Insect Picture of the Day

Hi Gang,

I upgraded the site to the latest version of WordPress yesterday. Things mostly went smoothly, but there were a few hiccups along the way–I accidentally trashed the database at one point and had to restore from backup. This caused the site to lose 2 new users (I have emailed them), one comment (which I am still trying to restore), and the original version of this news post.

The biggest change you will notice is that I have tightened up the comment restrictions. You now must be logged in in order to post. Registration is free, so hopefully that won’t be too tedious. I understand that this raises the hassle level, however, and I apologize for the inconvenience.

The reason I did this is that InsectPOD is squarely in the sights of several automated spam farms. The site gets several dozen spam posts per day now. Most of these get caught and filtered automatically, but about twice a month one gets through. By requiring registration, hopefully this will cut down on the spam traffic.

Again, I apologize for the inconvenience. If this is a problem for you, please email me at the usual address. Also, please feel free to contact me if you notice any problems with the new version of the site.

Thanks!

Click for larger version

This little yellowjacket is on her last legs, or possibly wings. She got in the house and managed to stay up in the upper loft windows until dehydration brought her to ground. You can see here that she’s gotten into some windowsill dust, and is too tired to preen herself clean.

Yellowjackets are cousins to wasps, but are closer to hornets. Wasps tend to be thin and agile, fighting with a quick stab of their stinger. Hornets, on the other hand, are bigger and stronger and will often kill prey with their jaws. Yellowjackets are smaller than most hornets, and while they still favor meat in Autumn like hornets, they tend to be more scavengers than hunters.

Hi Gang,

I’m preparing an extra-special ALL-SCARY bug month for October, and I need your help. Specifically, I need your scary bug pictures!

As usual:

• Images should be in-focus and 1280×960 or larger
• Images should be of live insects
• Send them to insectpod at shinybit com

Thanks in advance, now get clicking!

Click for larger version

Andrew Lin takes care of our Scutigera coleoptrata (house centipede) photo needs again, this time with a nice side view. It puts me in mind of a Viking warship. I wonder if there’s a little drummer on the back of the centipede keeping all the legs in time…

This is an adult house centipede. We know this because it has 15 pairs of legs. House centipedes are born with 2 pairs of legs. They gain a pair of legs with their first molt, and then gain two pairs of legs with each subsequent molt until adulthood.

Just a reminder to everybody, while these guys are way high on the creep factor, they’re extremely beneficial bugs! These little guys are ravenous predators of spiders, ants, cockroaches, termites, bedbugs, and silverfish. They are venomous, but their fangs are so small they are usually incapable of penetrating human skin. Even if they do, the venom is mild, comparable in pain to a mild bee sting and in itchiness to a mosquito bite.

I know, I know, you think I’m crazy, don’t you? Well, maybe I’m not crazy enough. In Japan, S. coleoptrata are called “gejigeji” and they are sold in pet stores. NOW who’s crazy?

Click for larger version

So we all know that I’m afraid of spiders.  David says that I’m bad at being an arachnophobe and lately I’m inclined to agree.  There was a time when the mere photo of a spider would send me into shudders of fear and disgust.  Now, I take up-close photos of many different spiders, and barely shake at all.

One  of the things I’ve been attempting to do is actually get in front of spiders to take better pictures of them, showing their eyes, fangs, pedipalps, etc.  The only problem with this, and I’ve learned from experience, is that this puts me in front of the spider.  Sure, I can talk about how I’m not that scared of spiders anymore, but as it’s charging towards my camera, ready to eat my face, you can be sure I’m running away once that photo’s taken.

So, there you have it.  I risked life, limb, and face to get this Wolf Spider picture for you all.  I was this close to it when I took the picture.  People who aren’t creeped out by spiders will tell you that I was in no danger from this little girl*, but arachnophobes understand; it was getting ready to feast upon my flesh.

*Small pedipalps=girl. And you thought I wasn’t going to say anything informative!  Of course, I have no idea if those are actually “small,” as I’ve never sat around any Wolf Spider long enough to compare them with one-another, but unless someone corrects me, I’m going to call this a girl.

Click for larger version

Okay, say you’re a bug, and you’re commuting to work, when BAM! You get broadsided by a bumblebee driving way too fast while talking on her cellphone. Now you’re upside-down in the garden furrow between the peas and the carrots, trapped in your crushed exoskeleton, and the only thing that can save you is the jaws of life.

Thank goodness this bug is right around the corner from the peas!

I’m not sure if it’s a wasp, or a bee, or a hornet, or a something else, but as sunset began to fall it parked inside this flower and watched patiently as I took half a dozen pictures.

[Edit: Yikes! Looks like I forgot to mention there's a wallpaper.]

Click for larger version

Do we have time for one more butterfly? Just one, maybe? Okay. Here’s Jesse Moore again, this time with another tiger swallowtail butterfly.

No, really.

Yes, seriously.

This is the Eastern Tiger Swallowtail butterfly, Papilio glaucus. (”Glaucus” is latin for “That doesn’t look like a tiger at all, Jonathan.”) Actually—and this is pretty cool when you think about it—tiger swallowtail butterflies are a bit like people: the same species can come in different colors.

Papilio glaucus also comes in the classic yellow-and-black striped variety, which scientists call a “phase”. As pictured here, they can have a black “phase” as well. Perhaps they’re moody and angsty and listen to The Cure a lot. Oh, and they write bad poetry about how nobody understands them. (But they don’t cut themselves. That’s Papilio emosi.)

I did a bit of digging, and it looks like, in spite of the term “phase”, they’re the same color their whole lives; some of them are just black and some of them are striped yellow.

Thanks, Jesse!

Click for larger version

Jesse Moore sends in this astonishing photo of a flying… um… lobster.

Yeah, see when they get tired of trawling for carrion on the ocean floor, they go looking for flowers.

What do you mean where are its claws? Well it’s flapping them, isn’t it? That’s why you can’t see them. It’s  flapping them very fast.

What about scales? Oh look, it’s past your bedtime.

(But before you go, take this wallpaper.)

Click for larger version

Jesse Moore keeps the butterfly parade coming with this beautiful specimen. This is one of the (very) few butterflies I can actually identify, and once you hear the name you’ll see why: this is a Tiger Swallowtail, genus Papilio. I actually think this is the Western Tiger Swallowtail, Papilio rutulus, but I’m not confident enough in my butterfly identification-fu to say that with confidence.

However, here’s what I know: swallowtails are identified largely by the little tails on their wings, and the yellow-and-black wing stripes mean Tiger. There is an Eastern Tiger Swallowtail, Papilio glaucus, but it has orange spots on the hindwings, just inside the tails. If there are only two species in genus Papilio, then I strongly suspect this is P. rutulus; the reason for my lack of confidence is that I don’t know how many species are in Papilio. As soon as I say “I am sure this is a Western Tiger Swallowtail”, somebody will come along and say “Dude, there are over fourteen thousand species in Papilio, some of which can only be distinguished by their SAT scores.”

Either way, it’s a beautiful pic, Jesse. Thanks!

Click for larger version

We went to see my wife’s parents last weekend, and I spent some time in their beautiful garden taking pictures of bugs. This is one of my mother-in-law’s prized Zinnas being serviced by a honeybee.

What, you want wallpaper? Sure, I can help you there.

Unless, of course, you want a widescreen version, in which case… oh, wait. Here you go. [Edit:fixed the broken wallpaper link]

Click for larger version

Who loves you? I do!