Late Summer Insects: Now showing!

Summer's starting to wind down (despite the temperature still hovering around 90 degrees on a daily basis), and that means new insects are now starting to make their appearances. One of my favorite groups are the assassin bugs, family Reduviidae, and late summer happens to be one of the best times to study them. Ohio's most charismatic species reach adulthood during this time, including the wheel bug (Arilus cristatus) and the jagged ambush bugs (genus Phymata).

The ambush bugs are small, stout assassin bugs in the subfamily Phymatinae. The family contains three genera in North America, and the most commonly-seen ones are in the genus Phymata. The subfamily hasn't received as much study as the rest of the assassin bugs, so your best bet for identification is to check out BugGuide's page. Dan Swanson has done some great work to figure out how to identify the Phymata spp., but it can still be tough.

A jagged ambush bug, Phymata sp., awaiting its next victim on wingstem.

Where are the best places to look for ambush bugs? Wherever the fall wildflowers are blooming. Roadsides and sunny fields are good bets, and it's usually worth your time to check out plants such as Queen Anne's Lace (Daucus carota), Goldenrod (Solidago spp.), Ironweed (Vernonia spp.), and Wingstem (Verbesina alternifolia). Ambush bugs prefer to creep around flowers, waiting for other insects to come in and land on the flower heads, and that's when the bugs grab them. Like other assassin bugs, ambush bugs have a proboscis they insert into their prey and use to pump in digestive enzymes. The bug will then stay a while, drinking up their milkshake.

These bugs come in a variety of colors: the picture above shows an ambush bug that's yellow with some green on its abdomen, but this can vary. These bugs exhibit some convincing camouflage, and if you want to find one on goldenrod, you may have to search for a while.

A golden ambush bug, Phymata sp.

Camouflage doesn't always help these bugs, however. You might not be able to see them, but sometimes you'll see their prey held, unmoving, above the flowers. Since dead insects don't have the power to levitate, you can be sure a predator is underneath, having a feast.

You may also encounter another vicious predator while walking through fields during this time a year, though you would barely know it as it flew by.

A gnat ogre, Holcocephala sp.

Believe it or not, the above fly is a robber fly, in the family Asilidae. Robber flies can be over an inch long, but this particular genus contains three species in Ohio, all of which could fit on your pinky nail. They're formidable foes of small insects such as gnats, small bees, and wasps, and are territorial. These ogres don't fear much, least of all humans, which allows people to get up close and personal with them. Macro lenses come in handy here. If the gnat ogre flies off before you can get your shot, just wait a while--it will probably come back and land on the same blade of grass in a few seconds.

There's a lot more out there waiting to be found, and many insects will disappear for the season while others start to emerge. If you want to see the beautiful Eastern Cicada Killer wasp, (Sphecius speciosus), for example, you only have a few more weeks left before it's gone for the year. Get outside and start looking now, before it's too late!

Cedar Bog....well, it's a fen

This weekend placed me in Dayton, Ohio for the Midwest Native Plants Conference. It was beyond spectacular and I was bombarded with new information everywhere I turned. The conference committee was gracious enough to award me with a scholarship to attend the conference, so I tried to squeeze all the information I could out of the three short days the conference took place. The conference was very well-planned and went smoothly, by the end of the weekend I was exhausted. Really though, I would make sure all my weekends were filled with biology like this one if I could.

The conference hosted some amazing speakers, particularly Steve McKee and Jim McCormac. Steve talked about Botanical Detective Work and his adventures with searching for plants in Richland County that haven't been looked for in over 100 years, which lit a fire under me to go explore Washington County some more. It's amazing what can slip under our noses due to simply not paying attention to what's growing (or crawling!). Jim gave a talk about hummingbirds and the ones we're likely to see in Ohio, very neat stuff. There were some beautiful pictures included to boot.

On the last day of the conference, Sunday, everyone split up into small groups to head into the field. My particular group headed to Cedar Bog, south of Urbana, and I lucked out with who else joined the group: Steve and Jim were both there, with Jim leading it, and we also had Cheryl Harner and Nina Harfmann. The group was in very capable hands. Essentially, if we passed by a plant, one of them would know what it was. Needless to say, I was writing down names like crazy.

Now, Cedar Bog is actually a fen. What's the difference? A bog is acidic, low in minerals, and doesn't really drain. A fen, however, is fed by water, neutral or alkaline, and supports more than Sphagnum moss. But, it was called a bog before it was recognized as a fen, so the name sticks.

Anyway! We found a massive amount of plants and animals during our trek, and it was extremely rewarding. It was the best use of a morning I've had in quite a while. By the end of it, I had taken pictures of 59 different species. That's pretty darn good, I'd say. Having said that, it's time for some pictures.

She has all her limbs, it's just a weird angle, don't worry!

 This beauty descended on a single strand of web and hung around long enough for us to get some nice shots of her. It's a female dark fishing spider, Dolomedes tenebrosus. You can tell it's a female from the sheer size of it: males are smaller. Due to their size, they can take out some pretty sizable prey.

This guy's tricky.

 What at first looks (and sounds) like a bumblebee is actually a robber fly, family Asilidae, Laphria species. Robber flies can be quite large and are vicious when they take down their prey. This one is a bee mimic, which is pretty evident, and if you want to know more about its mimicry, head over to Jim's blog: he's written a good summary of it. Robber flies are my favorite example of why it's important to pay attention to insects. You might think it's a common insect at first, but if you look closer, you'll often be surprised. Something I always look at when I hear a loud buzzing sound from an insect is the eyes. A robber fly's eyes will be very different from what you're used to seeing on a bee's body, so that's the quickest way to separate them. This one happened to be at eye level and caught me off guard after I turned away from the fishing spider. I scrambled for my camera and it flew off the leaf, but thankfully it landed on another one nearby. I'm glad I didn't scare him off, especially since I had already let an assassin bug get away from me a few days before, and later this day a tortoise beetle would escape from my lens. You can't win them all, but when you win one of these huge charismatic flies, you feel a bit better.

This is Michigan lily, Lilium michiganense, and just too beautiful to pass up. This picture turned out very well, and it's such a treat to run across a flower as vibrant as this one.

So that's where the Valentine's Day heart comes from.

Our group reached an open area in the fen and was taken aback by the plants and insects we found hanging around in the sun. I saw my first  Elfin Skimmer, Nannothemis bella, darting around, and also these Seepage Dancers, Argia bipunctulata. The dragonflies were much tinier than what I'm used to, which was super cool. Both species are endangered, making Cedar Bog a very important place for the survival of these two species. 

 Female Nannothemis bella, a wasp mimic not only in color, but in movement.

I still have 54 species to cover, so this Midwest Native Plant Society/Cedar Bog story arc will be elaborated upon in future posts, for sure. The diversity of the place is astounding, it still wrinkles my brain. If you haven't been there before, make sure to add it to your list, it's well worth the trip.