Mt Lemmon Highway in October

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

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.

Add caption

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!

 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

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

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!