a little wild   (a small slice of wildlife)

First of all, checked on the amphibian egg clutches. There are now three egg clutches I can see! Not sure if they’re salamander or frog. They look a little smaller in size, so if they’re salamander, then they are probably blue-spotted salamander. But what do I know. They’re either far away or covered in lots of algae, so I don’t know if I will be able to take photographs as they develop.

Secondly, Daphnia! For some reason, I’ve hitherto spent hours looking at the vernal pools and marsh without really seeing something I could point to as Daphnia, even though it’s supposedly one of the more common invertebrates there. Anyway, here’s one I’m fairly confident of.

In this next photo, we can clearly see the digestive tract. The bump closer to the start of the digestive tract *may* be the heart. I don’t know if those are eggs towards the right.

Springtime at Moose Hill means vernal pools, wood frogs crying, salamander eggs, fairy shrimp…

First, salamander eggs:

Tried for one of those fancy photos showing both above and below water. You will agree that the level of success is very moderate.

Caddisfly larvae with casings:

You can see the actual larva peaking out of the casing here:

And here is video of one of them moving around. You don’t usually see them poking out this much, but I think it was trying to navigate through the algae.

Here was the vernal pool:

Please listen to this video with your volume turned up. The sound of the wood frogs is incredibly moving.

White breasted water hen

Looks like a Chrysomelid beetle. Compare with Aulacophora lewisii.

I think it is Tephritidae, something like Bactrocera dorsalis? The body looks like it, but the wing pattern looks different from what I’d expect.

Ah, it turns out it’s Zeugodacus cucurbitae, also in Tephritidae:

A wasp in Pompilidae, aka the spider wasps. I think I count 11 flagellomeres in the antenna, so perhaps a male; females have only 10.

Birds do it, butterflies do it. I didn’t realize they were mating until I took a closer look at the photo. They are in Pieridae.

Hooded mergansers:

Needle ice, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Needle_ice:

“Needle ice is a needle-shaped column of ice formed by groundwater. Needle ice forms when the temperature of the soil is above 0 °C (32 °F) and the surface temperature of the air is below 0 °C (32 °F). Liquid water underground rises to the surface by capillary action, and then freezes and contributes to a growing needle-like ice column. The process usually occurs at night when the air temperature reaches its minimum.”

Tremella, I think, a type of jelly fungus.

A feather on our front lawn, a-misted with dew.