.
Me, the brave soul I am, instead of throwing my camera wildly and damaging it in the process, as I would have done only a year ago, I set it down gently, and the spider jumped off. While setting it down, I had the presence of mind to take a picture, because it’s funny.
Okay, first of all? BEST STORY EVER.
Second of all, here’s the panic photo itself:
And third of all, here’s what happened: the jumping spider saw itself reflected in the lens. A jumping spider, very near by, quite a bit smaller than itself. The perfect snack-sized prey!
Jeremiah, thank you. I’m glad you’re getting out and gettin’ dangerous with the fauna of your neighborhood!
James Newman makes his debut on InsectPOD today with this great photo of a stingless wasp. He has this to say about it:
Last night (or perhaps this morning, judging by timestamps (I couldn’t sleep)), we had our windows open to cool down cheaply, and had a guest fly in. My wife at first thought it was another mayfly, but after watching it, and seeing it land, I figured out that it was a parasitic wasp of some sort….
I’ve attached the best of the shots I could get, and if http://bugguide.net/node/view/85343/bgpage is a good match, it’s Genus Enicospilus, but I’m pretty sure it’s Family Ichneumonidae - Ichneumon Wasps (http://bugguide.net/node/view/150/bgpage). I didn’t think to get directly underneath it (and probably wouldn’t have had the nerve) to get a good shot of the wings, which looks like a key to identification. Ah, well.
Either way, after the photos were taken, my compassionate wife asked if I would kill it now. I begged off, it being late, and me not knowing if it could sting (I believe i found that it couldn’t). Later found a jar and transported it outside.
Thank for for sending this in, James! Great picture. And on behalf of solitary wasps everywhere, thank you for releasing it outside. 
