mthew
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Three Wasps Walk Into A Bar…
I. Probably Common Thread-waisted Wasp, Ammophila procera, although the whole Ammophila genus sounds confusing for IDing via camera. So let’s enjoy that orange midriff.Members of the genus parasitize caterpillars and sawfly larvae for their young. A big, bold creature, spotted late last week supping the nectar of seaside goldenrod. Have been seeing these for a few…
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Blue Waves
The other day, I counted a hundred Blue Jays (Cyanocitta cristata) streaming past the apartment over ten minutes. The birds were on the move above 5th Avenue. I’ve had similar experiences in the last two weeks: clumps and waves and straggles of jays, heading south. The green places have been full of their strident cries…
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Willughby
The very next book I picked up after No Way But Gentlenesse was Tim Birkhead’s The Wonderful Mr Willughby: The First True Ornithologist. And the very first section break, after a discussion of Honey Buzzards, which Francis Willughby distinguished from Common Buzzard at the dawn of taxonomy, is this dingbat of three soaring raptors. A…
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Swift Feather-legged Fly
Trichopoda pennipes, a parasitic fly of uncommon colorfulness. They lay their eggs on true bugs and have been used as biological control agents against squash bugs and the Southern Green Stinkbug, a crop pest with world-wide distribution. The hairy “feather” on the tibiae of hind legs can be seen here: this is a fringe of…
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The Quest for White Snakeroot
This picture turned out a little artier than I intended, but so be it. White snakeroot (Ageratina altissima) does like shade and flops around in the wind, two photo challenges. The NYC EcoFlora Project has an EcoQuest Challenge this month: documenting the presence of this wildflower in NYC. The project uses iNaturalist, a handy app…
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Autotomy
Lizards can shed their tails to escape predators, including the two-legged kind. This is called autotomy (“self-severing” or self amputation): reptiles, amphibians, spiders, mollusks, even some mammals have various forms of it. The lizard tail situation is probably the best known manifestation of this adaption. There will be some regeneration, as you can see here,…
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Nest
Underneath a pine, probably dislodged by the fierce rain of the day before, summer’s nest. Quite small, about 3.25″ across, but certainly not the smallest I’ve ever seen. That would be the absurdly tiny, lichen-camouflaged nest of the Ruby-throated Hummingbird. This is very elegantly made of grasses. Perhaps Chipping Sparrow? A little small for the…
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Autumnal Flowers And Their Familiars
There’s only so much in bloom now.But there are still hungry insects.And insects that eat insects.The goldenrod smorgasbord.
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Mammal Monday: Whistlepig
I’d just passed two woodchuck-sized holes under a tree when the lumbering run of a groundhog-in-the-fur caught my eye. The animal stood up for the best view in front of its burrow. Marmota monax, mammal of many names. Slightly easier to see if you click on this image to make it larger. *** The children’s…
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K is for Kestrel
Richard Hines’s No Way But Gentlenesse is a memoir of the stunting British class system, and his falcons. The first theme definitely grips one’s attention, the second, well, less so for this ornithologically-inclined kestrel-fancier. Hines’s older brother Barry wrote a novel called A Kestrel For a Knave (1968), inspired by Richard’s experience with Falco tinnunculus.…
Backyard and Beyond 