a little wild   (a small slice of wildlife)

I think it’s a Copper Underwing, Amphipyra pyramadoides, but my moth intelligence is very low.

Visitor’s Center to the Pond, to Pond Edge Trail, to the Swamp Trail. Then Pond Walk to Ames Mansion.

But first, spiders from right outside my front door. Shame on me for not noticing them earlier! This is Theridion. They can actually be social spiders, and there were multiple of them in this web.

The Halictids were out in force! Augochlora pura:

Halictus sp. : “the hair bands are stronger and seem apical while the head looks much larger than a Lasioglossum”

Maybe Three Streaked Sparganothis, aka Sparganothis tristriata 3699?

Figitidae:

Ancistrocerus cf adiabatus:

Diptera. “Calliphoridae, Calliphora sp. Wing veination in this case mainly gets you to Oestroidea, ruling out Muscoidea.”

A male Bethylidae. Wikipedia: “aculeate wasps in the superfamily Chrysidoidea. As a family, their biology ranges between parasitoid wasps and hunting wasps.”

Beautiful Crane fly, perhaps Tipulidae?, with beautiful eyes:

Pityohyphantes cf costatus in Linyphiidae

Harvestman aka Opilione. Leiobunum vittatum?

This wasp: Braconidae.

I thought this was fascinating. Some kind of leaf miner made a pocket, and I think there was water condensation between the two sides of the pocket.

Dictyniidae. My guess is Emblyna, but can’t rule out Dictyna:

These fireflies were everywhere. All MA fireflies in September in BugGuide are Ellychnia corrusca, so I guess this is too.

Tetragnathidae, Tetragnatha sp. probably. I think they’re so elegant.

This little piece of debris stuck in a web:

Really not sure, but Anthomyiidae if I had to guess.

I absolutely love these. Graphocephala fennahi (Rhododendron Leafhopper)?

Mangora spiculata

The whirligig beetles were busy busy busy. Gyrinidae.

I _think_ this is a meadow vole:

Crabronidae, Gorytes, with a grasshopper for its babies. It later flew off carrying it away.

A sunset walk at Stony Brook. I was hoping to catch my share of insects before the season ended, and especially Odonates (dragonflies and damselflies) seem to be common at Stony Brook. I hardly saw any, except for the ubiquitous mosquitoes. But a wonderful walk, and plenty of sights to see and snap.

Lebia ornata, I’m told.

View through a chewed up leaf.

Nothing at all eerie about this leaf. I have no idea what you’re talking about.

Lots of light and shadow:

This leaf was breathtaking:

Loved this simple view of fence and branch:

Just a spectral looking leaf. Not sure which crop I like best.

“Coleophora sp. of the type that feeds on Goldenrods and Asters. They need dissection to distinguish, but the common one on most Solidago species is C. duplicis.” In my defence, I actually did figure out that Coleophora was one of the likely candidates!

Again, which shot works better?

Porcelainberry. An invasive, but what colors!

Took the kayak out to Lake Massapoag. Went to a lily patch, and then just floated, taking photos of whatever came by. Older camera, no flash, moving boat…please forgive the lower picture quality.

Blue heron:

Water skimmer. Gerridae. Maybe Gerris buenoi?

These flies were everywhere. Probably Dolichopodidae, certainly gorgeous:

Painted turtle, I think (Chrysemys picta):

Found this the kitchen.  Love it when insects make house calls.

Again, little choice but to go during the hottest part of the day.  Relatively little insect activity because of that, I think.  As always, worth the walk!

Start off with non-insect photo, just one:

This weevil: Curculionidae –> Entiminae (Broad-nosed weevils).  Perhaps Asiatic oak weevil, Cyrtepistomus castaneus.

Some sort of egg, perhaps?  Pretty cute.

EDIT: Encyrtidae.  Compare with Encyrtus — https://bugguide.net/node/view/1702308

American toad.

Sarcophagidae?

Love the handsome trigs!

Perhaps a male Crabronidae wasp.

Some sort of Ichneumonid.  Spilopteron?

EDIT: “One of the cryptine ichneumons, maybe around Polycyrtus sp. ”

Don’t know what this is:

Perhaps a Pompillid wasp.

Female Mutillid wasp.  Timulla?  EDIT: “Pseudomethoca has a wider head, usually” — so it looks like I actually guessed correctly!  Weirder things have happened, but not often.

The hottest part of a very hot and dry day.  Spent the whole walk sweating and swatting flies and mosquitos.  The insects were missing, and the ones that were around were busy and elusive, so not too many photographs.  In the end: a wonderful afternoon walk.  It’s always nice to be out in the woods.

First a few non-invert photos! In hindsight, I *really* wish I had used a wider aperture for this shot.

 

Neriene radiata.

Zelus cf luridus nymph.

I think this is a 0299  White shawled Isocorypha, Isocorypha mediostriatella.

Anthomyiidae, in the process of, um, scathophagiding.

Vespula flavopilosa worker.

Cryptocephalus mutabilis in Chrysomelidae

I think this is Atanycolus in Braconidae.

Ancistrocerus adiabatus

Unknown.  Could be Anthomyiidae.

A pemphredonine. Something in Pemphredonini tribe.

So many of these beetles on this cluster of flowers!  Podabrus basillaris, I think, in Cantharidae.

Gnaphosidae, I’d say.  Maybe Drassyllus (but that’s probably wishful thinking, there are few sightings of Drassylus).

 

Unknown:

A fly, Micropezidae, maybe Rainieria antennaepes.

Male mutillid, likely Timulla sp.

One of my favorite spiders: Platycryptus undatus, tan jumping spider.

 

We don’t get out of the house enough during this pandemic, so this Northern Pine Sawyer (Monochamus notatus) was nice enough to drop by our place.

 

There were no other cars at the trailhead, so I was happy to be able to visit my favorite insect hunting grounds.

But first a beautiful beetle found at home.  Arrhenodes minutus, a kind of weevil.

 

EDIT: Identified by iNaturalist as Limonius basilaris.

I have been warned that most Elaterids really can’t be identified very well.  Still a beautiful creature.  *Could* be Sylvanelater cylindriformis.  But could be Hemicrepidius nemnonius.  The hind angles of the pronotum seem more like the latter; not sure about the “hairiness”.  And could be Cardiophorus gagates

My first Psocoptera!!!  Polypsocus corruptus.

 

A Geometrid, Hollow-spotted Plagodis, I think.

Exciting!  This belongs to Coniopterygidae!  A relative of lacewings and ant-lions, but much smaller.

 

Will probably never know which Diptera this is

Cicindella sexguttata, Six spotted tiger beetle.

Ichneumonoidae

What a beautiful, beautiful lady (with a long ovipositor).  Odontocolon, in Xoridinae.  Wikipedia mentions that these have a tooth on the femur of the hind leg, which you can see in the photo.  It was suggested that these may be used to clean and comb the ovipositor.

Leucauge venusta.  I just like getting to see the hairs on on the femurs of the IV leg.

Tiphiinae, Tiphia sp.

Ichneumonidae, Ichneumoninae.

 

Oak leaf rolling beetle, Synolabus bipustulatus

Philodromidae, Philodromus.   Beautiful shiny abdomen.  I turned off the flash for some of the shots to try to get the shininess better.  Two different individuals here, not adjacent to each other.

 

This beetle was dead.  Tenebrionidae, I think.  Tarpela micans.  Just enjoying the colors:

 

Weevil, Curculinidae, Piazorhinus scutellaris

Geometridae, Macaria bisignata.

Hadrobunus sp. suggested by iNaturalist.

These belong to Eulophus, a wasp in Chalcidoidea:

A fascinating scene.   The big fuzzy mass, plus the brown bit at the end, are a Cottony Maple Scale.  The ant is a Tapinoma sessile, which has a mutualistic relation with the scale, taking care of it and taking the sugary secretions back to the nest.

Sarcophagidae

Blattodean (okay, a cockroach):

Podabrus brevicollis?

Ampedus collaris, red-headed click beetle.