insects
awild | December 10, 2008I see that Pachycondyla chinensis, which people are apparently calling "The Asian Needle Ant", is making headlines this week.
I know very little about P. chinensis, but the ant is apparently becoming widespread in the Southeast. Rob Dunn's lab at NCSU researches the species and has put up a page about it. Also, check out Benoit Guenard's P. chinensis photo gallery.
(Incidentally, Rob Dunn has a new book out about biological discovery. It looks excellent. I'll write more about this later, once I get my hands on a copy.)
awild | December 8, 2008Today we have a guest post by myself, from 25 years ago:
It was my very first ant publication, printed on the back page of a biweekly family newsletter. The ants I later determined to be Lasius flavus, and I am happy to report that the species still abounds at my old haunts in upstate NY despite all my collecting and squishing of queens.
That's me on the right, collecting ants with co-conspirator Steve
awild | December 5, 2008
Metrius contractus
Oregon, USA
Many biologists are familiar with the Bombardier Beetles in the ground beetle tribe Brachinini, as their defensive tactic of aiming an explosive spray has been studied extensively. The Brachinini are even celebrated by creationists as animals that couldn't possibly evolve.
As it turns out, though, bombardiers have evolved at least twice. The second, less known radiation comprises the subfamily Paussinae, also in the Carabidae, and as we'd expect from an independent origin the spray dispersing mechanism is different, using a flange instead of a nozzle. …
awild | December 4, 2008
A deer flea hangs from a hair, California
I don't ordinarily hang around animal carcasses. But every now and again I'll brave a fresh roadkill to shoot the parasites as they jump ship from the cooling body. Fleas and lice are fascinating creatures, and as they are hardly ever photographed alive I can capture some unique images just by staking out a common subject that most people would not think to shoot.
photo details: Canon MP-E 65mm 1-5x macro lens on a Canon EOS D60
ISO 100, f/13, 1/200 sec, flash diffused through tracing paper
awild | December 3, 2008
Linepithema flavescens, last seen in 1934
Linepithema flavescens, a small yellow ant from Haiti, is one of the species I re-described as part of my Ph.D. dissertation. All we know about this ant, apart from the brief notes on the specimen labels, is the external appearance of a few workers. Queens and males haven't been collected. No one has studied its ecology or behavior. The few existing museum specimens- gathered from two different field sites- may be too valuable to attempt DNA extraction.
A 1934 collection is the last time anyone has ever seen L. flavescens. As the natural…
awild | December 1, 2008...as judged by an utterly impartial panel of one here at Myrmecos Blog. These are photographs that caught my eye and my imagination over the past year. I hope you enjoy them as much as I do.
Globular Springtail, by Brian Valentine
Horsefly, by Igor Siwanowicz
Angry Queen, by Piotr Naskrecki
Bee in Natural Light, by Dalantech
Tenhave Woods, by Rick Lieder
Painted Grasshopper, by Mundo Poco
Dragonfly, by Necip Perver
Untitled, by Martin Amm
Gotcha!, by Marsel van Oosten
awild | November 25, 2008
Rhagoletis fruit flies mating, Arizona
photo details: Canon MP-E 65mm 1-5x macro lens on a Canon EOS 20D
ISO 200, f/11, 1/200 sec, backlit by handheld strobe.
awild | November 23, 2008I've posted enough Friday Beetles that I can no longer remember which species I've already done. Some species were almost posted twice out of sheer forgetfulness. Must be the academic scatter-brain.
So to keep them all straight I've made a list. This is mostly for my own good. In any case, here is the Friday Beetle Directory:
Adranes - Ant-Nest Beetle
Onthophagus gazella - Gazelle Scarab
Dineutes sublineatus - Whirligig Beetle
Lutrochus - Travertine Beetle
Scaphinotus petersi - Snail-eating Beetle
Laccophilus pictus - Predaceous Diving Beetle
Apteroloma caraboides - Snowfield Beetle…
edyong | November 5, 2008If you want to drive someone away, then throwing up on them is probably going to do the trick. But the caterpillars of the small mottled willow moth (aka the beet armyworm; Spodoptera exigua) take defensive vomiting to a whole new level. Their puke is both detergent and chemical weapon; its goal is not to cause revulsion but to break through the waterproof layer that its predators find so essential.
Willow moths are attacked by a variety of predatory ants. To study their defences, Rostas and Blassmann reared several caterpillars and exposed them to the European fire ant (Myrmica rubra).…
grrlscientist | October 31, 2008tags: netwing beetle, Trilobite beetle, Lycidae, beetles, insects, streaming video
Just in time for Hallowe'en: This video shows a juvenile netwing beetle, sometimes known as the Trilobite beetle due to the plates on its back (scutes). Firefly larvae also have scutes. This individual was collected in the Puhipi mountains of Laos [2:02]
mikethemadbiologist | October 25, 2008...it's applied research. As far as I can tell, the McCain campaign is referring to a study of olive fruit flies which are an agricultural pest. From the congressman who wrote the earmark:
"The Olive Fruit Fly has infested thousands of California olive groves and is the single largest threat to the U.S. olive and olive oil industries," he said. "I secured $748,000 for olive fruit fly research and irradiation in the (fiscal year 2008) appropriations bill for the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The USDA will use some of that funding for their research facility in France. This USDA research…
grrlscientist | October 21, 2008tags: Gulf fritillary, Agraulis vanillae, butterfly, photography, Image of the Day
Gulf fritillary, Agraulis vanillae,
photographed at Smith Point Hawkwatch, Texas.
Image: Joseph Kennedy, 7 October 2006 [larger view].
edyong | October 21, 2008
Fighting malaria with mosquitoes seems like an bizarrely ironic strategy but it's exactly what many scientists are trying to do. Malaria kills one to three million people every year, most of whom are children. Many strategies for controlling it naturally focus on ways of killing the mosquitoes that spread it, stopping them from biting humans, or getting rid of their breeding grounds.
But the mosquitoes themselves are not the real problem. They are merely carriers for the true cause of malaria - a parasite called Plasmodium. It suits neither mosquitoes nor humans to be infected with…
grrlscientist | October 20, 2008tags: long-tailed skipper, Urbanus proteus, butterfly, photography, Image of the Day
Long-Tailed Skipper, Urbanus proteus,
photographed at Smith Point Hawkwatch, Texas.
Image: Joseph Kennedy, 7 October 2006 [larger view].
grrlscientist | October 19, 2008tags: common buckeye, Junonia coenia, butterfly, photography, Image of the Day
Common Buckeye, Junonia coenia,
photographed at Smith Point Hawkwatch, Texas.
Image: Joseph Kennedy, 7 October 2006 [larger view].
grrlscientist | October 18, 2008tags: honeycomb, honeybees, photography, Image of the Day
Honeycomb, photographed at Russ Pittman Park, Texas.
Image: Joseph Kennedy, 12 December 2006 [larger view].
Nikon D200, Kowa 883 telescope with TSN-PZ camera eyepiece 1/125s f/8.0 at 500.0mm iso400.
mikethemadbiologist | October 16, 2008
(Jodi Hilton/Tufts University)
In North Attleborough, MA, paleontologists have discovered the oldest insect fossil:
The exquisitely-detailed fossil has been identified as the imprint left 310 million years ago by a primitive mayfly that lighted briefly on a muddy outcropping in what was then a steamy Carboniferous Period flood plain.
That fleeting moment in the life of a creature that probably lived no longer than 24 hours was captured for eternity by mud that hardened into rock, until it was discovered last year by Tufts geology student Richard J. Knecht working with Jacob Benner, a…
grrlscientist | October 10, 2008tags: foraging bee, flowers, photography, Image of the Day
Foraging Bee.
Image: David Warman [larger view].
When I met David in Seattle last week, he explained his flower photography as his wish to get down inside the blossoms.
clock | October 7, 2008This insect has been sitting on my window, completely motionless, all day. It is about 2in long in the body, probably around 5-6in if one includes the stretched legs. What is this? Does it sting or can I handle it safely, put it on a sheet of white paper to take a better picture?