Arizona: Beetles, Bugs, Birds and more

Of Cactus Flowers and Fruit

2012-01-17T09:43:00.000-08:00

The flowers of chollas, prickly pears, saguaros, queen of the night and barrel cacti are strikingly beautiful but delicate and very short lived. If an individual bud opens in the early morning or even at night the flower will begin to wilt by noon with raising temperatures or even as soon as it is pollinated. If it lasts till nightfall it will most likely not open again the next day. There are cacti which go through their whole annual blooming cycle within one night and a short morning like the night blooming cereus, but most species produce enough successive flowers to keep the bloom going for a week or more. It doesn't matter how long it lasts: the bloom of the Sonoran desert cacti is a beautiful spectacle that we celebrate every year. It is also a reliable fiest: the succulent cacti are able to faithfully produce flowers even in drought years when the showy and celebrated annuals of the desert like poppies, lupines and Owl Clovers have to skip the year.

Santa Rita Prickly Pear: Only a few of these pears will ripen.

At least some rain is necessary for the cacti to follow the bloom with the more costly production of fruit. If it doesn't rain enough for too long even the fertilized flowers will just shrivel up and fall off. But in years of at least average rainfall the fruit of our desert cacti are not only at least as beautiful as the flowers but many also last much longer.

Saguaro Cactus

Carnegiea gigantea - Saguaro Cactus

After the bloom in June, Saguaro fruit grow very quickly. They stay plain green on the outside. But as soon as they are ripe in late June they burst open to form a bright red star that advertises the sweet pulp and thousands of tiny seeds to birds and insects.

StellaTucker (Tohono O'odam) harvests Saguaro fruit by pushing them down with a 12 foot pole made from Saguaro ribs

Generations of Tohono O'odam have collected the fruit to brew ceremonial wine. Midsummer dances of this tribe are a plea for good, life spending monsoon rains. By the time the storms arrive, Saguaro fruit are usually gone from the cacti and the seeds distributed by everybody who enjoyed the sweet snacks.

Mammillaria

Mammillaria grahami - Arizona Fishhook Cactus

Pretty much exactly 8 days after each summer rainstorm all our tiny Mammillarias wear crowns of pink flowers. Shortly later they produce small red-pepper-like seedpods. Just the right size to be carried away whole by Trashers, Cactus Wrens, Squirrels and even ambitious Harvester Ants.

Night-blooming Cereus

Peniocereus gregii - Arizona Night-blooming Cereus

The beautiful Queen of the Desert Night chooses a warm night in June or July to open its flowers and fill the desert with its sweet heavy fragrance. Mysteriously, all plants in a certain area appear to be synchronized, while other groups, at only about ten miles distance, follow their own internal signal. Temperature, moon phase or humidity seem of little importance, or their interaction is so complex that I don't understand their impact. Anyway, every year I scout for new plants in the desert around our place during this spectacular night. This cactus is thin-branched and much less succulent than others. Instead, it has a big underground bulb to support it during drought years. Some plants dry up completely and rest for years before they thrive out and bloom again.
Elongate big fruit develop from the pollinated flowers. This year the Pima County gardener asked me for seeds, so I covered a fruit with a paper bag. While the woodpeckers made holes into the other fruits and harvested the seed pulp in mid September, the protected one kept growing until I lost patience in late October.

Prickly Pear

Opuntia engelmanii - Engelman's Prickly Pear
Desert Tortoise Photo by Doris Evans

Prickly pear Cacti bloom in late March and their fruit grow and ripen up to the end of summer. In good years a big Engleman's Opuntia can produce many pounds of purplish plum-sized 'pears'. They sit in tight decorative rows on the pads until in late September finally Gila Woodpeckers, Fig Beetles, ants and bees dig into the juicy flesh. Fruit that fall off are gobbled up by Desert Tortoises and Havelinas. Our neighbor boils prickly pear juice and jam, mustard and salza in big purple stained pots. With the harvest of the prickly pears, the bounty of summer is mostly gone.

Barrel Cactus

Ferocactus wislizeni - Arizona Barrel Cactus

Cacti that produce their fruit later in the year tend to hold onto them throughout the winter months. A bright yellow crown of fruit on often shoulder-high barrel cacti is a great sight when all other desert colors are rather drab. The fruit are nestled among formidable hooked thorns. Only the most daring squirrels and woodpeckers break some of them loose before their time.

Barrel Cactus seedlings

The cactus is holding on for a good reason: The seeds, though ripe, will not germinate when it isn't warm enough. We spread seeds last year in December on moist sand in a container on the window sill, and they were just sitting there through the winter to finally produce little cacti at exactly the same time as some other seeds that we put out in March. The March seeds germinated after three weeks in the sand box.

Cholla Cacti

Cylindropuntia spinosior – Cane or Walkingstick Cholla

Cane Cholla fruit also stay on the plant during the winter months. Their bright yellow color stands out against the clear blue sky. Winter visitors often insist that they saw blooming cacti on their hikes in December.

Chain Fruit Cholla - Opuntia fulgida

The Chain-Fruit Cholla drives holding on to its fruit to the extreme. It simply never lets go, so after every blooming season more fruit are added to the ones already hanging on the branches, forming long, dangling chains. I have to cut one open: I doubt that there are seeds inside. Instead, those green fleshy members increase the photosynthesis-surface of the cactus just like leaves would. This cactus is one of the jumping chollas, and spreads its offspring by enlisting animals and people to carry broken-off pieces into new territory (zoochory). This vegetative propagation produces clones of the originals, rather than new plants.

Christmas Cholla - Cylindropuntia leptocaulis

I like the fruit of the dainty Christmas Cholla best. Unassuming but pretty little star flowers appear in late summer, and the fruit cling to the thin green branches like red holiday decorations just around Christmas. They are juicy and sweet like strawberries. Of course, they don't last too long when they are ripe.

Water and Song Birds at Sweetwater Wetlands in January 2012

2012-01-10T18:28:00.000-08:00

On January 7 2012, I joined the Sweetwater excursion of the local Audubon Society led by Janine Spencer. Thank you Janine it was a delightful morning! It was cold and sunny, so the light was beautiful but the contrasts were a bit harsh.

A Solitary Sandpiper poked through the mud, just one individual, but he turned up several times very close to the trail and the bridge, so I even got a video.

Hundreds of ducks, mostly Northern Shovelers were asleep along the banks or just waking up to preen themselves. The photo above is meant as a little puzzle. Can you find a pair of American Wigeons, Northern Pintails, a Ring-neck, and a female Mallard?

This shot of a subtly patterned Gadwall is on of my favorites. I just read a quotation from an old-time hunter who called it ' just a gray duck, nearly to be ashamed of, far inferior to a Mallard' To each his own!

We also saw Ruddies, some Pied-billed Grebes (above), a Moorhen and of course many American Coots. A Sora Rail could be heard but not seen.

Sliders were basking - it got soon quite warm. I felt in my down west, carrying two cameras and binoculars. At this time there seemed to be sufficient thermal up-drift for the local Harris Hawks to make an appearance.

I finally got a shot of one of the rats that scurry in the salt bushes. I had to consult Rich Hoyer's blog for the species id: It's an Arizona Cotton Rat (Sigmodon arizonae).

Scores of small song birds around the little pond right at the parking lot. Yellow-rumped Warblers were the most lively and numerous ones, and hard to photograph.

A group of beautiful Lawrence's Goldfinches shows up year after year. They posed nicely, but not quite close enough for my little camera.

On the ground, a Song Sparrow and a very uncooperative Abert's Towhee. But he is a character resident for Sweetwater, so his shot has to be here, no matter how blurry.

White-crowned Sparrow females were confusing until easily recognizable males joined them. They are familiar from the feeders at home where they show up every winter in good numbers

Photo by Muriel Neddermeyer (cropped)

A Marsh Wren entertained us with his constant chatter, but he was hard to spot and nearly impossible to photograph, so I had to borrow this photo.

As it got warmer, gnats and other insects swarmed over the water. Black and Says Phoebe (or is this a female Vermillion?) were competing for the best perches from which to start their short, fluttering forays over the creek.

After consulting Rich Hoyer for Ids, and with Robyn Waayer's input, I'm now confident to add some more of the little gray, green, and brown guys that make birding so challenging and interesting.

A female gnat-catcher, but from this angle and with this light it's impossible to tell whether it's a Black-tailed or a Blue-gray. I think there wasn't much gray on the tail, though.

The Chestnut-sided Warbler that everybody wanted to see. Check out Susan Beebe's excellent photo here also from Sweetwater.

A cute Orange-crowned Warbler was pruning the cat tails. Was he feeding on seeds or bugs that were hiding in there? A couple of Common Yellow Throats teased me for half an hour while they invaded the territory of a ver upset Marsh Wren. I got lots of blurred action shots.

My photos are taken with a 150 mm zoom lens on my Olympus SLR and with my little SP-800UZ Olympus (30 x optical zoom). I wasn't carrying a tripod around, so if there was no bridge rail or tree trunk to stabilize my aim tI was just shooting freehandedly. While these images are just good enough to document a sighting and help with ids, I'm nearly ashamed showing them here, especially in comparison with Susan's and Muriel's excellent photos. Maybe I should invest into a better camera for bird photos, but my main focus will be on insects again soon. Spring is coming early this year in the desert, the Fairy Dusters are already blooming.

Grasshoppers

2012-01-08T13:48:00.000-08:00

Here are just some images that I put together for a proposal. I'll let them speak for themselves

A new Backyard Dove

2012-01-07T16:57:00.000-08:00

Here is a strange addition to our backyard fauna: I think it is a leucistic Eurasian Collared Dove. Last year one lonely Eurasians moved in and tried to make friends with resident Mourning Doves. Now there are three including this very light one. The question is now whether it's a fawn-colored variant of the Eurasian Collared, a leucistic bird (which might be the same thing) or a very light Ringed Turtle Dove (domestic variety). Since it is the same size as the other Eurasians I believe it's one of them.

Native Mourning Dove left, normal-colored Eurasion Collared Dove in the middle and our light-colored new one on the right

Interestingly the Eurasian Collared doves were just expanding their range from eastern Europe to Germany when I was a kid. In the eighties they were already our most common doves in Western Germany. Here in the US they were introduced in Florida and are spreading rapidly west. I've seen them for years at Sweetwater.

Mourning Dove nest in our potting shed

The Collared doves will certainly be competitors of the Mourning Doves. But the locals have enormous breeding success, raising clutch after clutch all year round in every possible niche, flower pot, top of a cactus, awning, shelf....

Birding in Sulphur Springs Valley

2011-12-29T13:10:00.000-08:00

A winter trip to Sulphur Springs Valley has become a tradition that even Randy and the dogs look forward to. We cruise through the SE Arizona grasslands, pass Tombstone and then head for Whitewater Draw, where thousands of Sandhill Cranes rest and feed in the harvested fields. This year we had heard that there would be fewer cranes than in other years because of a lack of water in Willcox Playa, the main draw for the cranes. But on Christmas Day there was a gray band of thousands of birds on the ground at Whitewater and endless chains of incoming new arrivals appeared constantly in the northern sky.

While I went exploring, Randy just wanted to sit and listen to the raucous calls of the cranes and mysterious rustlings in the reeds. When I came back with pictures of hunting Northern Harriers, frustrating sparrows, law-abiding shrikes, fighting coots and singing Marsh Wrens he had been watching (without binoculars) a 'big guy that was foraging in the cat tails for 'hours' ' and two little black guys stirring up the mud.

I was happy to find two little Sora Rails and started shooting away, but Randy kept pointing at the bank right in front of him to make me look at the 'big guy' - it took several attempts at triangulation to make me recognize the still shape of a stocky, extremely well camouflaged heron: an American Bittern.

He was only about 12 feet from us in an upright, frozen pose that makes him really look just like part of the bleached dry cat tails. I kept loosing him when I changed cameras, even after I knew his location.

Finally he began walking around, searching and catching food. Even though he resembles Night Herons and Green Herons, his behavior sets the Bittern apart. He nearly never exposes himself by climbing up the bank or into the branches of trees like they would - he rather stays hidden in full view among the reeds on the ground.

I had an equally close encounter with a Least Bittern while I lived in Gainesville, Florida (still searching for the slides to add the image here) and I once saw an American Bittern at Sweetwater in Tucson from a distance. Otherwise, their booming deep calls were all I could remember from Northern Germany.

Beautiful views of a Yellowlegs were nearly anticlimactic after this. But the winter guest from the tundras of northern Canada knew how to put himself into the right light in the smoothly reflecting water.

I think it's a Greater rather than a Lesser because of the long beak.

After giving the dogs a good run in the grassland (and waiting for the two 'pups' to return from an extended visit to a not so nearby farm) we headed back towards Tucson. Going north towards Interstate 10 we enjoyed the low light on the sculpted Mustang Mountains and views of gleaming snowfields on Chiricahuas, Huachucas and Pinalenos.

More avian excitement awaited us among the artesian ponds and swampy meadows of Benson: The meadows were literally black with birds from a distance, but swarms flying up and billowing over the road, turning in unison against the light showed their yellow heads for a moment, before swinging into the other direction and turning into a black cloud again.

Yellow-headed Blackbirds - many thousands of them. The pictures were taken as the sun just sank below the horizon, changing the color palette abruptly from warm golds to hues of icy blue.

White Christmas in Tucson?

2011-12-25T22:03:00.000-08:00

Not really in Tucson, but on our local Mount Lemmon. It's more than an hour's drive from our house because we have go across town before driving up Mt Lemmon Highway, the road that climbs in wide, sweeping curves from the desert at 2500 feet to nearly 10000 feet at the ski runs.

The ski slopes are already open because we had one of the wettest Decembers since precipitation has been recorded, resulting in several feet of snow at the top. The crowds stayed close to the parking lots, so we had the Marshall Gulch trail nearly to ourselves.

Cascades of icicles, dark conifers, steep rock walls and a gurgling creek all from a winter wonderland - and our dogs enjoying the deep, fluffy snow -

Staying mainly on the trampled path where the white stuff wasn't quite as deep and fluffy...our dogs aren't stupid!

Of Migrants, Aliens and Mutants

2011-12-18T18:46:00.000-08:00

A disclaimer first: Being part of at least two of the above categories, at the Gilbert Water Ranch, in the heart of Sheriff Arpaio' s Maricopa County territory, I made sure to carry my green-card while bird watching.

In Gilbert, 110 acres with seven large shallow basins that are used to recharge the water table with processed waste water. The eighth pond is stocked for fishing. Waste water there, too? For most visitors, wintering migratory waterbirds are the main attraction of this urban wetland.

From Bob Beatson I finally learned field-marks to differentiate between Ringnecked Ducks (rings around the beak and a white shoulder spur) that were in the majority and Lesser Scoups (above, right). The female on the left was one of several with an unusual amount of white around the beak...leucistic? Nothing special - as Bob remarked, if it were a displaced Scooter, there would be birders lined up all along the shore....

Elegant Northern Pintails were drifting among hundreds of Long-billed Dowitchers and a few Yellow Legs. Surprise: the total absence of Northern Shovelers. They must ALL be at Sweetwater in Tucson. American Avocets (above right with Black-necked Stilt) were still in their pale Winter plumage without any salmon blush of neck and head.
We saw an impressive phalanx half of Canada and half of Snow Geese overhead. No camera was ready.

A Snowy Egret danced and fluttered, fishing busily next to a pair of Pied-billed Grebes. Quite in contrast a Green Heron moved in on the same great fishing spot in absolute slow motion. Fishing must have been good: A Kingfisher rested satisfied and a male Osprey carried a huge fish around a female who very slowly followed him.

We watched a dispute between a Sharp-shinned Hawk and a female Kestrel. For a while he kept harassing her on her tamarisk perch. She flew up and hovered, trying to ignore him and hunt. He mobbed her in the air, then treed in a mesquite. A little later she landed there as well, then the whole tree rustled when she went after him and attacked. Finally, the Sharp-shin cleared out. Interesting: two raptors that probably go after similar prey fighting over territory?

Bob's species list was growing. Red-shouldered Blackbirds, Great Grackles, Curved-billed Trashers, Mockingbirds, Verdins, Lesser Goldfinches, Yellow Rumps, Say's Phoebes and Anna's Hummers were common, Black-tailed Gnatcatchers, and Ruby-crowned Kinglets appeared sporadically. Abert's Towhees, White-crowned Sparrows and House-finches made Bob's list, but House Sparrows and Starlings were purposefully ignored as alien invaders from Europe.

So what about those Peach-faced Lovebirds (Agapornis roseicollis, Psittacidae)? Would Bob count those? An established colony of those cute little 'mini-parrots' lives at the preserve. They are the feral descendants of escaped pets that feel very much at home in Gilbert because they are native to southwest Africa, (Namib Desert and southwest Angola) where they inhabit dry areas with shrubs or trees, usually near bodies of water.
We found several pairs in a big umbrella shaped Chilean Mesquite, preening each other and cuddling. They are just too charming to ignore, even if they are as much an invasive species as the European Starlings. We ended up spending more time watching them then some of the natives.

And, at the end, another water Ranch specialty of the year, a leucistic Say's Phoebe. This one isn't all light colored but pied in a way that looks nearly like a regular pattern. I am glad that another birder had told us about it or I would have searched the field guide for some interesting immigrant from Mexico.

I am aware of several cases of leucism in flycatchers from waste water recharge areas. I hope that this isn't the result of an accumulation of harmful, mutation generating substances in these birds that probably feed on insects with aquatic larvae. Most leucistic birds seem healthy enough to produce and raise offspring, which in most cases turns out phenotypically normal.

More bug life from the Santa Cruz River in December

2011-12-14T11:54:00.000-08:00

Chrysomela sonorae

Even December, fresh green leaves of the willows along the Santa Cruz river support several species of leaf beetles. Here is a single freshly eclosed Chrysomela sonorae. I have found this species only once before in the Patagonia Creek Preserve, in late October.

Last instar larvae, fresh pupa with split larval skin (black), fully pigmented pupa and adult beetle all of

Plagiodera arizonae

Plagiodera arizonae can be found in great numbers on Willows all over Arizona, and I have seen all stages of development, as shown above, in early April, in August, and in December. So it seems to reproduce year round in several generations. If you look closely at the third picture, you can see that only one layer of the leaf was eaten not all the material between the leaf-veins as a skeletonizing leaf beetle (Subfamily Galerucinae) would do. Plagiodera belongs to the subfamily Chrysomelinae.

Lexiphanes guerni (left and middle) and L. mexicanus

In the same habitat, groups of many tiny Lexiphanes guerni are hiding in the young tips of Seep Willows Baccharis salicifolia. At least on other species of this genus can be found along the river closer to the Mexican border.

Leptinotarsa lineolata adult and larva (left) and Apleurus saginatus

Burrowbrush Hymenoclea monogyra accompanies the sandy banks of the river all the way from Marana in Pima County to the Mexican Border and beyond. It feeds adults and larvae of another specialized leaf beetle Leptinotarsa lineolata. This late in the season, however, there were only a few big weevils of the species Apleurus saginatus. The adult weevils can be found mating on this plant from Semtember to December.

Brochymena sp. (Rough Stinkbug), Neoscona oaxacensis (Western Spotted Orbweaver)
Tetragnatha sp. (Longjawed Orbweaver), Metaphidippus chera (Jumping Spider)
On another willow, a stinkbug and a heard of aphids were utilizing the juices of the plant while a whole army of predators was waiting its chance to sneak up on the vegetarians. There were spiders of several different families (above)

and of course ladybugs, here represented by larvae and adults of Ashy-gray Ladybugs (left) and our most common black-with-red-spots Chilocorus cacti.

Grasshoppers, Crickets and Katydids in December in Arizona

2011-12-13T09:04:00.000-08:00

Dry grassland and yellowing cottonwoods, but still some green along the creek

Before it gets really cold in the desert, which can happen any time between late October and late March or not at all, insect live seems to be limited by drying-up food supplies rather than just shortened day time hours or cold nights. When for example the grasses of the Empire State Ranch (above) turned brittle and dry the enormous grasshopper population there crashed within a couple of weeks.

Santa Cruz River in Marana on Jan. 4, 2012

Along creeks and rivers, where a narrow belt of vegetation is still green, and even around cattle ponds where algae and water plants become accessible by the falling water level, many insects, among them many grasshoppers and crickets, are still holding out even after some freezing night time temps.

Singing male and mated pair of Tree Crickets Oecanthus sp.

Along the Santa Cruz River in Marana a continuous choir of tree crickets greets the visitor in the late afternoon. Most males are perched on big cockle-bur leaves that seem to provide especially good acoustics. Several appreciative females can be found close to every singer. The pair above right has already mated, there is a spermatophore visible at the base of her ovipositor (a little pink sphere).

Ovipositing Microcentrum rhombifolium (Greater Angle-wing Katydid)

Close to the river are large stands of willows (Salix gooddingii). At dusk a much fainter crescendo of little clicks made me search the canopy for another long-horned hopper, but it took two additional visits to finally find an extremely well camouflaged over 6 cm long female Greater Angle-wing Katydid whose male was probably the caller. This female was using her ovipositor to glue a row of her big disk-shaped eggs to a willow twig.

Scudderia sp. (Scudder's Bush Katydids)

The purpose of the saw-like edge of the ovipositor isn't quite obvious in the Angle-wings, but there are other Katydids like the Scudderia species, that actually use this structure to separate the layers of a leaf to push the egg disks between them. Thanks to Carl Olson who made these images available from the slide collection of the UAIC!

On the ground underneath the willows another big green grasshopper, Schistocerca shoshone, was pushing her eggs into the loose sand of a dry part of the riverbed. She belongs to the Orthoptera suborder Caelifera and lacks an ovipositor. Instead, her abdomen can be elongated like a telescope. When she pulled it out of the sand, it was nearly 2 cm longer than her wings. In the image above left it is already partly contracted again. The images on the right were taken hours later and show the normal appearance of this bird grasshopper.

Trimerotropis pallidipennis, Pallid-winged Grasshopper

Eggs that are laid now are most likely be the form in which these grasshoppers, katydids and crickets overwinter. Some of these eggs may even need a cold stimulus to end their diapause and begin their development. But I also saw some young Meadow Cricket nymphs and I know that adults of the most common band-winged grasshopper species shown above can be found all winter long.

Grashoppers and Katydids of the bajada of the Tucson Mountains

2011-11-26T17:27:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I rescued a Creosote Bush Katydid (Insara covilleae) from drowning in our dog bath. We actually find both Western Bush Katydids, I. elegans and I. covilleae on our property, mainly at night around lights. We have many Creosote bushes and enough Mesquite trees to keep both species happy.

Desert Clicker (Ligurotettix coquilletti) and Creosote Bush Grasshopper (Bootettix argentatus)

Earlier in the year the Creosote Bushes, which seem so well protected by their load of strong smelling volatile oils, were also frequented by the little Desert Clicker (Ligurotettix coquilletti) and the Creosote Bush Grasshopper (Bootettix argentatus). Fittingly, the gray Clicker spent most of his time on the branches. During day and night, the males constantly made their short little noises, not really a click but more a short two syllable rasp. It took me a while to find the first one, but then I discovered exactly one on every bush: they seem to have their defined little territories. They actually face the observer without fear and a lot of attitude.

By contrast, I have never been able to find a green and white Bootettix argentatus actually on the Creosote foliage, they are just too well camouflaged. Those little white markings, just like those of I. covilleae not only break up the shape but also resemble the reflection on the shiny creosote leaves. But sometimes B. argentatus comes to my black light. I have kept the grasshoppers in a terrarium for several weeks. With voracious appetites they devoured nothing but leaves and green twigs of Creosote. Their enclosure and the whole room soon smelled of desert rain and cough drops.

All four species introduced in this chapter belong to the order Orthoptera. They have the characteristic long hind legs that allow grasshoppers, katydids and crickets to jump long distances when disturbed.
They are members of the two big suborders of Orthoptera, and below I will try to explain their differences:

The two Insara species represent the suborder Ensifera. Katydids, Crickets. All members of this group have very long, thin antennae. Adult females have external, long ovipositors (the swords that the name Ensi-fera, sword carriers or rather makers refers to). The males are the great musicians of the insect world, producing species specific mating songs by stridulating with special structures of the veins on their front wings. Of course, animals using songs for communication also have sensory organs to receive sounds. In Ensifera, these tympana (Eardrum like organs) are located in the front tibiae.

Desert Clickers and Creosote Grasshopper are examples of Caelifera, the suborder of the Orthoptera that contains the Grasshoppers and their short horned relatives. The lubbers that were featured in an earlier blog are also part of this group. Caelifera also use acoustic signals as calling songs for mates and for territorial displays, but their sounds are far less musical than those of the Ensifera. They use various body parts for stridulation, like rubbing the hind femur against the forewing or the forewing against the hind wing. Here is a video of the Desert Clicker calling: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYhcfGr8nTc , demonstrating the first version of stridulation. In grasshoppers the tympana for sound reception are located on the sides of the first abdominal segment.

Yesterday, I went to Las Cienegas to find more hoppers of the grasslands and this evening I listened to the Tree Crickets along the Santa Cruz River in Marana. In late autumn in Arizona, Orthoptera are definitely among the most active insects and I will soon have some more blog chapters devoted to them.

Add you own interpretation

2011-11-09T09:29:00.000-08:00

My presence on communication media like Flickr, facebook, and the Bugguide, the comment section of this blog, my rather publicly available email address, and the good old telephone in Carl Olson's room at the Entomology Department of the University of Arizona provide me with a never ending series of interesting and often confusing stories. While many callers are very observant and have great photographic skills, we all tend to add so much of our own interpretation to a story that it becomes, well, a really moving or exciting tale...

Adult Yellow-crowned Night Herons at the nest

When for example a professional photographer and close friend watched a Heron colony on Florida's Sanibel Island, he brought back great shots of an adult bringing twigs to the nest and a nestling grabbing them. Then the adult took the twig back and wove it into the nest. My friend wanted me to write a detailed and moving story of Father Heron purposefully teaching his son the nest-building craft. As a young (this happened in the nineties), still very uncompromising biologist trained in the ethology school of Lorenz and Eible-Eibersfeld, I just couldn't do anything but describe the difference between pre-programmed instinct actions and true learning....and I missed the opportunity to be part of a very pretty, not too serious book for children, illustrated with beautiful photos, and certainly doing much more good than harm...

Of course, many misinterpretations are less benign and scare people into frantic actions against perceived pests or make them feel very sick from imagined parasites (and I'm not discounting that there are also real ones). Carl Olson and Garret Hughes are providing extension services for the entomology department of the University of Arizona. They often have to use a lot of tact, detective and persuasive skills to get to the bottom of the problem and give reasonable and helpful advice.

This 9 mm long spider that is sitting on my desk right now was just identified by Garret and Carl as Philodromidae (Running Crab Spiders) genus Thanatus. It came from the local Petsmart. I was buying live crickets when the employee jumped back from the cricket bin with a shriek and the assurance that she would NOT go near it again because there was a huge spider in it. I volunteered to take it outside. The lady at the cash register took one look and declared it a Brown Recluse. She could clearly see the violin shape on its back....

There is a long tradition to stories that get a peculiar twist through the interpretation and memory of the raconteur. As Arizona's centennial is approaching our newspaper is resurrecting stories that have been published 100 years ago. Here is one that will delight all herpetologists:

Saguaro National Park BioBlitz: At the Madrona Ranger Station in the Rincon Mts.

2011-10-31T19:36:00.000-07:00

Last weekend, citizens and scientists came together to assemble in 24 hours an inventory of all the species of plants and animals that inhabit the two parts of Saguaro National Park, one (West) where I live in the Tucson Mountains and the other (East), older and larger one that covers parts of the Rincon Mts. Of course, there was much more to it than that 24 h rush. There was of course the long and thorough preparation by the team of the National Park and National Geographics. Everything very efficiently planned and executed, as far as I could see from the remote outpost that I had signed up for: the oasis of Madrona in the foothills of the Rincons, an old ranger station without public access but with a fragile, beautiful riparian habitat at its heart. Several perennial pools are fed by bedrock springs and drain into Chimenea Creek.

Canyon Tree Frogs and Lowland Leopard Frog

Madrona has been the focus of a "Pulse Study" in 2003, of ongoing monitoring of water levels and chemistry, and of several herpetological studies since then. The pools proved their importance for the survival of several endangered species during the drought of 2005-6 when canyon tree frogs, lowland leopard frog, and Sonoran mud turtles survived in the Madrona Pools but disappeared from nearby streams that went completely dry.

I was driven up to Madrona by our group's coordinator Mike Ward. Mike turned out to be the perfect person to keep going a camp full of up to 50 school kids, chaperoned by their teachers, and a bunch of scientists who were at times probably all a little bit overwhelmed by the demands of teaching the kids, finding the species to inventory, and the rocky terrain that we were moving around in. Mike stayed cheerful and kind, matching us up with our groups, getting everybody fed with interesting freeze dried meals, keeping an experienced first responder team around, and he still found breaks to quietly play his guitar at times.

Mating Buprestid Beetles and Skipperling

But mostly, breaks didn't exist. Right after we arrived, I tried to explore the area and actually found that the insect fauna was still much more active and prevalent than I had expected this late in October. Then the first school classes arrived and we were called to pick up our kids. From then on, we were supposed to return and switch groups about every half hour, so all students could accompany the turtle trapping group, butterfly and bird watchers, several general entomologists, and researchers who studied frog populations, measured water quality and more. After a short lunch, more of the same.

Ninth Graders of Sabino High

By then, many of the students had developed special interest in certain kinds of research and had moved from observers to active participants who contributed very actively to ongoing projects. The kids in my group found many insect species that I would have overlooked on my own.

The caterpillar of Agrius cingulata (Pink-spotted Hawk Moth)

It is difficult to identify many arthropods to species level in the field. Instead, I tried to keep a continuous log of everything we observed with my camera. I don't think we covered much more than half a mile up and down stream and up one dry, rocky canyon, but repeated visits to the same locality soon revealed distinct changes of visibly active insect species during the progressing daylight hours.

Mexican Yellow, Sleepy Orange and Southern Dogface Butterflies in a seep at noon, where we found hundreds of Queen Butterflies in the morning

At night, I had two black lights set up, and most of the insects drawn to the illuminated sheets were different from what we found during the day. As the night progressed we also saw a shift from early visiting small moths (Actiids), grasshoppers and beetles to a few late arriving bigger sphinx moths and water bugs.

Rustic Sphinx, black lighting sheet and Toe-biter

The other attraction of the night was the bat station, where four species of bats were recorded (sonograms) trapped, measured, identified and released.We all marveled at their angry little faces, sharp teeth, big ears, translucent but strong wings, and listened to their clicking, squeaking voices. Bats that were released flapped close to the faces of giggling teenagers who very quickly turned into interested students as fascinating stories about some of the smallest mammals, their ecology and challenges unfolded.

Finally the night was too far gone to put up my tent, and I was still hoping to see the resident ringtail, so I lay down under the unbelievably bright stars, watched a huge shooting star, listened to great horned owls who kept hooting their duet right above me....

When a group of National Park officials from Washington arrived in the morning they were treated to amazingly detailed reports of our activities given spontaneously by some of the students (who must have gotten more sleep than I) and a visit to a mist net set up at one of the pools to catch birds.

Red-naped Sap-sucker

Our ornithologist demonstrated on a beautiful male Red-naped Sap-sucker how a bird in hand can be sexed, aged, and evaluated for its breeding status and fat reserves. We learned that surprisingly many species from the north interrupt their migration in Arizona to undergo a month-long molt before they move on to their wintering grounds further south.

I thoroughly enjoyed my stay at Madrona Ranger Station, in parts because it is a very rare and beautiful place, but mostly because of the great people whom I met there who all joined forces there to help protect this natural gem.

Dicromantispa sayi, a Mantis Fly

Of course, the expectation was that we scientists would go into the field, find as many species as possible, identify,document and list them and then deliver those data to the base camps to be counted and published in Saturday evening's news on television. The Rincon Base Camp had been asking for data repeatedly during our stay. I think most entomologists could not quite accommodate those requests: I spent all of Sunday formatting and choosing the relevant photos, identifying them and the few specimens that I had collected, and sending the questionable ones out for expert opinions. While I didn't come up with any totally unexpected or even new species I hope that with over 120 identified and photo-documented species I contributed a solid piece of data to the Saguaro National Park BioBlitz for the Madrona Ranger Station. Please click here to see all arthropods that are identified at least to genus level

Mt Lemmon Highway in October

2011-10-19T21:42:00.000-07:00

American Lady Vanessa viginiensis

On October 18th the Desert Broom bushes at Molino Basin in the lower elevation of the Catalina Mountains are in full bloom and surrounded by clouds of insects. I am glad I stopped on my way to the top of Mt Lemmon.

Soldier Beetles Chauliognathus profundus

and Chauliognathus misellus

Female Longhorn Beetle Tragidion densiventre

I am only showing a few samples of the abundance of species here, I think I will devote a whole blog chapter to the annual event of the Baccharis bloom that is like a final feast of the year for all entomologists from Arizona to Texas.

Hummingbird Trumpet Zauschneria californica

Other wildflowers are putting on a great show because of the unusually late rains.At Molino (Oak zone) there are still Hummingbird Trumpet, Flee Bane and Turpentine Bush.

Turpentine Bush (Ericameria laricifolia)

Higher up under the Ponderosa Pines along General Hitchcock Highway the air is filled with the fragrance of Tagetes lemmonii. It evokes childhood memories of catching butterflies in 'Studenten Knopf' (Tagetes) beds in my mother's garden.

Tagetes lemmonii

But at this elevation the floral show is out-competed by the colors of the autumn leaves. The dark conifers that are in the majority here form a beautiful contrasting backdrop for a sprinkling of Mapels.

The Maple trees are only just turning fiery orange. The photo below is from October 15th 2009, when the deep crimson color was already fully developed. This year a few cold nights will have to add the finishing touches.

At the ski run some Aspen are glowing golden, while others were still green. That's a rare sight, as the trees are genetically identical and clones off the same stock.

A beautiful palette and I am glad I didn't miss it this year. Luckily the Aspen and Maples of Ski Valley escaped the devastating firestorm that raced through Summerhaven some years ago. It is sad to see that for the safety of the rebuilt community many slopes are kept bare. The houses grew back much bigger than they used to be, but the forest is not allowed back.

On the narrow road from the ski run to the top of Mt Lemmon the low standing sun made driving a challenge but the light changed the young Aspen into pure enchanted gold.

The burned slopes further up are a stark contrast but they allow for a beautiful view over the valley. It must have been quite cold up here already: there were nearly no grasshoppers, bees, or robberflies around even though a few flowers were still holding out.

Seining for native Arizona fish at Empire Cienegas Creek

2011-10-14T16:13:00.000-07:00

Thanks to Bob Beatson, last Tuesday I had the opportunity to tag along with Jeff Simms (BLM), Ross Timmons (AZ Game and Fish), Adam Barkalow and Bob for a part of the annual BLM fish survey of Cienegas Creek. This creek flows through the rich grassland of the Empire State Ranch (now BLM). The creek is clear and fresh and seems to find an ever-changing bed under the shading canopy of mostly Cotton Wood trees. The creek varies from a few feed in width, easily stepped over, and flat areas with lively ripples to wide quiet pools that are over five feet deep.
Under BLM management that reduced the grazing impact, the ecological health of this little creek has actually been improving over the last years. This maybe a unique situation among Arizona riparian habitats. But the planned site of the Rosemont Coppermine is not far away, just across Highway 83. If those deep pits go in, water flow of this watershed may reverse its direction and that would be the end of this paradise.

Seining is hard work. I was impressed with the organized protocol and efficient teamwork of the group of biologists, and even more with their obvious enthusiasm for this beautiful habitat and its creatures.

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The fish were of three native species: Long-finned Dace, Agosia chrysogaster, Gila Chub, Gila intermedia, Gila Topminnow, Poeciliopsis occidentalis. The species, though their niches overlap, seemed to favor different conditions concerning temperature and light (canopy cover), cover within the creek, flow velocity etc. I did not learn to identify the distinguishing features of the species because the fish had to be returned to their element as quickly as possible. Bob used a smal tank to take photos. Maybe he'll share some images with this blog later.
To everyone's relieve, no exotics like for example Mosquito Fish were found. The competitive pressure of introduced species is a great problem for native fish in most other Arizona streams and creeks.

Orange Sulphur, Colias eurytheme

The insect fauna of this beautiful intact riparian area seemed extremely rich, even in October. I was not well equipped to capture any comprehensive records, but this visit was hopefully just a first glimpse.

Several interesting species of darners (that I wasn't familiar with) were patrolling along the creek, but I only got a photo of the a very common one.

Libellula saturata, the Flame Skimmer stayed rather close to the water and several males kept coming back to their individual perches.

Sympetrum signiferum, Spot-winged Meadowhawk

A smaller red dragon and his yellowish female frequented the riparian forest, but came out into the open grassland in the late afternoon when it got cooler and shadier under the trees. I chased them for a long time before I got identifiable pictures but it was worth it, as the distribution of the Spot-winged Meadowhawk is only a tiny dot in SE Arizona in Sidney Dunkle's Dragonfly book.

Spreadwings, Archilestes grandis,. were still mating. Above a female and a pair in tandem.

The females of the striking Painted Damsel Hesperagrion heterodoxum still showed immature orange color while the males were in full blue ad red regalia.

I was told that there are Clubtails at the creek, and we may have seen some larvae. We also found larvae of Stoneflies (we thought) and some unidentifiable Diptera larvae clinging to the underside of rocks. I really need to figure out how to take images of wet, reflective subjects in dark places that require a flash.

As seigning by-catch we found Toebiters (Lethocerus medius) and Giant Water Bugs (Abedus herberti), Backswimmers (Notonecta shooteri), and Waterscorpions (Ranatra quadridentata).

Big Fishing Spiders (Dolomedes triton) scuttled out of the way all along the creek.

There were scores of small Whirligig Beetles (Gyrinus sp.) dancing in sunny spots. I mistook the one smooth black water beetle for a Dytiscid until I had it at home and it showed its clubbed antennae: Tropisternus ellipticus, a Hydrophilid.

A Differential Grasshopper on my sweep net

The most prevalent group: Orthoptera, the Grasshoppers and Katydids. I counted at least 15 species between the grassland of the ranch, a rocky slope on the way, and the true riparian meadows. Here is my flickr gallery of Las Cienegas Orthoptera. I have added a few images from other locations of species that I identified without doubt but didn't photograph.

I found only a few terrestrial beetles, some small Epicauta, The Long-horn Sphenotecus bivittata, and very few Carabids under dead wood. The area had been upset by recent violent floods and many ground beetles may have been flushed out.

On high ground a number of Pinacate Stink Beetles Eleodes longicollis appeared just before sunset. From herbs in the grassland I swept big numbers of Striped Ladybugs, Corn Root Worm and, closer to the river the Melyrid Collops grandis. Please visit my Flickr gallery for more pictures.

On the way home deer and coatimundi watched our trucks rumbling by, more curious than afraid, but not obliging for a photo....

A Gem of a Grasshopper, lost for 70 years, rediscovered!

2011-10-04T23:14:00.000-07:00

Last week my Flickr/ Bugguide friend Bob Beatson invited me to go to Sycamore Canyon. I thoroughly enjoyed his company and the trip! The dirt part of Ruby Road was much longer than I remembered but it took us through country that had burned earlier and is very green now after the rains.

In the canyon Cloudless Sulfurs fluttered among Cardinal Flowers and large congregations of male butterflies were sipping minerals from the moist soil.

A mantis surrounded by the colorful wings of her victims and a big paw print in the mud (it's a mountain lion, the claws are visible because he was slipping in the mud) reminded us that we shared this paradise with some formidable predators.

A beautiful, but very aggravated Black-tailed Rattler announced his presence from across the creek. Very unusual behavior for that species, we would have missed him otherwise.

Rounded Toad Bug and Neon Skimmer

The creek and its banks were full of life: Leopard Frogs, too shy to reveal their species, small endemic chubs, big-eyed toad bugs, predatory water beetles, and beautiful dragonflies - I tried to photograph them all....

Leuronotina ritensis by Robert Behrstock

I paid special attention to the grasshoppers of the area, because several friends had sent me their spectacular images of a Lichen Grasshopper that lives on the rocks of the canyon.

Free standing rock needles rising up like small versions of Spider Rock in Canyon De Chelly on the Navajo Reservation had plenty of lichen cover, but I didn't find the elusive camouflaged hopper.

The Atascosa Gem Grasshopper

Instead there was a bright green, short-winged hopper with accents of a striking, complementary-contrast red, a little azure blue on the hind tibias thrown in for balance. Because the wings were so short I wasn't even sure that it was an adult. But I did take a series of photos, and so did Bob.
Back at the university Carl Olson was rather sure that my photo showed a mature individual and thought it might be of a mostly Mexican genus. I posted an image on Bugguide and then left for the Sierra Vista art show. There, in the evening, I met with Pat Sullivan who casually mentioned that he and Bob Behrstock were planning to search for a long lost grasshopper in Sycamore Canyon. Guess what he described?
We checked my pictures (it's so good to have my images accessible wherever I am) then called Bob Behrstock with the news: the Atascosa Gem Grasshopper Aztecacris gloriosus was rediscovered after 70 years! On Bugguide , David Ferguson had also already identified our pictures.

Enoclerus decussatus Klug

This is the second time that Sycamore canyon surprised me with such a treasure. In August of 2008 I was black-lighting with Fred Skillman and found a little Checkered Beetle. I couldn't identify it with the available information about Arizona Clerids, so I sent it to Jaques Rifkind. He wrote back: "Your beetle arrived safely today. It is indeed Enoclerus decussatus (Klug). I looked into the literature, and it seems that Horn made a note in 1885 about a darkened specimen collected in Arizona. More recent checklists assumed this was an incorrect record, and the species hasn't been considered part of the US fauna since Corporaal's 1950s catalogue. So, you may have collected the first specimen of this in AZ since the late 19th century! And so it is now officially part of the US fauna. I will get a note out on the record soon."
Jaques Rifkind wrote up my rediscovery of Enoclerus decussatus in the Pan-Pacific Entomologist and Behrstock and Sullivan will post the grasshopper find (they managed to collect several specimens last Sunday) in one of the orthopterist journals.
I can't wait to get back to Sycamore Canyon for more surprises!

2011 ARIZONA INSECT FESTIVAL

2011-09-26T15:23:00.000-07:00

So now it's over: all the planning, collecting, preparing, and the big day itself. We are all still amazed how incredibly well received the festival was. It seems that the Tucson community was just waiting and ready to come out on a beautiful, still rather hot Saturday morning to celebrate these small, but most numerous and ecologically most important, fascinating creatures.

So for the four hours from 8 to noon, we had a solid stream of thousands of visitors descending on our 25 tents.

Although it was the family weekend of the U of A, and a lot of our advertising used campus media, the majority of the visitors seemed to be young Tucson families with children. They may have come to treat the kids to a fun event, but most of the adults were as fascinated as the kids with our live insects and all the different aspects of insect live on display.

I spent most of the time behind the tables of the Insect Zoo, letting big Horse Lubbers, a Praying Mantis, and a Hercules Beetle crawl onto peoples outstretched hands. Some of the big bugs jumped or flew up and landed on shoulders or heads, but surprisingly nobody flinched, and no insects were lost or trampled. The crowd in front of our double booth was constantly at least five to six rows deep.

On a short walk around I found the other booths just as crowded. Lines in front of microscopes to see insect brains, people watching fritillary caterpillars chew clematis leaves or touching the soft skin of big hornworms,

brave ones tasting mealworms in salza and grasshoppers in chocolate chip cookies, kids creating their own bugs from play dough and pipe cleaners, cheering on their roaches in the insect olympics...

Beyond the fun, serious facts and information were offered at most booths. One just had to find a quiet moment.

Our live animal display did turn into the proverbial zoo, one could hardly exchange words over the din of voices (except Carl Olson: his voice training as a singer in the University choir payed off once again). So I hope the experience that our visitors took with them is that insects are interesting and beautiful and deserve a lot of follow-up observation and research.

I have placed many photos of the festival in my flickr files here.

The Hazards of Temporary Insect Zoo Keeping

2011-09-23T15:35:00.000-07:00

This guy ( I hoped it was a male without a stinger, but Justin just sexed her: a big dominant future queen, I promise to take her back after the show), is circling the light in my office. She's one of the largest paper wasps I've ever seen and she got out of her enclosure when I tried to take her photo. Well, this is an entomology department in the last hours before the big event, the ARIZONA INSECT FESTIVAL. So nobody gets too excited about an escaped wasp.

While most scientists are going to show off their research in beautifully done posters and displays, Carl Olson and I and some other adventurous collegues are going to present life insects that we collected over the last weeks.

There are insect that are traditional easy keepers, like tenebrionid beetles, but since this is a short term venture, we tried our hands on some more unusual Arizona bugs.

We'll have more wasps, like this enomous Acanthochalcis nigricans and a bunch of Velvet Ants, and Justin Schmidt will be there to explain the pain index for their stings. Just in case...

Other challenges result from the short life span of insects - we found some really nice ones early in the season but not all of them made it or simply grew up too fast, so that instead of an interesting caterpillar we now just have a brown pupa to show...

Some bugs may not perform in public the fascinating behavior that we would like to demonstrate.

Others may behave too freely (most of them do).

Our Bee Assassin produced hundreds of eggs and now we have hundreds of 1mm long assassins - and what do we feed them?

No one can be trusted with smaller species in the same container. We knew that about the mantis, but the Plains Lubbers were supposed to be vegetarians (I should have listened to Carl)

The famous predatory scarabs and the prickly pear eating Cactus Weevils surprised with a very sweet tooth and a preference for apricots.

And someone developed serious star attitudes because he got to be on TV with Carl (Tucson Morning Blend Sep. 23, 2011)

We are sooo ready now! Hope to see you all tomorrow morning on the big lawn between Old Main and Student Union - 25 little whit tents are already set up!

Stories in the Sand

2011-09-21T15:01:00.000-07:00

Last week's violent monsoon storms brought life spending water but also destruction and death to Tucson. Yesterday I visited two of my collection spots on the Santa Cruz River and found the Disk Golf Park in Marana still completely submersed.

At Sanders Road Bridge the riverbed was scoured clean of any vegetation. In the aftermath of the flooding the waste water treatment plant must have stopped releasing any water, so all that was left was a 500 feet wide corridor of bare drying sand and gravel with some uprooted salt cedars and burrow brush and no running water. Small fish were wiggling and dying in the last puddles while a few water bugs were making use of the easy pray.

I was ready to go home, disappointed.

But then low sunlight and hard shadows brought to live the sandy surface itself, exposing deeply sculpted, cracking, and peeling textures of an eery beauty.

Smoother planes of sand and mud had preserved a log of all passing visitors.
Tracks, regular as pearls on a string, followed the riverbank: Perfect canine paw prints with at least the two middle toenails showing betrayed coyotes pacing, stopping to investigate ever so often.

Round and firm, showing no trace of the retractable claws, were the paw prints of a bobcat who had approached from behind some still standing vegetation, took one leap into the wet stuff and then walked away - I can just imagine the disgusted look on his big tom-cat face when he shook the mud from his paws.

Herons had been stalking along the edges when there still was water, so their huge prints already looked washed out.

Smaller wading birds left strings of perfect marks, Killdeer running speedily from sand bank to sand bank.

Little groups of impressions, regularly spaced about a foot apart turned out to be those of a wading bird that had stopped, probed several times with its beak the sand around his feed, than run forward to do the same again, and again... leaving these peculiar little groups of impressions. A Spotted Sandpiper or a Lesser Yellow Legs maybe? They used to be here.

A very regular double row of imprints about 6 inches wide was left by an animal that steadily and unhesitatingly moved across all kinds of ground textures. The depth of the imprints changed between mud and loose sand, but not the rhythm of the machine-like motion. A turtle? Yes, the marks of his stiff claws were clearly preserved where he had crossed some harder, dryer sand.

Another paired row of imprints with a blurry middle line had to be that of a rat or big mouse. I think I can exclude reptiles as the source because a lizard that size would have left a sharper line where the tail dragged and the tracks would have followed a more undulating line.

I found surprisingly few five-fingered raccoon tracks. I know that a healthy population lives along the river and at Sweetwater Wetlands, but maybe there was just not enough river left to make it attractive to them.

Closer to Sanders Road Bridge, the riverbed traffic had been most intense with humans and their companions and livestock contributing. So the deeper hoof tracks of the resident Black Angus herd intermingled here with hiking boot and dog paw prints.

There were no visible foot prints of arthropods (they can be very obvious in the finer sand of the dunes around Yuma) but ant and wasps had left their mark by quickly reconstructing mounds and burrows after the flood.

As a kid in Germany, I loved to look for tracks of roe deer and bunnies in the fresh snow around our house in the light of crisp, sunny winter mornings. The memory still makes me a little homesick, but reading the sands of the Santa Cruz River was a nice little surrogate.

My new Blog

2011-09-17T11:28:00.000-07:00

I have started a new blog that I will use to showcase my Watercolor paintings Please visit!

I call the blog Margarethe Brummermann Watercolors, hoping that people who are looking for my old website with that name may stumble upon it.

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But I will also post my new photography based Insect Collages and links to the entire collection on flickr. The blog will also have an event calender to keep you updated about upcoming art shows that I'm planning to participate in.

Finally real monsoon storms!

2011-09-15T15:24:00.000-07:00

By the middle of September the best of the monsoon should be over. But this year the low pressure systems keep rolling in from the south. A couple of nights ago in Madera Canyon, we had to fold up our black lighting sheets early and on the drive down to Green Valley I could not tell where the road ended and the flooded wash began until the water pushed against the car, because it was raining so hard.

At our own place north of Picture Rocks we had to wait till yesterday afternoon for a substantial down-poor. But then it came: dark clouds obscured the Tucson Mountains, and within 20 minutes we had more than half an inch of rain, no electricity, but an ongoing puddle that covered most of ten acres.

I heard a noise like from a car driving too fast on a wet road, except we have no real road and there were no cars out in the storm: the sound that was fast approaching was that of falling hail, ice balls with the diameter of a penny, bouncing hard of cacti and desert rocks and then pounding our roof.

A little later the lovely sound of rushing water: our two regulatory washes were finally running again, after years without any water. Soon it would not have been possible to cross on foot on either side of the house.

Of course, these floods don't last. The water level fell nearly as fast as it rose and we walked around in the great acrid smell of wet desert sand and creosote, waiting for the next shower from clouds that were already building again, this time on the north side. We were in for a very quiet evening without electricity.

Rustic, but no topic for Kinkaide: his cottages don't come without reassuring lights in the windows. And the next storm is brewing.

A Psychedelic Night Trip

2011-09-10T14:17:00.000-07:00

Caterpillars from Florida Canyon, Santa Rita Mts.

Last Saturday we set up our black lights at the parking lot of the trail head next to the research station in Florida Canyon. We got some interesting beetles, moths and antlions, but mostly our sheets were inundated with small brown dynastini of the genus Oxygrilius - and there were so many that one could hardly find anything else. So we left the black lights and wandered up the trail into the canyon. It was very dark because the moon had set behind the mountains quite early. I had never seen the narrow trail so overgrown with tall grasses and prickly leguminous bushes. So we had to walk behind one another and go slowly because in places it's rocky, though not very steep.

Olios giganteus

Then, in the beam of our flashlights, magical creatures appeared, their colors more vibrant than ever against the dark background. There were big spiders waiting for prey and katydids climbing on long spindly legs.

Apiomerus longispinis and A. flavivestris

Several species of Bee Assassins seemed to be resting, while night active flightless cactus beetles like the longhorn Moneilema gigas and the round little weevils, Gerstaeckeria sp., were coming out to feed under the protection of the darkness.

Moneilema gigas and Gerstaeckeria sp.

By far the most striking shapes and colors are those of the caterpillars of our big moths and butterflies. Nobody was camouflaged and hidden away. Flashing their colors, they announced or pretended to be poisonous or foul tasting.

Pipevine Swallowtail, Battus philenor

Royal Moth Citheronia splendens sinaloensis

Syssphinx montana

Syssphinx hubbardi

Automeris cecrops pamina, Hodges #7748

Bizarre protrusions and appendixes made them look much more formidable and less vulnerable than simple caterpillars.

Estigmene acrea Salt Marsh Moth - Hodges#8131

The moths of the Salt Marsh Moth come from platinum blond to brunette in all hair colors imaginable. Even siblings from the same clutch on the same food plant seem to show the whole spectrum.

Pygoctenucha terminalis Hodges#8244. Moth photo by C.W. Melton

Hairs and bristles would spoil a predators appetite and even potentially give overly curious humans skin rashes to remember (I do - I poked at the nest of procession spinners in Greece many years ago).

Eacles oslari, Oslar's Eacles -Hodges#770

Oslaris moth have a wingspan that covers the lenth of my hand.

The white-lined Sphinx is one of many species of sphingids that appear regularly at our black lights.

Hyles lineata White-lined Sphinx - Hodges#7894

Some Moths are cryptic and camouflaged as adults, while the caterpillars sport bright colors and patterns.


Purslane Moth Euscirrhopterus gloveri. Moth photo Arlene Ripley

Lirimiris truncata Hodges#8027. moth photo by Randy Hardy

If you think about it, all this fantastic, and probably costly beauty must be geared exclusively towards interspecies predation avoidance, because there is really no (known) reason for caterpillars to signal to or even recognize members of their own kind visually. One could speculate of course that an egg-laying female might avoid an already heavily populated area to minimize competition for her own brood. I'm not aware of any research data supporting this hypothesis.

Herping on the side, and some mammalian encounters

2011-09-08T12:41:00.000-07:00

Last weekend, Robyn Waayers from Julian, CA, visited to enjoy the late monsoon activity and the bugs the monsoon brings out in Arizona. We picked up Eric Eaton, and made arrangements to meet some other naturalist friends for black lighting session in different canyons of the Catalinas and the Santa Ritas. Despite many blind spots for even the smartest cell phones in these mountain ranges all connections were eventually established.

In Peppersauce Canyon in the Santa Catalinas Bruce Taubert and I cornered a beautiful Western Lyre Snake Trimorphodon biscutatus. It had vertical pupils and slightly triangular shaped head. With a vibrating tail and a hiss that sounded very much like a rattle the snake did somewhat of a rattler imitation. It's not a total bluff: its grooved hind teeth are used to envenomate prey that in addition is subdued by the coils of the muscular body of the snake.

In Box Canyon, Santa Rita Mountains, the next vertebrate, Equus africanus asinus, took the initiative and investigated us: he marched around the car, rubbing his behind against bumpers and mirrors and shoving his head into every open window. My straw hat was mistaken for a treat and I had to pry it from the burro's teeth.

Photo by Robyn Waayers

All our trips take much longer than expected, so we were hurrying west through Box Canyon to meet with Nancy from Wisconsin in Florida Canyon. But the best intentions .... At dusk, Robyn spotted a Gila Monster crossing the road. It was Eric's first, finally just before he is leaving Arizona. Herpetologists assume that the monsters are not really rare, but their life style usually hides them even from avid naturalists. They spend most of the year under ground, probably not even feeding much.

The best times to see them is in June, when clutches of quail eggs provide enough provision to fatten up the Gila's tail, which seems to be his main energy storage. A second wave of observation reports usually coincides with the monsoon in August when female Gila Monsters lay their clutches of up to 12 eggs (but only every other year).

Our monster was obviously annoyed and hissed at us from his gaping black mouth. Gila Monsters are venomous, but they are hardly fast enough to grab a human and chew on him to transfer the venom that is secreted by glands in the lower jaw and released along grooves in the teeth.

Later at Florida Canyon we found the biggest and heaviest Sonoran Desert Toad that I've ever seen. I need both hands to lift the heavy guy out of the brush around a light where he was harvesting an abundance of bugs, mostly Oxygrylius ruginasus. I hope that Robyn has a picture of that guy. My hands were full.

Robyn's photo arrived! And no, the toads are not poisonous on contact, but I wouldn't lick them!

Announcing: THE 1ST ARIZONA INSECT FESTIVAL

2011-08-30T16:46:00.000-07:00

The Entomologists at the University of Arizona are proud to present the first ever Arizona Insect Festival! Bring the whole family out to the UA Mall for an interactive learning experience about insects in our ecosystem. We promise a fantastic day of facts and fun!

There will be tents full of live insects and beautiful displays of insect specimens arranged to highlight and explain many different biological principles.
Knowledgeable people, scientists, teachers, students, and enthusiastic hobby entomologists.
Organizations that promote interest and understanding of insects and their natural world like SASI and Tucson Botanical Gardens.

We hare planning Insect Olympics and Rodeos, kids can make their own bugs, bugs can be tasted, photographed, held and admired...

As the program takes shape I will update this blog, and you can also find us on facebook.

Peppersauce Canyon, 4 weeks later

2011-08-26T22:49:00.000-07:00

I have been trying to collect some phenological data - see the column to the right of this blog - about the appearance of some key species that I observe every year around our house. Our own property is the only place where I can hope to keep somewhat continuous records. Short visits to all other places will only allow a very limited snapshot of the insect life at that particular moment.

My second black lighting visit, exactly four weeks after the first, to Peppersauce Canyon on the north side of the Catalina Mts. made this very obvious: To me, weather and temperature seemed similar, both visits fell within the monsoon season, and the moon was in the same phase. But in the world of short lived insects, changes occur quickly and are caused by rather small variations in temperature, humidity and simply the progressing season. So this time, the Phyllophagas and Anomalas that 'rained' down on our lights a month ago were nearly absent, Chrysina gloriosa appeared, but only two specimens. There were only very few Lebias (Colorful Foliage Ground Beetles). I found a big big Alaus zunianus but hardly any small click beetles which were so abundant last time..

The lone cerambycid was a very nice Neoptychodes trilineatus.

On a dead log I found an assembly of fungus eaters that still await identification. I can only identify the tenibrionids as Platydema sp. Larger tenebrionids began walking at dusk just like last month.

A Calosoma scrutator expected to prey on the insects at my light and was instead caught to be a star of our upcoming Arizona Insect Festival in September.

Diapheromera -

Bucrates species nova - Weissman's Conehead

Interesting walking sticks were marching up and down the oaks, and many species of grasshoppers and katydids, even a big Jerusalem Cricket came to the light.

Being on my own with only some hunters camping somewhere down the road I was rather nervous and nearly jumped when a big object bumped into my back - a very nice male Hercules Beetle Dynastes grantii on his bumbling flight to the light.

A big brown Ox Beetle followed, and I just cannot tell whether it is a female S. aloeus or a male S. cessus. Right after the big beetles, a human was drawn by my light, another entomologist who was collecting further up the canyon. I was delighted to meet John Spaulding and his friends and to scavenge beetles from their mercury vapor light as they were more interested in moths.

Moths were definitely the theme of the night, densely covering our sheets and dancing in a cloud around every light. The best one for me was the beautiful Arachnis picta - Painted tiger moth. We also found the impressive caterpillar of Syssphinx hubbardi the dark moth with pink under-wings.

Syssphinx hubbardi caterpillar

Neuroptera were represented by Owl Flies, a very ornate antlion and at least three species of Mantispids, one of them a great mimic of the big aggressive and very common Polistes comanchus.

Ululodes sp., Glenurus luniger, and Mantispid

It seems that many species of insects time their emergence to coincide with the monsoon season, but every species uses different triggers for the fine tuning. Many species emerge in masses at exactly the same time, ensuring that mates are available and find each other during the often very limited life time of adult insects. So repeated visits to the same location can always surprise the naturalist with completely new experiences.

Collecting trip to the Pinaleño Mountains

2011-08-24T15:57:00.000-07:00

We were lucky, no major storms hit, but the rain cover was a great idea

I spent the last weekend with Wendy Moore's entomology lab group camping in the Pinaleño Mountains in eastern Arizona. The Pinaleños, often just called Mt Graham after the name of their most prominent peak, are the largest of our Sonoran Desert Sky-islands. Of all the sky islands, the Pinaleños have the greatest expanse of mixed conifer habitat. Smaller areas of this plant society are also found in the Catalinas (Mt Bigelow and Mt Lemmon, and in patches on other sky-islands). This habitat is home to several rather rare carabids, Wendy Moore's main research focus.

Scaphinotus petersi is a snail eater, and I found the two under the same piece of bark

Other research interests in our group ranged from general ecology of the sky islands, conifer botany, rare scorpion and pseudoscorpion species, flightless beetles (mostly tenebrionids and carabids), minute fungus eating beetles, to general insect photography, and later we were joined by a cerambycid geneticist from Cornell.
Collection methods varied accordingly, from gleaning and substrate sifting to black lighting with a sheet for night flying insects, to searching with bright headlights for night active beetles and uv-flash lights for fluorescing scorpions, to setting pit-fall traps, peeling lots of bark and rolling many logs.We also tried to cover different elevations, including the oak juniper region further down the mountain (Noon Creek Campground)


Leptomantispa sp., a mantisfly at the black light at Noon Creek

I found it difficult to choose which of the many species we found would be the most interesting ones to introduce here. So I will show only a few that fascinated us most and in addition post links to my flickr sets that show all my photos from the trip.

Sesiidae, Carmenta giliae, wasp mimicry clearwing moth

When you click on the links and flickr tells you that imbedding links is not permitted, just go to 'click here'. To see more than the initial thumbnails choose 'detail' or 'slideshow'.

Shannon Campground and trail

Columbine Corrals and high elevation meadows

Noon Creek black light

We are still working on the identifications of some species, so you may want to visit again later if you are curious. For completeness, I have augmented the actual Mt. Graham photos with a couple of pictures from other sites. Those are of insects that I have frequently found before and did not photograph again on this trip.

Several Nicrophorus marginatus turned up in the bathrooms of the campground

We all came back tired and dirty and very satisfied with our finds. I added at least half a dozen new species to my virtual Arizona beetle collection that will hopefully result in an Arizona Beetle Atlas. I posted some of my photos on bugguide and found out that one of the Elateridae is a new species currently being described, and that another researcher was hoping that I collected the pretty hairy caterpillar for his genetic research (I didn't).

Caterpillar of Lophocampa maculata, Spotted Tussock Moth

Not for the squeamish

2011-08-18T11:19:00.000-07:00

Coleoptera (Beetles) are the largest and arguably most successful order in the animal kingdom. The extreme variety in physique and behavior found among beetles results from adaptations to nearly every conceivable ecological niche found in terrestrial and aquatic habitats. The eating habits of coleoptera species range from total abstinence in adult life to absolute gluttony. Some beetles have a highly specialized diet while others are opportunistic omnivores. Beetles hunt animals, have their brood raised by foster parents, care for their larvae or abandon their eggs, destroy stored seeds and grain, prune plants and stimulate rejuvenating regrowth, feed on nectar while pollinating their hosts, have wood boring Larvae, break down organic material and feces and further decomposition, and beetles also take care of dead bodies.

Steel engraving from Brehms Tierleben 1893

Beetles in the genus Nicrophorus will bury small corpses of birds and rodents to give their larvae the exclusive rights to the food source. In Southern Arizona these species are much rarer than in moister climates, but I have found a couple at lights during cool humid nights at higher elevations.

Nicrophorus nigrita (from CA) and N. marginatus (AZ, Pima Co.)

Other beetles come to bigger dead bodies in different stages of decay. Forensic Entomologists use the strict sequence of species arrival as evidence for the timeline of a killing.

One of the workshops at our last SASI meeting studied for several days insects at the corpse of a dead pig that was (astonishingly) placed right outside the conference hotel.

On our bug hunting trips into the Arizona grasslands we sometimes come across carcasses of cows that are nearly mummified by the dry heat. Entomologists know that those can be treasure troves for bug hunters, but I usually stand politely back behind the more enthusiastic colleges. A succession of Carrion and Carpet Beetles, Rove Beetles, a species of Checkered Beetles, Hide and Clown Beetles and a few Scarabs can usually be found.

The larvae of Dermestes marmoratus form at times a dense layer covering most of the carcass. Forensic labs make use of their voracious appetite to quickly and thoroughly clean bones.

Omorgus scutellaris

After the dermestids are done with the softer parts, the tough hide still attracts the scarab related Hide Beetles, Trogidae. When disturbed they can withdraw legs and heads like tortoises.

Necrobia rufipes

Red Legged Ham Beetles (Cleridae) don't seem to make any difference between an Arizona cow or an Egyptian pharaoh, as they were also found in the wrappings of ancient mummies. They stay around when even the Hide Beetles are gone.

Tanatopilus truncatus and Dermestes caninus

Not just the state of decomposition, but also the biological class of the dead animal seems to matter to beetles. While mouse and small bird carcasses attract several Nicrophorus species, and the larvae on the dead cow were probably predominantly Dermestes marmoratus, I have found only Tanatopilus truncatus and Dermestes caninus on dead snakes in Arizona.

Dermestes caninus and Green Bottle Fly on a dead snake

The smell of dead fish, often used as bait in pit falls, works for a number of carrion species but also attracts dung beetles (scarabs).
I hope this detailed description of beetles on carrion did not gross you out too much. These beetles play a very important role in the ecological system, and the existence of at least one species is threatened in the US . It's endangered status inspired this imaginative campaign:

Finally: The other Stenaspis

2011-08-16T18:49:00.000-07:00

During every good summer monsoon the Desert Broom bushes (Baccharis sarothroides) in Madera Canyon (Santa Rita Mts, AZ) start, whether spontaneously or caused by gnawing bug mandibles I do not know, to ooze sweet phloem juices from their stems, attracting many paper, spider and thread-waisted wasps, leaf-footed and stink bugs, scarabs, and most impressive colorful big long-horned beetles.

I have documented this event every summer since 2007. I often found and photographed the 'big three' longhorns that are common in our area:

Tragidion densiventre was formerly T. annulatum but the genus recently underwent a revision. All the males that I saw had ochre colored lower elytra and enormously long banded antennae, while most of the females were red and black with a very fuzzy pronotum and shorter solid black antennae.

Trachyderes mandibularis seems to appear somewhat later than the Tragidions. The males have huge jaws that look more useful for interspecies fighting than bark-gnawing, but I have never seen them attack each other. Smaller males do seem wary of bigger ones. All individuals of the species are always prepared to quickly take flight which goes well with their wasp like black and yellow pattern.

The big solid black Stenaspis solitaria is the most common of the longhorns. They can be seen flying between desert broom bushes where they snack and meet their mates and the Velvet Mesquites trees that are hosts for their larvae.

From other collectors I had heard about another, metallic green Stenaspis, S. verticalis. Fred Skillman described how he found one last summer, recognizing it just from its antennae that protruded from the Baccharis branch that hid its body from view.

Stenaspis verticalis specimen in the UAIC

When I looked up the species in our University collection (UAIC) I found that the black S.solitaria specimens fill more than a drawer there, but all green S. verticalis specimens fit into just one unit tray.

Last Saturday evening a threatening thunderstorm drove me from Box Canyon into the safer Madera Canyon. I stopped at the little abandoned visitor center where only a few desert broom bushes survived last years attack by irresponsible collectors (Supposedly some interesting cerambycids develop in Baccharis branches and lay waiting in their pupal cradles, ready to 'pop' or to be excavated by some over-eager human.)
As usual, all the bug action was concentrated on just one old bush. Actually action is the wrong term. Chlorion wasp, Giant Agave Bug, Western Fig Beetle and a pair of Tragidions all perched peacefully sleeping close to the source of sweet juice.

I nearly disregarded a big dark Stenaspis on the same branch, until my flashlight beam fell on its red rimmed pronotum and legs. I still wasn't quite sure that it wasn't just a teneral S. solitaria because I had expected S. verticalis to be much more metallic and green.

During the day I would have been afraid to loose the beetle if I spend too much time taking pictures, but on that rather cool evening I even dared to wait for the Tragidion to crawl closer to the Stenaspis to have them both in one shot.
While taking those pictures I nearly lost my truck and had to be rescued by the famous bat and hummingbird photographer Bruce Taubert, but that is a different story....

The Hanging Thiefs (or Murderers, rather) of Patagonia Lake

2011-08-07T18:31:00.000-07:00

In the unlikely case that you've ever tried to photograph the arrival of scores of dung beetles (Canthon imitator in this case) that rain down simultaneously on any fresh pile of cow dung, you will have noticed that the beetles literally dive out of sight right after they have landed. The one in the photo was only slow enough for a shot because the surface of this cow pie was already getting dry.

Competition, greed, and the urge to prepare food for their offspring are not the sole motivators for this rush. There is danger lurking at the dung buffet. At a pile of horse manure at Patagonia Lake we watched how the beetles had to pass a gauntlet of 12 huge robber flies to get to the feast. The only reason most beetles made it past the flies was that they all arrived pretty much simultaneously and the lurking robbers were distracted by the need to avoid ending up prey themselves and by courting the ladies among them. A. Scarborough, our local Asilid specialist, tells me that Diogmites are known to congregate at places with high prey traffic density like bee hive entrances, and also for their high (10% of courting males) rate of cannibalism.

The robber flies seemed to ignore weak but quick prey like bottle flies and only lay in wait for the fat beetles. They were of the genus Diogmites, or Hanging Thieves. We soon got a demonstration of the reason for this name. A fly grabbed one of the landing beetles and carried it off to a mesquite tree.

At first the beetle seemed to have a fighting chance to get away. The effect of the paralyzing bite seemed slow, and as soon as the big beetle felt the tree branch under his tarsi he started to scramble away, dragging the fly along. He probably would have stripped her off his back by crawling into some tight spot.

But the fly was able to detach the beetle from his hold by using the enormous reach of her long legs. To keep him from reaching the branch again,

the fly held the beetle with four legs and used just one pair, and later just one single leg to suspend the weight of the prey and herself. This trick earned the genus the popular name Hanging Thief. The beetle had now lost any chance of fighting back.

Other robber flies tend to crouch tightly above their prey holding it down with their superior body mass and strength. It seems that these slender flies need the suspension tactic to control their strong bulky prey while their paralyzing, tissue-dissolving poison is slowly taking effect.

Fighting Fig Beetles (Cotinis mutabilis)

2011-08-05T22:26:00.000-07:00

In June and July, Fig beetles (Cotinis mutabilis) noisily careen all over Tucson's neighborhoods, and through the lower parts of foothills and canyons of the Sonoran Desert. They are day-active, compact, big, noisy strong fliers, and often described as black. Of course, they only appear black when seen against the bright sky. Sitting on the ground or on flowers, they probably impress you with the velvety green of their elytra and the shiny, metallic colors of their legs and underside. There is a questionable tradition of tying strings to the beetles and tossing them into the air to fly - performing tethered rounds and rounds around your head.

Life cycle: After mating, the females lay spherical gray eggs into soil with high organic content. Here in our sandy desert that usually means lawns or flower beds, old, decomposed cow dung or our compost pile.

The larvae feed for two years on organic material including the roots of grasses, alfalfa and shrubs, but they can also grow up on a diet of old cow manure. In late spring of the second year they pupate close to the soil surface in earthen cells and eclose as adult beetles in June - July.

They adults feed on leaves, pollen, and everything sweet. On opuntia cacti in our backyard I often find a couple of beetle buts protruding from every hollowed out prickly pear.

Acacia or desert broom shrubs are often oozing sweet sap because of a sudden over-supply with water during the monsoon rains. This can attract hundreds of Cotinis. When I watched these gatherings I was usually too distracted by the noisy coming and going of the beetles (and also dodging tarantula hawks and paper wasps) to pay much attention to the behavior of individual beetles.When I noticed them shoving and pushing each other, I thought they were just haggeling for space at the sap bar.

Yesterday in Amado I watched a couple of them fighting over a spot of oozing sap on a Desert Broom branch that could have easily accommodated both of them. They very persistently faced each other, head-butting like little bulls. They indeed have a little horn-like structure on their forehead, but I couldn't tell whether that was used in the pushing and shoving match. The match actually went through several rounds, with one or the other fighter being pushed off the branch and immediately flying back to resume his stance.

In one of my pictures I captured one beetle flinging the other one over his back with a move that fighting stag beetles or the big dynastes would use. The males of those species have special protrusions on their heads that are used to lever and grab the opponent off his perch. It looks as if the behavior is phyllogenetically older than the weapons of those species, as it seems to occur in this related but rather unarmed species.

Back in position again

I am pretty sure that my two Cotinis were not just fighting over access to some sweet juice, but that I was watching a test of strength between males and a competition for a territory that would promise the winner access to females who would soon be drawn to the tempting food source.

The Yuccas of Cochise's Stronghold

2011-07-27T08:03:00.000-07:00

Maybe you recognize the landscape from the many Western movies that were filmed here. It is also a place were dramatic real western history took place:when in the middle of the nineteenth century the Chiricahua Apache leader Cochise used this part of the Dragoon Mountains as his inaccessible retreat during his decades-long fight against the US military. Today a dirt road that has been greatly improved since I first drove up there in 1991 ends at a picturesque campground among granite boulders and Silver-leaf Oaks.

Urodera diliticollis and Megalostomis subfasciata

This years devastating fires had forced the closure of most Arizona wilderness areas. On July 17, the entrance to the campground itself was still barricaded but a nice ranger let us park off the road anyway.
Despite some showers that had interrupted our Beetle Bash black lighting the night before it was still extremely dry, with even the drought tolerant Manzanita bushes looking yellow and about to die.
But a few Acacias were beginning to green and even to flower, and several species of Leaf Beetles were getting the message: The monsoon is coming and life can only get better.

Agave pareyi

A dominant plant family at the stronghold are the Agavaceae. Molina Beargrass, Sotol, Agaves and Yuccas provided the Apaches with fibers for baskets, soap, starchy roots and stems and edible flowers and fruit. Agaves are succulent and build up resources for a spectacular, once-in-a-lifetime bloom over many years (hence the name century plants). Yuccas are not succulent, but protected against too much evaporation by the leathery surface of their leaves. Most have extremely long tap roots to reach water sources deep in the crevasses of the granite mountain side and bloom reliably every year.

Banana Yucca, Yucca baccata

The relationship of Yuccas and their only pollinator, the yucca moth (Tegeticula, Pronuba) is famous: The female moth collects pollen in a yucca flower, rolls it into a ball and stuffs it into the cup-shaped stigma of another yucca flower.While thus making sure the flower is pollinated, the moth also lays her eggs in the flower. The caterpillars will hatch and feed in the ripening fruit. They will destroy some, but not all of the many seeds each ovary produces. This is an example of obligate mutualism where none of the partners could procreate without the other. The moths are active at dusk, so we didn't find any during our visit.

Giant Agave Bug, Acanthocephala thomasi

The gorgeous, rich yucca flowers were attracting a number of other less specialized and less beneficial guests.

Giant Agave Bugs (Acanthocephala thomasi, a coreid true bug} were mating on the flowers. Nymphs of different ages were already around. It seemed that each group of nymphs was guarded by a parent.

Young nymph

Older nymph

All of them were using their sucking mouth parts to extract juices from the thick flower petals.

A big green Stink Bug was also reluctant to give up his perch at the food source.

Green Stinkbug, Chinavia hilaris

The inside of another stand of creamy white flowers seemed strangely dark.

Epicauta ochrea

When I pushed the flowers apart, dozens of rust-brown blister beetles became visible. They seemed to be resting during the day, but frass patterns around them betrayed their nightly feasts on the yucca petals.

Glaucotes yuccivorus

An aptly named Longhorn beetle was sitting on the long pointed leaves.Yuccivorus means 'Yucca eating' and that is about all that literature has to say about this flat-faced borer that occurs only in Arizona (Texas?).

Hermetia comstocki

Hermetia concinna.

Soldier flies of several species kept landing on the leaves, maybe just using their spikiness as protection against predators. While all resembled wasps, the one one the right was an exceptionally good mimic of Paperwasps - only her twitching antennae gave her away

Predators also made use of the three radial architecture of the yucca plant: certain spiders built their three dimensional webs between the leaves, and a young mantis was hunting in the bird safe sanctuary.

Stagmomantis limbata

Blooming Yucca, watercolor by M. Brummermann

Black Lighting in Peppersauce Canyon, Catalina Mountains

2011-07-22T20:19:00.000-07:00

On the north side of the Catalina Mountains a service road connects the town of Oracle to the top of Mount Lemmon. Connecting may be the wrong term. None of my vehicles seems appropriate to negotiate the steep rocky, barely maintained road. The entrance to Peppersauce Canyon, however, is on the lower part of the road that is smooth and easy to drive. Last week Jeff Eble, a college from the entomology department, and two students asked me (and my black light) to join them on a collection trip. Jeff wants to study genetic shifts among isolated beetle populations of the sky islands, so he is mainly interested in flightless species that can't mingle as much as their more mobile counterparts.

Black lights, of course, draw the good fliers first. That evening, we were immediately inundated by hundreds of Phyllophaga vetula, a chunky, hairy June beetle. Scores of Anomala delicata followed soon after.

Soon a bristletail and a stick insect walked up, and a slim beige Mantis with surprisingly dark eyes, and a mantispid came to prey on 'our' bugs.

The most common Cerambycid was Methia mormona (top, middle), but we were also visited by a huge Prionus heroicus (left), several delicately spotted Orwellion gibbulum arizonense (right) and a tiny Sternidus decorus mMiddle, bottom). A number of Bycids in the the genera Aneflus and Oeme are still unidentified.

Weevils were represented by two Curculio spp (left). and the broadnose weevil Pandeleteius buchanani.

Surprisingly several Sunburst Beetles Thermonectus marmoratus (right) and two Whirligig Beetles Dineutus sublineatus (left), all living in shallow ponds, showed up. We couldn't find any water close by, but the beetles are good fliers who often approach shiny surfaces like car roofs and lights.

The only carabids appearing in numbers looked like Selenophorus which we ignored because they are impossible to id. We also got several specimens of a tiny Bombadier Beetle that hopefully will be a new species for me. Jeff collected Lebia mimics of the Bombadier Beetles even though they do fly - he needs some control groups for his flightless stuff.

Walking along the trail with flash lights, we found two larger cerambycids, Enefalodes hispinicornis and a Prionid. Both are good fliers, so I got them for my photo collection.

Jeff was happy with his collection of large flightless Darkling Beetles like Eleodes subnitens and longicollis on the trail, and Strongylium atrum (above) on tree trunks.

We also found several very attractively shaped Embaphion sp. I hope to keep one of them alive and happy for the U of A Beetle festival on the 27th of September (Tucsonans, mark your calendars!).

Windscorpions (Solifugiae) were racing about at top speed, with Jeff in hot pursuit.

Under a rocky overhang an impressive Cat-faced Orbweaver, Araneus illaudatus, was hanging out in her over 20 in wide net.

Meanwhile at the black light, interesting moths had arrived: Clock-wise: Manduca rustica, Gerrodes minatea, Euclidia diagonalis, Syssphinx hubbardi, Datana sp.

While we were observing arthropods, fellow vertebrates were spying on us: A Woodhouse's Toad, two Gray Foxes and a gang of Havelinas took their turns.

Maybe we were set up right in the path of their evening rounds.

Cochise County Roadside bounty

2011-07-18T18:53:00.000-07:00

After this years Beetle Bash Eric Eaton and I explored the rocks and cliffs of Cochise Stronghold. I'll post photos and observations from this excursion another time. This blog will just focus on the very humble looking strip of vegetation along Ironwood Rd (none of those trees anywhere), the road that connects Cochise Stronghold in the Dragoons to the flatland of the Sulphursprings Valley.

Along dry grassland, run-off from the road feeds a narrow green strip of Senna, Silverleaf Nightshade, little blooming gourds, a Zinnia species and stands of a fresh-green, knee-high Asteracea that wasn't blooming yet. On its slightly sticky leaves we found most of the insects shown below.

Altica sp. and Systena sp.

Little Flea Beetles (Alticidae) are at the bottom of the food chain and very difficult to identify.

Zygogramma piceicollis and a pair of Leptinotarsa decemlineata

Two of the larger leaf beetle (Chrysomelidae) species. The species on the right is known all over the world as a potato pest, but there is evidence that our local populations, that live on small nightshades rather than potatoes, are genetically different enough to maybe offer some solution to the pesticide resistance of the potato bug.

Rainbow Grasshopper, Dactylotum bicolor Toothpick Grasshopper, Achurum sp. Horselubber Taeniopoda eques

The two on the left belong to the same family Acrididae, Shorthorn Grasshoppers, but could they be more different? The one on right is an early instar nymph of our big Horselubber.

Apiomirus sissipes and Apiomerus flaviventris

Two assasin bugs that are also called bee assassins, because they often hang out around flowers to grab nectaring bees. Even though nothing was blooming yet these guys seemed to make a good living hunting the abundant leaf beetles.

We found nymphs of different ages. The little one one the left is most likely A. sissipes which was most common among the adults (see the pair on the right). In the middle is an older nymph whose identity remains a mystery to me.


Juv. Phidippus sp. Megaphorus sp. Argid Sawfly Anasa sp. Battus philenor

Here are two more predators and some vegetarians: a jumping spider, a robber fly, a saw fly (wasp) a squash bug and the caterpillar of a Pipevine Swallowtail. We found all of these just by walking along the road and looking, not using any swipe nets or beating sheets, so there probably were a lot more species that we missed.

The Arizona Queen of the Night, Peniocereus greggii

2011-07-12T16:37:00.000-07:00

Two of my watercolors of the Night-blooming Cereus

Last night the Arizona Queen of the Night (Peniocereus greggii) bloomed in our part of the desert. Buds on all plants in our area simultaneously opened at sunset, the petals still growing and stretching outward for hours, until finally the dense anthers and star-fish-shaped stigma were presented above a skirt of slightly drooping petals.

I don't know what signal synchronizes this magical event. It's not day length, because it can occur any time between mid June and the beginning of August, and Tohono Chul Park 30 miles to the east celebrated the bloom about a week ago. The blooming is also rather independent of the onset of the rainy season, probably because the plants are drawing on the resources of a large underground bulb, although the hydration state of a plant seems to decide whether it's going to bloom in any given year at all. Sometimes, often following a very rich flowering, all the visible parts of a plant just dry off and crumble, and it takes years until the next flowers appear.

The vegetative parts of this cactus are so thin and unassuming that they blend in completely with the branches of the Creosote bush. Our friends Frank and Lynn bought the land next to us years ago and were very much looking forward to the flowers of one Queen that we had planted, but we were all surprised by several other large plants that suddenly opened their flowers last night.

The cactus flowers stay open into the early morning hours, so a couple of hours before sunrise Cody and I went out into the desert to find some more blooming Arizona Queens. At night usually a cloud of sweet fragrance is the first sign that leads pollinators and photographers to the plants. But at dawn, the pale flowers stand out like beacons.

The flowers are about the size of a baseball. Many plants are not more than knee-high, but today I found several that were taller than I. This is impressive considering that a heard of cattle had a devastating 4 year run in this 400 acre parcel of state trust land. Wile the bovines destroyed Paloverdes, Prickly Pears and Ironwood trees, they left the fragile stems of E. gregii untouched in their cover of Creosote branches.

This ten-flower cactus was the prize of the morning. I wished you could smell the cloud of sweet fragrance that surrounded it. This smell attracts the nocturnal sphingid moths that are the main pollinators of P. greggii. Big Manducas and the White-lined sphinx Hyles lineata are usually very common, but this year I have only seen a few at my black lights.

When the moths are scarce unpollinated flowers probably stay fresh longer and their the beacon-like appearance at day break may insure visits by bees, although those promiscuous pollen gatherers are probably not the most reliable pollinators.

Roadside Drama

2011-07-09T15:14:00.000-07:00

Since there is no parking close to campus, I get a nice morning walk and a very hot afternoon work-out whenever I'm working at the University of Arizona Insect Collection. It's an urban environment, but with very nice old established xeroscaping in the residential areas. After the first monsoon down-pour, even a fence made from ocotillo clippings sprouts fresh green leaves

I always have my camera ready for interesting encounters. Cicadas are singing and huge Cicada killers are buzzing about, Carpenter Bees hover around palm trees...I've seen Trap-jar ants carrying Harvester Ants in their huge fangs. There seem to be more lizards in town than in the true desert environment at our home.

Sceloperos magister, Desert Spiny Lizard

Today a beautiful metallic blue wasp was searching for prey under a thick layer of mesquite pods that recent rains had deposited in the gutter. Eric Eaton confirmed from the photos: clearly a Chlorion species. So it belongs to the wasp family of the Sphecidae, the Thread-waisted Wasps. These solitary wasps either dig burrows to lay their eggs or build mud structures. They provision their brood with life prey that is paralyzed by the wasp's sting. Their choice of prey is strictly species specific. (Of course there are exceptions: some are klepto-parasites, who they let someone else do the hunting and digging).

At first I assumed that this wasp was C. aerarium, the Cricket killer. The layer of nutritious, moist debris seemed like a very reasonable spot to look for crickets. The wasp was thorough, sometimes disappearing under leaves and seed pods, sometimes running around with its typical jerking, twitching movements.

A couple of times she came out onto the pavement as if to catch her breath, always returning to the same section of leaves and intently searching- she must have known that there was something hidden.

Then there was a rustling struggle among the leaves and the wasp finally bend her abdomen forward to carefully place a sting into something that her front legs and huge jars were pinning down out of sight. Now I know why she needs such a narrow bendable waist (petiole)!

After the sting, the wasp backed off, probably to wait for the paralysis to take hold. The prey that became visible was a surprise. No cricket at all, but a female Sand Roach. I had only once before seen one, in the dunes at Parker when Charlie O'Brien was sifting sand for weevils. But winged males of two species are commonly seen at porch lights around Tucson.

Female and two males of different species of local Sand Roaches in the genus Arenivaga

Anyway, the unexpected prey made me rethink the species ID for the wasp. There are two species of Chlorion in Arizona that are very difficult to tell apart in the field or from photos. But while C. aerarium feeds crickets to its larvae, C. cyaneum hunts roaches for its brood. So my wasp can be safely identified as Chlorion cyaneum.

Chlorion arerarium, the Cricket Hunter

To me, C. cyaneum looks bluer (kyanos, Greek, dark blue) than the verified C. aerarium specimen in my photo collection (above), but according to literature and specialists, that's not a good diagnostic character.

Unfortunately my observations were abruptly ended by a group of students (isn't the semester over?) jogging down the road. While my wasp had been very tolerant of my camera, she got spooked by so many stomping feet. Since I had no time to wait whether she would return to the paralyzed prey, and female Arenivaga Roaches are hard to find, I collected the abandoned roach.

Pine Valley Creek, San Diego County, California

2011-07-07T17:50:00.000-07:00

Randy and Robyn discussing Southern California weather

On our way home from a family visit in California, we joined our friend Robyn Waayers on a hike and bugging trip along Pine Valley Creek in the Cleveland National Forest. Actually, Randy and the female dogs decided to instead launch in the shade at the trail head...but Cody and the 'pups' ran along and had a great time wading in the clear water of the creek.

Clouds in the sky announced the beginning of the monsoon season in Arizona to the east, but Robyn told us that summer rains would be quite unusual for this area. Nevertheless, besides the ubiquitously blooming buck-weed, we found some very nice wild flowers high above the creek where the trail passes among oaks and sage brush.

But there was something ominous about this canyon forest: Many of the biggest oaks were dead.

This is the sad result of Agrilus auroguttatus infestation . We found some of the rather pretty buprestids (metallic wood boring beetles) in lime traps. In California,. A. auroguttatus has a devastating effect, while the same speciesdoes not do much damage in its home range in Southern Arizona and Mexico. The reason may be a difference in climate and in prevalent species of oaks.


Agrilus auroguttatus . Photo Mark Lewis

The beetle lays its eggs on oak trees of a certain trunk size. In California, the larvae kill the host tree by girdling the trunk in the cambium and phloem layer of the bark. Having seen the devastation I can only hope that everyone understands the danger of transporting firewood, a sure way to spread this destructive pest. See addendum below!

Along the creek we found lush willows, blooming meadows, Yerba Mansa, very little Poison Oak, and wild California Roses. The pretty pale pink flowers were paradise for beetles and coleopterists.

Lepturine cerambicids (Flower Longorn Beetles) were flying everywhere, mating and feeding on pollen. Two species, the larger, more common Strphiona tigrina and the small Judolia sexpilota are strikingly patterned black and yellow wasp mimics. I also found a very pretty velvety Triodoclytus lanifer in the Clytrini tribe.

While the rose bushes are probably not the hosts for the wood-boring larvae of the cerambycids, the elusive bright red weevils that led us on a long chase among the rose bushes totally depend on this plant. The female of the Western Rose Curculio lays her eggs into holes that she bites into the rosebud. The larvae then feed on the flower and over-winter in the rose hips, pupate, with the adults emerging the following spring to mate and begin a new cycle. The adults were also happily chewing rose leafs and petals when they were not too busy mating or dodging paparazzi by suddenly dropping out of sight.

Merhynchites wickhami, Western Rose Curculio

Several species of buprestids were also congregating on the roses, like Acmaeodera hepburnii and a small dark Anathaxia.

Many thanks to Robyn for sharing this great place with us! We will definitely stop there again on our next California trip.

P.S.
I found that Wikipedia refers to the Agrilus that kills the oaks as A. coxalis, other sources call it A. auroguttata. Here is a paragraph from a paper by Henry Hespenheide et al that Henry sent to clarify this discrepancy:
"Agrilus auroguttatus Schaeffer 1905, Revalidated status (Figs. 34–36)

Only a single specimen is known from the peninsula, beaten from Quercus sp. at the end of August in the Sierra de La Laguna, BCS. Agrilus auroguttatus has been considered a synonym (Hespenheide 1979) and later (Hespenheide and Bellamy 2009) a subspecies of A. coxalis Waterhouse 1889 (Figs. 31–33), but on further study we now con- clude that they are distinct species. Although A. coxalis has been recorded from southern California (Westcott 2005, Coleman and Seybold 2009), this population should be treated as A. auroguttatus; A. coxalis s. str. has been found only in Mexico, Guatemala, and perhaps Honduras. The senior author only recently had males of A. aurogut- tatus available for study, and when genitalia of specimens from the California population were compared with those of A. coxalis from Chiapas, México, consistent differences were observed (cf. Figures 33 and 36). In addition to differences in genitalia, the elytral pubescent spots of A. coxalis are typically smaller (<0.25 mm in width) and very pale yellow or white, whereas those of A. auroguttatus are larger (>0.25 mm in width) and distinctly dark golden orange in the Arizona and California populations, although they are pale in the BCS specimen. The disjunct distributions and consistent genitalic and morphological differences given above all recommend considering A. auroguttatus and A. coxalis as separate species. Until recently, A. auroguttatus had been known only from south- eastern Arizona, and had rarely been collected. Coleman and Seybold (2009) reported A. auroguttatus (as A. coxa- lis) to be causing widespread damage and death to oaks in San Diego Co., California, where, because of its sudden appearance, large numbers, and apparent mortality to its host, it was assumed to have been introduced."

It's a lizard, not a toad

2011-06-26T18:48:00.000-07:00

In June, Saguaro fruit are ripe, ants come to feast on them, Horned Lizards emerge from hiding to feast on the ants. When I posted my first image of a juvenile Regal Horned Lizard (Phrynosoma solare) to the photo gallery of the Arizona Star and sloppily called it a Horned Toad, Doris Evans, a teacher and long time Arizona Sonora Desert Museum docent corrected me right-a-way. We have become a good friends since then.

So: it's a lizard, of course. Even if he's short and round and waddles a little bit like his neighbors, the Sonoran Desert Toads, the scaly skin and his complete independence of water mark him clearly as a reptile. See his regal dragon profile above! His English name 'regal' and the Latin 'solare' (sun-related) both refer to the full crown of spikes of our Sonoran Desert species.

Photo from the AZ Star Gallery (Photographer's name will be added)

After mating in the middle of the hottest season the female of our low desert species lays up to 33 leathery-shelled eggs in an underground chamber that she has prepared in the sandy soil.

After hatching, the little ones are on their own. They are vulnerable to many predators, so the large clutch numbers are not excessive.

Photo by Collins L. Cochran who allowed me to use it

High in the Catalina Mountains, a close relative, the Greater Short-horned Lizard, gives life birth to even more babies - up to 48 per clutch. In a lizard, giving live birth means nothing more than laying very thin-shelled eggs that rupture during the birthing process to release the fully developed young (Ovoviviparity). This may be an adaptation to the difficulty to bury eggs among those rocks and low night time temps that might interfere with egg development.

Extremely spiky scales make it difficult for predators to swallow the lizard whole. Smaller youngsters do get gobbled up by the voracious Roadrunners, though.
In addition to being spiny, the lizard, when threatened, makes himself very flat and wide. I have been able to rescue several from our Husky, who is a terrible predator constantly prowling for extra food, because she just couldn't get a grip on the flattened disk.

None of those horned lizards that the dog attacked and even one that she retrieved in her mouth used the defense against canines described in literature: attacked horned lizard are said to spray 'blood' from their eyes - as far as a foot! I found this impressive video.

Illustration in the book 'Horny' by Emery and Le Blanc 1968

This story always made me wonder. Spraying blood may deter a squeamish human. (Although according to a 1912 story republished in our newspaper to celebrate 100 years of AZ statehood, postal clerks at that time had to routinely liberate numerous 'Horny Toads' that Tucsonans were trying to illegally ship to their friends out East. So those though human Westerners didn't get scared off....)
A well aimed squirt of any fluid as shown in the illustration above might scare off most inexperienced canines, but I still suspect that the spray isn't really just blood.

Photo by Bill Gorum

When I did my postdoc at the physiology department of the University of Arizona we speculated that the source of the excretion may be the extraorbital gland situated above the eyes of reptiles and birds. In seabirds like Albatrosses and reptiles like sea turtles, who have no access to fresh water, these salt glands, with a much higher concentration capacity than the rather simple avian and reptilian kidneys, are responsible for elimination of excess salt from the animals' blood stream. So the fluid constantly running down (on the out side of) a seabird's nose is a brine much more concentrated than either sea water or blood. As a desert creature with limited access to water the horned toad also uses salt glands. So could it be that the horned lizard is ejecting something more concentrated than blood? But, salt gland excretion itself is neither red nor pressurized...So that's not the answer.
Wade Sherbrooke (Sherbrooke 1981) describes a complex vascular mechanism that allows the lizard to increase the blood pressure in parts of their head. This pressure difference between head and body has other functions in thermoregulation and molting, but as part of this unique a defense mechanism it can also produce a fine stream of blood originating from the blood sinuses located in the eye sockets. The discharge seems directional and can reach a distance of up to four feet. This still doesn't explain why coyotes and other canines don't just lick their lips and pounce on the tasty morsel, but react with violent head shaking, excessive salivation and signs of distress. Maybe the supraorbital salt glands, located so close to the blood sinuses where the spray originates do have something to do with it after all, or maybe the lizard's diet, consisting mainly of ants, some of witch carry potent poisons of their own, is the source of some distasteful chemical in its blood.
PS: Eldon Braun just sent me the paper of a study on the composition of the ejected blood: It is just about identical to the systemic blood in hematocrit, osmalilty, sodium and potassium content. But coyotes reject food laced with the ejected blood, but not if systemic blood is mixed into the food.

By far the most successful and much less costly protection of the horned lizard is his amazing camouflage. His color and pattern brake up his shape and blend with the sandy ground. Even the spiny scales look just like sharp edged rocks, and the middle stripe that of this individual echoes the dead creosote twigs so successfully that I kept losing him in plain sight, specially when he moved around in his typical stop-and-go-and-freeze pattern of motion.

His eyes are shaded under heavy ridges and often half closed, so they don't draw attention to him either. In his usual pose the body is pressed against the ground and a flaring fringe of spiky scales along the sides eliminates any cast shadow. If he has to straighten up, the light color of the underside acts as counter-shading that reduces his optical three-dimensionality from above (and most of his predators are taller than he).

In this last photo, he abandoned his cryptic behavior for a moment. At very high temperatures, all our lizards minimize the contact with the hot ground by standing high on their legs and even lifting their toes off the ground. But the horned lizard also uses this pose as a threatening bluff when a predator (probably my camera in this case) molests him too much. (Note how the cast shadow now betrays the lizards location!)

Literature: Horned Lizards, Unique Reptiles of Western North America by Wade C. Sherbrooke, publisher: Southwestern Parks and Monuments Association 1981

Comparison of Blood Squirted from the Circumorbital Sinus and Systemic Blood in a Horned Lizard, Phrynosoma cornutum. GA Middendorf, WC Sherbrooke, EJ Braun, The Southwestern Naturalist (2001) 46(3):384-387

Arizona Wild Cats (and other wildlife) in Watercolor

2011-06-19T16:01:00.000-07:00

The encounter with the bobcat at Sweetwater reminded me of my old habit of interpreting adventures like that in watercolor. Dissatisfied with just photographs, I began this kind of painting during my postdoc at the University of Trondheim in Norway. My flickr album 'Norwegisches Bilderbuch' shows those northern impressions.

Stylistically, the images were narrative and often composed from memory. They tended to focus on an animal encounter and place it in a setting that seemed most typical, but wasn't necessarily realistic.

I one of my first Tucson paintings, the American Kestrel has a background showing of the south side of the Catalina Mountains but with the vegetation of the grasslands around Oracle.

After only a month in Arizona crammed the shapes of all the cacti that impressed me so much into a painting of a Coyote that had crossed my path close to Gates Pass.

At that time, the introduction of Colorado River Water was a problematic topic in Tucson, so I painted my Acorn Woodpeckers in front of a little fountain at the Madera Canyon Lodge and titled it 'CAP Water?'

The Roadrunner was probably a great grand father of the two guys that I just photographed at Sabino Canyon. He was as unafraid of humans as thy are and chased his lizard up a mesquite tree right at the visitor center (which was much less imposing back then).

On a hike to Weaver's Needle in the Superstitions I saw Collared Lizards running on their hind legs like miniature dinosaurs, but the one that held still for a reference photo was a female from the Arizona Desert Museum. I don't remember why I chose such a saturated green for the background - maybe just to show off her colors. Hard edged and overly detailed, she makes me cringe a little now.

I liked the ASDM settings with their carefully constructed artificial rock formations so much that I painted bobcat and bighorn sheep there before I ever saw them in the wild.

Later, at the creek at Madera Canyon, I walked right into a bobcat that looked much more impressive than the ones in captivity. By the time I painted him though, I had just been in some aspen forest around S. Francisco Peaks, so the slim silver trunks appeared in the background.

As developments encroach on their territory, bobcats are becoming quite used to people and their patio furniture. The portrait was half finished when its subject slid of an Orovalley friend's chaiselongue, so I had to finish it from photos.

I liked his face so much that I even included him in a series of paintings on river rocks. This heavy rock had a diameter of more than 12 inches.

I waited for years for an encounter with a mountain lion and delayed that tempting motive. At a ranch on the San Carlos Apache reservation I even rode along with hunters who were after a cattle-thieving lion, found huge tracks, lots of skunks, and a porcupine... I still haven't seen much more than the blur of a fawn shape leaping up a slope above the Lodge at Canyon d' Chelly - but I clearly saw a long tail trailing behind - so what else could it have been?

I then painted one from a photo and one with my easel set up at the Mountain Lion enclosure at the Phoenix Zoo. A critic later suggested a more contrasting background to make the cat stand out better. But that just didn't feel right.

All the paintings above, with the exception of the bobcat portrait, are 10 to 20 years old, and so is the photo, taken in my first little apartment on Swan and River Rd. My painting style and choice of topics has changed since then, but I still enjoy the memories contained in the old images.

The original paintings were sold to private collectors. The copyright is owned by me, and cards and prints are still available.

Sweetwater Wetlands Morning in June

2011-06-17T18:40:00.000-07:00

This morning I had Sweetwater Wetlands all to myself. It's probably hot enough now to keep most birdwatchers away.

At first there wasn't much going on. Lizards rustled in dry leaves, mostly Whiptails darting around but also Zebra Tails and Desert Spiny males that are getting very territorial at this time of the year.

Blue Dashers were involved in a never ending game of musical chairs around their perches. What makes one Cat-tail blade so much more desirable than another?

Young Round-tailed Ground Squirrels were playing close to their burrow's entrance and digging out shallow holes to cool their bellies. A Towee was scratching under a huge willow.

Suddenly a shrill whistle from the squirrels and right in front of me a larger shape appeared in the dappled light.

I hadn't seen him coming, but he was only about ten meters from me in the middle of the path: a bobcat. He checked me out for a moment, decided that I was harmless, and kept coming. When he passed me, he was not even six feet away. A little scrawny looking, and panting from the heat....The squirrels were sitting at a save distance, watching like statues.

Please, check out all of the Sweetwater critters in this video. The bobcat makes his appearance towards the end!

A Cooper's Hawk was patiently waiting for me to leave. Definitely a day with lots of predator sightings. I hope the little squirrels stayed alert and careful.

Another Backyard Snake: The Western Patch-nose

2011-06-15T22:11:00.000-07:00

The temperature was supposed to climb to 105 degrees today, so I was hand-watering some smaller cacti. They may not need it, but they get less sunburned when they are well hydrated and at least it makes me feel better. I nearly missed the sleek, striped body of a snake among a group of little golden barrels because it looked just like a dry branch of creosote. Then my first thought was Whipsnake, so I had little hope of getting close to that extremely wary, lightning quick reptile. I checked later: the Striped Whipsnake occurs further north, and the Sonoran does not have a striped body.

This snake allowed me to crawl around the creosote bush and photograph its blunt face with one big scale covering the snout - clearly a Patch-nosed Snake. Our land in the bajada of the Tucson Mountains is the typical desert scrub habitat of the species called Western Patch Nose Salvodora hexalepis, while the Eastern S. grahaminae prefers the open slopes of the Evergreen Woodlands. The mottled double stripe visible in the top photo confirms the identification.

The big scale that protrudes slightly over the sides of the snout is probably useful when the snake digs in the ground for reptile eggs. The day active snake also feeds on lizards and small mammals. I was happy to see him, but I hope he will not be too hard on our drought stressed lizard population.

'Raubritter' among Insects

2011-06-14T07:55:00.000-07:00

Stenopogon inquinatus male

The German word 'Raubritter' has no good English translation that I know of. In lawless medieval times rogue knights were sitting in their fortified castles along European trading routes, ready to capture, rob and often slay passing travelers. Similarly, robber flies perch by day on objects near the ground, watching every movement in clearly binocular vision, always ready to fly up and strike at any insect prey that passes by in the air.

Stenopogon inquinatus female

Last week on our trip to Mount Lemmon, the highest peak of the Catalina Mountains, Eric Eaton and I found some exceptionally large specimens. The one in the picture above had just caught a grass hopper of the species Trimerotropis modesta. The fly had grabbed it, injected its paralyzing digestive juices through its pointed proboscis and then sucked out the dissolved tissue of the grasshopper. After the robber fly had finished its meal, the exoskeleton of the grass hopper seemed mainly intact.

Trimerotropis modesta

The robber fly below has caught a honey bee by grabbing it by the thorax and holding it in the firm grasp of its bristly legs so the bee had no chance to sting. The bristles at the tip of the female's abdomen, called acanthophorites, help her to push the abdomen into the soil to lay her eggs.

Stenopogon inquinatus female

There are nearly 1000 species of robber flies (Asilidae) in North America, and most of them live in the hot, arid Southwest.The family has members of all sizes from 3 mm up to 5 cm.

It seems understandable that we found several very large species on Mount Lemmon: Like many insects robber flies stake out territories on local high points (hill tops) of the terrain, and size and strength are great advantages in the constantly whipping wind on Mount Lemmon that could easily rip any hunter or courting male off its exposed perch.

Laphria engelhardti

Around Tucson, bumble bees occur only in the higher elevations. They share the mountain habitat along the Meadow Trail with Laphria engelhardti, one of the many bumble bee mimics in the genus Laphria. When startled, it flies only for a few feet, very low over the ground, so the strong wind can't catch it.

Eccritosia zamon

I photographed this pair at the end of August 2009 on a hill top along the north side of Sabino Canyon.
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As with many powerful predators, the male has to take quite a risk when he approaches the female to mate. Usually they seem to approach from above and behind and grab the female before she can go on the attack. Asilid males haven't come up with the gift-bearing trick that some other relatives in the fly family use, but it doesn't hurt to find the female already busy with prey. In this case the mating couple devoured the yellow jacket together.

Wyelia midas

The sting of an asilid fly is supposedly very painful, but obviously it doesn't hurt to advertise this by wearing the colors of another famously pain-inducing stinger, the Tarantula-Hawk Wasp (Muellerian mimicry). At the same time, this robber fly evokes in color and sluggish flight very much a harmless Midas Fly which also finds protection from predators in its similarity to the wasp's appearance (Batesian mimicry). So the robber fly, like a wolf in sheep closing, maybe fooling its prey as well as its predators.

Archilestris magnificus

The largest of our robber flies I have not found in the high Catalinas, but in lower areas further south along the Santa Cruz River in Amado, in the grassland of lower Madera Canyon and along Highway 90 towards Sierra Vista. There, several times I had the chance to watch two of these guys pursuing each other for whatever reasons - an impressive aerial dance. Dr Scarborough pointed out that the identification of this species may not be quiet certain - so I'll call it Archilestris near magnificus.

Thank you to Prof. emerit. A. Scarborough for his help with the identifications.

Firefly without a flash: Pyropyga nigricans

2011-06-10T23:12:00.000-07:00

When I walk to the entomology department in the Forbes building on the U of A campus, I pass well irrigated manicured lawns. Since the end of May, little black insects were flying there. They first reminded me of March Flies until I saw the spread elytra - they were clearly beetles. It's an interesting experience to chase down a flying object with a somewhat erratic course, too small to be noticed by most humans, while walking among students absorbed in texting and phone conversations. It makes them emerge from oblivion and stare...Finally I swiped my hat in flamboyant musketeer fashion and caught one.

The narrow dark beetle is about 8 mm long, soft bodied, has flattened antennae and the head is hidden under the half-circular thoracic shield with a continuous black border, rosy sides and a wide black middle stripe. This is Porpyga nigricans, a very common western firefly or lampyrid beetle.(The western distribution of P. decipiens, 4.5-7.2 mm is unclear. P. minuta is smaller and its US distribution ends further east).

Adult fireflies in the genus Pyropyga are day active and have no luminescence. Both sexes are winged (aleate) and can fly, but specimens with reduced wings have been found, too. Males and females find each other with the help of pheromones. In captivity the larvae have been raised on snails and small earth worms. I guess the irrigated lawns offer a similar diet. I've never seen any Pyropyga around our house in the desert but I have photos of a specimen from the research station in Portal where there are ponds and swamps (when the water isn't used up to fight forest fires).

The heamolymph of Fire Flies contains lucibufagins (Eisner et al. 1978), steroidal pyrones. Droplets can be expelled from joints and membranous parts of the exoskeleton as a defense against predators and birds and lizards show strong avoidance of these beetles. As many other poisonous insects, Propyga also has its mimics:some Soldier Beetles (Cantharidae) and Netwing Beetles (Lycidae) look very similar to Porpyga and may also be poisonous in their own right (Muellerian Mimicry enhances the effectiveness of the warning color/pattern for all of them).

P.s. mating activity is high in August on the lawn of a fraternity house on University Boulevard, that always irrigates the lushest lawns in the neighborhood.

Literature:
Eisner et al., 1978. Lucibufagins: Defensive steroids from the fireflies Photinus ignitus and P. marginellus (Coleoptera: Lampyridae). Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 75: 905-908.

Dorms for Aculeate Bachelors

2011-06-04T12:41:00.000-07:00

Longhorn Bees, Melissodes paroselae

The males of several solitary wasp and bee species come together at dusk to sleep in dense aggregations of bodies. The phenomenon has been described repeatedly - Eric Eaton had two blog chapters last summer and John Alcock in his book 'In a Desert Garden' also devoted several chapters (and many evening hours) to sleeping bees.
The bees or wasps cluster conspicuously on free standing plant parts, and it is difficult to see the advantage that this behavior entails. I was tempted to call it 'bachelor parties' in the title, but yesterday at the Santa Cruz River in Marana I watched a group of Sand Wasp males come to rest on a twig of Burro Weed: No partying going on.

Steniolia sp.

I found the sleeping place by following several slow-flying wasps that caught the evening light very nicely. They led me to clump of wasps that were already settled. The newcomers picked a place, shuffled and pushed their neighbors a little, sometimes had to fly up again and find a new spot, but then immediately became very quiet and non-responsive. To collect one, I simply pushed him into a vial. No protest from him or his neighbors. Alcock had observed the same passivity towards a Bee Assassin Bug who just came and collected his victims while the others slept on.

Bee Assassin, Apiomerus flaviventris

Alcock also observed the bees' unwavering drive to settle on their chosen branch and nowhere else. They would come back to the same twig for several nights, even after he experimentally moved it to a slightly different location, but they did not accept a similar one that he placed in the original location. Chemical traces of last night's gathering seemed to play a role in this preference. I remember seeing the long horn bees several times in the same spot last year, but since neither they nor the sand wasps are in my own backyard I didn't have a chance to really follow up in detail.

Yesterday I filmed the landing of several new arrivals in the sand wasp group and noticed in the video that at least two stuck out their proboscis repeatedly. They didn't seem to actually lick anything, so what were they doing? I am aware that the chemical sense of insects is not limited to their mouth-parts but is located on the antennae and even the pads of their feet (flies). But why did these arriving males stick out their tongues like tasting the air around them? Check out the video on you tube and judge for yourself.

Tarantula Hawks, Pepsis sp.

On a cool morning in May of 2008 I found more than fifty Tarantula Hawk males resting on a knee-high herbaceous plant. There were no flowers offering pollen or nectar - the wasps had probably spent the night there together and were just getting active. This clustering behavior is in strong contrast to their day-time attitude: Tarantula Hawk males are known to stake out territories centering around hilltops or tall bushes.

Chlorion sp. Cricket Hunter

In June of several years I watched large numbers of wasps in the late afternoon in a row of Desert Broom (Baccharis sarothroides) bushes along an irrigated cotton field of the Avra Valley. They were not all of the same species, not even the same family. The majority were in the Sphecid genus Chlorion. Dozens of those big dark metallic wasps were running around on and then settling to sleep among the slender Desert Broom Branches.

Cicada Killer, Sphecius convallis

Velvet Ant, Timulla sp

unidentified Eumeninae (Potter and Mason Wasps)

Paper Wasp, Polistes dorsalis

There regularly were also males of two species of Cicada Killers (Western and Pacific), Tarantula Hawks, Velvet Ants, Pottery Wasps and even two species of Paper Wasps (flavus and dorsalis). Although there was a long hedge of similar looking bushes, the wasps seemed to frequent just a few of those. The observations were made in June of three years when the Desert Broom was not yet oozing any juices, and the wasps did not seem to be chewing to release any plant juices as they do later in the season. Taking into account Alcock's branch-displacement experiments, one could speculate that there was a chemical signal emitted by the wasps that drew more wasps, in this case even across species limits.

Three is a crowd

So the tendency among male wasps to seek each others company for the night seems to be widespread, but depending on the species this can range from loose aggregations (which can be multi-species) in the same bush to dense clusters on the same branch. Densely packed groups seem to always consist of just one species.

The evolutionary advantage of this behavior is not clear. To me it seems that the loose aggregations maybe the more primitive version which excludes group-thermoregulation as a primary incentive. All these males are without stingers, so they can't deter predators in a group-response. Actually, they are so passive, they don't even seem to profit from the increased vigilance of a multitude of eyes. Alcock concludes that the aggregation may result in a dilution of risk for the individual, but one could argue that such an accumulation of rather sluggish prey could also draw predators? If I can learn how to find the wasps reliably and repeatedly, shouldn't generations of predators have figured it out as well?

Hawk Update

2011-06-02T09:48:00.000-07:00

This morning (June 2, 2011) we walked by the nest again - still just one adult, the dark one, circling above.

Again there are only two chicks visible, but looking from the other side it seems possible that there is a third.
The single parent will have a hard time raising even two. It's hot and extremely dry and the cows have diminished what brush cover there was. We wish them luck!

Dark Female

2011-05-30T15:57:00.000-07:00

If you have seen the movie 'Pale Male', about the light colored Red-tail that was the first of his kind to breed in New York's Central Park, you have an idea of what I mean if I say that our raptor here is exactly the opposite of that hawk: our Red-tail is very dark, very unused to humans, and lives under extremely harsh conditions. For all I know, she may be female. But she also seems to be a pioneer, just like Pale Male.

Around our house we have a breeding pair of American Kestrels, a group of Harris Hawks, many Cooper's Hawks, a hunting Peregrine Falcon, a visiting Prairie Falcon, and a wintering silver gray Northern Harrier. They share the habitat with formidable and dangerous competition: there's always a pair of Great Horned Owls around. And there is neither water and nor a supply of feral pigeons.
There are Red-tail nests along the Santa Cruz River and in lusher parts of Saguaro National Park, and the hawks come through our part of the desert regularly, but I've never seen the aerial shows of mating pairs here.

The first indication that Red-tails were moving in was an abandoned nest in a saguaro with no sign that it was ever occupied. We checked ever now and then, but nothing changed: no fresh twigs, no whitewash....

Only once in late January I caught a glimpse of a pair of Red-tails on the power line at the far side of the 400-acre state land.

Then a dark silhouette appeared a couple of times high above us while we were walking our dogs. When the tail caught the sunlight it flashed in striking, bright orange contrast to the clear blue desert sky. But nothing ever happened at the old nest. The bird seemed protective of the area though, and we mostly stayed away.

On this fresh cool morning (after a spell of near 100 degrees) we were going to give our dogs a special treat - a long walk through the state land. No hawks in the sky yet. The dogs watched Zebra-tail Lizards scramble out from under a thin cover of sand and scurry away, dug feverishly for squirrels, looked longingly for traces of cattle ....We passed the empty old nest, picked up some trash, collected some nice rocks, and inadvertently stepped over a rattler who completely ignored two shoes and eight paws coming within inches of his low-profile coil.

When I looked up, Randy was standing next to a saguaro, and right over his head the shape of two or three small hawks in a big nest were outlined and back-lit by the rising sun. They stood completely still, and so did we. Two of the nearly grown chicks had light chest feathers. Harris Hawk or Red-tail? We memorized the location and rushed home to get cameras and our friend Frank who wouldn't want to miss this.

Returning a little later we were discovered by the dark hawk. She circled. Banked right above our heads. Screamed at us. She is definitely not used to people walking her territory, and let us know her displeasure long before we came close to the nest.

Staying at a fair distance, equipped with very long lenses, we walked in a wide circle to get the sun behind us. The nest is on the west side of the Saguaro, nestled in its massive arms. Until noon no possible angle would allow a clear view of the inhabitants without looking into the sun. I wonder why it's so exposed to the afternoon sun, the hottest around here. The wind blew sharply out of the west all day yesterday, as it often does. But the other, unused, nest has the same orientation.

While we were there, the chicks never moved. They are tall and leggy and already have lost all of their downy fluffiness. One is as dark as the parent, one has a light chest - did I only imagine a third one earlier?

While female hawks stay with the nest and the young while the chicks are small, leaving all the hunting to the male, both parents would be hunting to provide enough for the hungry beaks of chicks this big. I'm worried because there was only a single parent around. The urgent calls should have alerted the other partner. Shortly, the hawk was joined by another big soaring shape, but that one turned out to be a Turkey Vulture. Still no sign of another adult hawk, but time for us to leave them in peace.

Sabino Canyon at the end of May

2011-05-28T17:03:00.000-07:00

So far this year we were spoiled by rather low temperatures during the days and nice chilly desert nights. But now it's definitely getting too hot for hiking in the lower desert. On Saturday we will supposedly reach the first three digit temperatures. But I had postponed my last Sabino trip for the season several times, and I really wanted to go.

Racoons at Sabino, Watercolor from 1992

During my first years in Tucson (when I lived on the east side of town on River Road) I used to run in Sabino Canyon nearly every evening, and I never went home without seeing something exciting like several Black-tailed Rattlesnakes, a Tarantula Hawk with his prey, Mule Deer watching me, Mountain Lions imagined (I always just missed the big cats lounging around the visitor center). On the evening a friend proposed to me we saw Fire Flies which are rare out here, and a cute family of Hooded Skunks which are not. Racoons washed crayfish at the creek and bats were clicking over head.

But those were the hours after sunset. Last Thursday I arrived at 10 am. All other visitors seemed to stay close to the visitor center, even the trams were going mostly empty. Two young Roadrunners, maybe too tame for their own good, were hanging out at the tram stop, rushing from shade to shade, making their sharp noises that seem to be as much a clapping of their pointed beak as they are vocal. I kept checking the white balance and the color saturation on my camera. But it was the blistering sunlight that bleached all colors into monochromes.
Even Quail and White-winged doves seemed subdued by the heat. Fewer Lizards than usual, and I saw no snakes, even though I even crawled into the cool moist hollow of the first bridge were the road crosses the dried up creek. Wild Cotton was blooming there, very ethereal with its translucent white petals and only a few leaves, but standing taller than I.

I had hoped to photograph interesting wasps on blooming mesquites, but the catkins were far past their prime and many had long green beans sprouting from between the last flowers. Mesquite bug nymphs were clustered around those beans, already big and beautiful in the 4th and 5th instar of their development. I collected a few because Carl Olson had told me that the UAICollection could use some more.

Staring up into the trees, I found that there were other gleaners at work, though after smaller insect prey than I. Amazingly bright Yellow Warblers, a pair of Black-tailed Gnat-catchers feeding a single chick.

Verdins were still working on a nest. A lone Black-throated sparrow was scratching under Palo Verde and Prickly Pear, and since I was standing quite still, he came within a few feet and to be captured on video and still photo. These sparrows are so elegant, and usually quite shy.

Even in the steeper parts of the trail a Zebra-tail and a Greater Ear-less (this must be the narrow zone where their habitats overlap) are the only lizards that I saw, but I believe that I heard the rustling of a heavier Spiny Lizard (most likely Clark's) on the rough Cottonwood bark. By now I was too exhausted to find out.

At the dam, there was only the sad and muddy rest of an evaporating puddle. Even the Predatory Waterbeetles and Giant Waterbugs had left. I the moist sand I found Aztec Pygmy Grasshoppers.

Dozens of tiny, extremely quick Carabids were racing for cover. Measuring only 3 to 4 mm and dark, they were difficult to photograph even in the studio, but I captured a couple anyway.

A Spot-winged Glider, Pantala hymenaea landed on a bush - that's a new Dragonfly for me! It was cooler among the big Willows and Ashes, so I felt invigorated enough to follow a Midas Fly to get a picture hopefully good enough to identify it.

Under the tall trees of the riparian forest where several Hummingbird feeders are part of study on bird migration, Broadbill males were living up to their reputation as feisty warriors.

Loud hammering drew me to a mostly dead tree in time to film a Ladder-backed Woodpecker's successful grub hunt. He devoured one and carried the next one away to his brood and left me to wonder which beautiful buprestid beetles that might have been...

Time to leave the riparian area and cross the mile or so of open desert under the relentless afternoon sun. There are water stations in Sabino Canyon, so I'was only carrying a tiny bottle that I refilled four times, but I was also dragging two cameras around with me - the heavy SLR for reliably good macros and the little point and shoot, that is excellent but sometimes doesn't focus, to take videos and long distance shots of birds.

A Round-tailed Groundsquirrel escaped from the heat of the desert surface into the canopy of a mesquite tree enjoying the added bonus of fresh mesquite beans.
Luckily, my car was parked in the shade of that same tree.

Night Hawks

2011-05-24T22:41:00.000-07:00

Two dry washes cut through our land and continue through the State Trust-land to the north. Before our rodeo loving neighbor started to run his roping cattle there, we walked our dogs nearly every morning along those arroyos. Even though they haven't had much running water in years due to drought and earth-moving activity in the nearby quarry, they are lined with trees. The tallest blue Palo Verdes and the widest Foothill Palo Verdes grow there.

Ancient Ironwoods still bear the scars from the time when wood was cut to make charcoal for limestone kilns that have long since disappeared. Even dead Ironwoods seem to last for ever. We use one grotesquely crippled one for orientation and call him Hieronimus after the Dutch painter of medieval horror visions.

Strange big-headed birds sleep motionless during the heat of the day in those strangely shaped trees. They melt into the shape of a branch with bark-colored feathers and by sitting along its direction rather than crosswise. Only when the dogs are running right underneath its hide-out, a bird flies up. Soundlessly like an owl, but gliding like a big slow swallow, zigzagging close to the ground and never in a straight, predictable line the Night Hawk swoops away.

White markings close to the tip of the long pointed wings flash identify him as a Lesser rather than a Common Night Hawk. The bird lands on another low strung branch nearby and becomes invisible again. To photograph, I have to follow, but more often then not I loose the bird, until a dog accidentally flushes it again or maybe another one.

In the last hours before sunset the birds change from shapeless lumps into elegant long-winged, aerial acrobats with the shape of a small falcon but a much slower wing beat..

Night Hawk headed southeast in the evening light. In the back Wasson's Peak, Tucson Mts.

During the dry months of May and June the insectivorous predators have to undertake a daily journey from our arroyos on the west side of the Tucson Mountains to the Santa Cruz River about 10 miles to the north.
There they feed on dancing swarms of gnats and mosquitoes but also catch large moths. Their short, enormously wide beaks are surrounded by bristles that allow them to scoop up prey while erratically swooping close to the ground and over the water.

Can you find all 7 Night Hawks?

I was at the river at the Sanders Road Bridge in Marana yesterday. There must have been close to fifty Night Haws gliding right towards me through gaps in the vegetation, low over the river, high in the velvety evening sky, holding their pointed wings in a slight v-shape, tipping from side to side, seeming to do acrobatic tricks. In the setting sun they kept changing from dark silhouettes to glowing beacons when they turned, their white wing bars flashing. They were competing for insects with kingbirds and other flycatchers, several species of swallows and White-throated Swifts. As the evening progressed, the other birds disappeared, leaving the air over the river to night hawks and bats.

During the monsoon months the night hawks will stay closer to our house, feasting on swarms of termites and ants that, during their nuptial flights, rise from the desert sand like smoke. On those evenings we will also hear the strange goat like sound produced by air rushing through the tail feathers of the night hawks during the aerial dives that are part of their mating display. This sound together with their low to the ground flight gave their European relatives the reputation to swoop down on goats to steel milk - hence the German name 'Ziegen Melker"