Mantis Season

It's late August, the humidity is up, the summer insects are maturing, and I'm wishing I was jumping into a high Sierra lake.  Recent travel to Lone Pine was highlighted by a visit from this male mantis (species: uncertain) perched on the shiny red door of room 2 at the Portal Motel.













Meanwhile, back home in Tustin the buddleia is a great spot for mantises seeking prey.  Buddleia in bloom attracts lots of butterflies and other nectar feeders.

This little one is lurking under a fragrant flower on the lookout for unaware smaller prey.

Nearby on top of the highest flower on the same shrub, this nearly mature female Stagmomantis californica perches on top of the highest flower awaiting prey.














Wait long enough, and a fiery skipper (Hylephila phyleus) provides her with a juicy greeen meal,

leaving a trail of wings spread across the white flowery site of its demise.

Then, I found this beauty flirting with the sedum nussbaumerianum in our nursery.  

This is also a female, as evidenced by the broad abdomen and female parts at the end of same.  Stagmomantis californica take on a variety of colors including brown, yellowish, very light tan, and green as seen here nicely contrasting with the coppertone stonecrop.  Here is a closer-up of the wing buds which appear after the second to last molt.

Rock Moth Cellphone

We were shopping for rocks, and had settled on the small Three Rivers boulders for this particular project.  Upon closer inspection found this White lined sphinx moth (Hyles lineata) on the face of what could seem a largish boulder to the moth.  As we picked further through the boulders, another moth was found.  We were all enthusiastic about our find and took these cellphone pictures.  The rock yard man, driver of the forklift, was not too excited but he did a fine job of loading our boulders.

Are Three Rivers boulders especially attractive to these moths?  Or maybe the rock yard man's indifference was due to a general abundance of moths among all the rocks.  We may never know; we took our pix and our rocks and left.

Space Spider

News item in today's paper about a jumping spider that was sent to space by an Egyptian student.  Poor Nefertiti, as she was named by the student, died soon after returning from her 10 month sojourn aboard the International Space Station.  The experiment's purpose was to study the effect of low gravity on the feeding success of non-web building jumping spiders.

I was glad to read that the space travelling spider was able to adapt to the new conditions and hunt and feed during her trip, even if she had to be satisfied with fruit flies.   Article's title seems to be in error, since as stated in the last paragraph the spider will actually be added to the National Museum of Natural History's spider collection rather than residing in heaven.  Unless you believe spiders have immortal souls etc.

Another question about this story is how the Egyptian student (studying in Alexandria) came to acquire a specimen of Phidippus johnsoni, a species found in North America not Africa.  Is there international trade in jumping spiders?  Maybe he got the spider while visiting Washington DC when he won the competition.

Arachnophobes here on Earth and in space-- consider these words the next time you think about squishing a spider that has successfully navigated the ever-changing and dangerous world to reach the inner sanctum of your abode:

The Smithsonian said that the loss of Nefertiti, "a special animal that inspired so many imaginations," would be felt throughout the museum community.

From the Many, One

We made our annual pilgrimage to the Cal Poly pumpkin fest in search of, what else, pumpkins.
Out of the huge field of pumpkins available

I am happy to say we found the One Perfect Pumpkin:


And took some mostly-perfect ones home as well.

Happy Halloween to you all,
Long Live Halloween,
and remember this year and every year

No Xmas B4 Halloween.

Thank you and have a great Halloween.

Speaking of Wolves

So Mr. Cardui and I were off on a brick and mortar shopping expedition because after a long and blustery life one of our fans died in the middle of an off-season heat spell.  What I mean to say is, we actually needed another fan to blow hot air out of our bedroom window and we needed it NOW.

The fan that died looks similar to the one in the top photo, except it was made by Bionaire and was in no way marketed as or considered to be "retro" when we bought it, which I guess was many years ago.  Suffice it to say the little guy did well by us, not only pushing a lot of air but also fit perfectly perched on the window sill and looked kind of cute as well.  A well built item of stainless steel, it finally bit the dust just as the early morning low hit about 78 degrees one day at the end of the soon to be legendary September 2012.  Hot weather predicted into the foreseeable future; we decide to try our luck at the local retailers.

I believe both the mister and I knew in our hearts this would be a futile quest.  Back to school had passed, Xmas was less than three months away.  The clerk at CVS directed us to the area where the fans had been replaced by portable heaters.  Similar experience at Walgreen's.  A saleswoman at Kohl's just shook her head while humming "Jingle Bells" or else that's what it sounded like.  Bed Bath and Beyond had a small stack of sorry dysfunctional looking leftover concept fans as close to the exit door as they could be without being outside the store . . . good bye summer merchandise!

At Lowe's I got momentarily distracted by the small display of Halloween decor in danger of being crowded off the shelves by Xmas stuff.  Before I knew what was happening, I hear Mr. Cardui's voice from way over in the far end of what used to be the patio shop, now chock full of fake trees and boxes of holiday lights.  He's calling: come quick, hurry.  I'm thinking, fans in the Xmas section?

Anyway turns out there was this cool, large spider on the floor by the 12 foot tall display of mini lights.  I believe some sort of wolf spider.  The body length (measured against the only tool I had in hand, my cell phone) including legs was 3/4 of a flip phone.  The critter skittered along the floor in an odd floating way; Mr. Cardui swears he saw it move sideways.

Did the spider come in a box of red and green lights?  Did it pop out of a freshly unfolded plastic tree, fresh from wherever such things are made and freed at last to roam the floor of Lowe's in search of unfamiliar prey?

After playing with the wolf spider awhile we did buy a fan at Lowe's, a large cheap inelegant plastic box fan that, admittedly, did feel pretty good the next couple of ridiculously hot October days.

Note to Retailers:  Southern California is a warm climate.  Sometimes people's stuff like fans break, and it's hard to plan ahead for this circumstance.  Fans are also often used to improve ventilation in dwellings, outbuildings, garages and places of business.  Air has been known to get stuffy even when it's not summertime.  There is no real reason consider fans a seasonal item.  Better to remove shoe polish to make room for fans year 'round . . . who polishes their shoes except at Xmas?

Stop making people that simply need to buy stuff feel like tools in your big genius marketing plan, okay?

Even though the heat wave is over, and maybe even rain in the forecast, no reason to rush through the season.
## end of rant ##

Somewhere in Tustin

While I was out treasure hunting on the weekend, I came across an outstanding example of what is in my opinion the best, possibly the only good, use of fake grass.

These Tustinites had captured the natural heat generating property of fake grass to promote healthy vigorous growth of their watermelon crop.  Not only do the melon plants dig the heat, but the artificial surface will no doubt help protect the fruits from rot and insect damage.

I like the way the vines are beginning to spread over the public sidewalk here.  Hope these residents don't get an encroachment ticket from some over-zealous code enforcer.

West Coast Lady Says Howdy

I was hanging around out front waiting for Mr. Cardui to finish whatever he was up to so we could leave on our every three months whether we need it or not jaunt.  It was a warm sunny late morning; way too late already for taking the 5 north, but a perfect time for butterflies.

As I was standing by the mailbox contemplating the contrast between the firesticks and the coppery-purple osteospermum flowers otherwise known as my navel, a West Coast Lady (Vanessa annabella) landed on the warm sidewalk just a yard or so from my feet.  The camera was nearby in the car (did I mention I was ready to leave?) so I grabbed it and attempted to capture the Lady nectaring.
Skittish but hungry, the butterfly flew off when I got too near but kept returning to the same group of flowers.



I was rewarded in the end when it landed on the sidewalk behind me; I twisted around without moving my feet to get some photos.

And then, we left the butterfly to my garden full of nectar and the sidewalk full of heat;  I was wondering as we hit the 22 whether we would see migration flights of V. annabella's close relative V. cardui along our route to rest and relaxation.

As it turned out, our get-away destination was still waiting for spring, dry from a long mostly rainless winter and without flowers for the most part and butterflies.  Still, beautiful.

Spider Wow

Wow.

Have You Seen the Big Rock?

We traveled to Rowland Heights over the weekend to view a big rock on an even bigger rolling transporter rig.  It's being hauled to LA County Museum of Art; more info here; also a picture of what the rock looks like under its protective wrappings.  Worth having a look; tomorrow it will be in Long Beach which is really just a stone's throw from OC.

I thought the little work lights strung around the rock were cute.

Beware the Solanum?

I was creeping around a well-known garden center in Newport Beach whose name shall remain nameless because they are already well known enough, checking out their very cool but too expensive collection of Halloween decor.  Out of the corner of my eye, looking past the gigantic animated spider, the moon-face jack o lanterns, the headless horseman, the gothic costumes and candelabra, the skeletons, the crows, the spooky photos . . . um, yeah and the price tags . . . past all this I saw some scrumptiously Octoberesque porcupine tomatoes, Solanum pyracanthum.  Yeah, this garden center is really more of a lifestyle shopping  experience, but they do also sell plants.

Hold onto your credit cards, this one gallon specimen of one of my favorite plants was less than 10 bucks.  Since I already knew what pot it would look good in (bought when Mainly Seconds in Orange was closing for 70% off) I wasted no time picking out the best of the litter and carting my new porcupine tomato home.

Called that because 1) it is in the tomato genus, closely related and it even produces little tomato-like fruits after flowering in a tomato-like but purple way; and 2) it is covered in long spines.  Now, porcupine spines are not day-glo orange, but as you know common names for plants sometimes stretch the truth.

After the plant was potted up (with sedum nussbaumeranium, lilac lobelia, and lysimachia congestiflora 'Persian chocolate'), looking good, and set in a place of honor by the front stairs, I noticed a group of newly hatched leaf footed bugs, Leptoglossus zonatus, gathered on a flower bud.  It looked like they were in a huddle or maybe a prayer meeting but really I suppose they were just getting ready to disperse.  Here's one that was well on its way to exploring the porcupine tomato world it has found itself inhabiting.

I assume the bug eggs were on the solanum plant when I bought it, and hatched soon after I brought it home.  Tomato is one of the many many plants this bug likes to feed on, being as they say polyphagous.  Previously in my garden the leaf footed bugs have been found on pomegranate, opuntia, myrtle, jade plant and milkweed.  I guess I got some cool (and free of additional charge) Halloween bug decorations after all.

Finally one last note about solanum:  it is in no way connected with zombie-ism.  Solanum virus is NOT REAL.  Solanum is a genus of plants, not a zombie-causing virus.  Check out this article from the Zombie Research Society for clarification on all things zombie.  Thank you.

Alkali Flies a Bonus for Sierra Visitors

Mr. Cardui, myself and I took a quick jaunt up the eastern Sierra end of last month.  This time we toodled around the Upper Owens River area as well as Mono Lake.  Though Mono Lake and the Owens River are not hydraulically connected (Mono has no outlets; the Owens headwaters are just south of Mono) they each have played big parts in the water use history of the eastern Sierra.

This top photo is the shore of Mono.  The black line on the shore is comprised of gazillions of Mono Lake alkali flies, Ephydra hians, one of the very few organisms that can live in the waters of the lake.  The female traps air on her body hairs and walks under water along an algae bed laying eggs.  The larvae eat the algae and turn into, what else, pupae.  The native people of this area used the incredibly abundant pupae as a food source; they called them "kutsadi".  However, white people had established contact earlier with the Yokut people of the western Sierra, who traded with the kutsadika'a ("fly eaters" in their own tongue); these traders called the tasty pupae "Mono" and so that name stuck . . . easier to say, I guess.  The gulls (also seen in the top photo) feed on the flies in all their life stages.

Anyway, Mono Lake is really pretty and the flies are interesting bonus material.

Flowing through a broad valley (Long Valley) and into Crowley Lake is the upper Owens River.  Lots of people fish up here, but I found these old bridge supports interesting.  Soon after this photo was taken, those clouds up among the sierra peaks started sprouting lightning.

Lightning can be scary, and even more so the fires it often starts, but on Space Trash Day, I was way more freaked out about getting hit by satellite parts, so I took shelter under this antique hair curler at the Laws Museum in Bishop.

No that's not really me but this is:

There's always lots of interesting barbed wire in the valley, separating someone's old ranch from someone else's new dreams.

I encourage you all to visit the Owen's Valley and the Eastern Sierra as it is particularly beautiful this time of year and the residents could use the money.

Have I Mentioned I Like The Eastern Sierras?

Been busy since the Thanksgiving break trip up the Owens Valley through the mountain passes to Nevada to visit with the old man's folks.  I'm sure no one's interested in our gossip, but some photos of the mountains with the pristine blanket of the first snows of winter resting on them are in order.  From north to south, a few scenes from highway 395.

Attack of the Amphipods

Yesterday I visited my mom's place in Laguna Woods, and she showed me her Tupperwares, pitchers, buckets and plastic deli food containers out on the patio filled with rain water (Yay!) and small shrimp-like critters (#@!Bugs, she says).  There were quite a number of them in these containers which were up off the ground on small tables or plant racks.  Some of the shrimp-likes were dead, some of them crawling around the bottom of the containers.  There were also some of them dead or near death on the indoor/outdoor carpet of the patio and a few on the concrete walkway.  What the heck?  I took a few photos with my phone but they are unprintable.  I took a pair of them as a sample in a Beneful Beef Stew container (very handy lidded containers even if food fit only for spoiled dropkick dogs, btw) and went home to the internets.

So I started searching for info, and got no further than typing "shrimp-like" when the species Talitroides sylvaticus came to my attention.  This is a shrimp-like crustacean belonging to the order amphipoda, commonly known as Lawn Shrimp or House Hoppers.  They are apparently very common in Orange County, sometimes becoming pests when they enter homes in large numbers.  They are about 8mm in size, flattened laterally, colored brown with a shiny grey green sheen, and inhabit shady damp landscape areas with access to damp soil and decaying organic matter that is their food.  They move by springing on their hind legs.  Several sources note t. sylvaticus are often noticed after a heavy rain when their habitat becomes flooded.  Similar to earthworms the lawn shrimp are sensitive to excessive moisture and they leave the flooded landscape seeking drier conditions.  Then they become too dry and die; after death they turn orange kind of like, well, shrimp.

I took a look at my specimens.  The bigger one is close to 8mm; the smaller about 6mm or so.  They are shiny blue grey to my eye, with reddish antennae (4 of them) and legs (um, didn't count those).  They don't stay still for long, scooting or scuttling around and around the bottom of the container.  From time to time the two meet on their travels and interact by laying on their sides and moving their antennae around.  I never see them rise to the surface of the water.  They seem content in, or at least adapted to their aquatic environment.

Lawn shrimp are described as terrestrial amphipods, and are sensitive to changes in the moisture in their environment, poorly equipped to control their internal osmotic balance.  These two swimmers in the dog food container do not look like terrestrial creatures.

Ventral view

Freshwater aquatic amphipods include two likely species.  Hyallela azteca is common in freshwater environments in our area and throughout north America.  They are laterally flattened, variously colored shrimp-like creatures that feed on algae, diatoms and organic matter.  They are typically 2-3 mm long, much smaller than my specimens.  Gammarus is a genus of freshwater amphipods of various sizes commonly used as fish bait and turtle food.  This post at Backyard Arthropod Project has some info on these and pictures of some found in a stream in Michigan.  I especially related to the description of the mode of locomotion, very much as observed in my pair of what I have become to call Mystery Shrimp.  The name amphipod means different footed, meaning these creatures have legs with different forms used for different functions:swimming, crawling, hopping.

No matter which of these species is most likely or even correct, it is still unexplained how they got where there were found.  If they are Lawn Shrimp, how did they hop out of the landscape, over or around a 6 foot block wall and into pans and bowls placed not less than 18" off the ground.  If they are aquatic amphipods, the possibilities seem fantastic:  Maybe they were picked up from a nearby body of freshwater by a waterspout in the recent storms and magically happened to rain on my mom's patio (this sounds extra crazy but I read a news report of marine shrimp raining on a San Diego suburb, maybe an urban myth, though).

There is a balcony above my mom's patio and above that a roof gutter.  Hmmmm.  Maybe the shrimp-likes (whichever species) were living in a semi-clogged roof drain, feeding on the detritus there moistened by a recent rain and were washed out by Tuesday's downpour, onto the balcony and my mom's porch below.  Except, how did they get there in the first place?  A bird could have carried a female with eggs up there and dropped it, I suppose.

Maybe the people above now or once had pet turtles and fed them gammarus; the amphipods bred and bred and their containers overflowed in the rain.

Any and all guesses or theories will be most welcome.

Dec 15 update and (in)conclusion:    The two amphipods in the Beneful container continued to swim/crawl/scoot around and defecate (did they also consume?) until 10/26 when one of them died.  It turned pinker after death and very quickly become mush.  The second one survived another 3 days until the 29th.  Here is a photo of it post mortem in which you can see it is appreciably pinker.

Meanwhile in Laguna Woods, on 10/25 there was more rain and mom reported amphipods appeared on her patio.  Since then she hasn't seen any more.  Also, after surveying the neighbors, she found none of them had seen any wayward shrimplike creatures, or at least they weren't willing to admit they did.  Mom also reported the shrimp attack to the maintenance department in her community; they basically said, "For goodness sakes!  Umm are they harming you?  No?  Well just leave them alone . . ."

So.  It's my sense that the circumstances (appearance after a rain, near a lawn, species commonly found around here) of the amphipod appearance points to Talitroides sylvaticus; however the description of the species as terrestrial and also ill-equipped to regulate its osmotic balance does not fit with my two sample individuals living in seeming comfort for days (after all, how long is the lifespan) in one inch of water.  I think these could have been aquatic amphipods, maybe gammarus, living in the clogged roof drain above my mom's porch.  How they got there . . . I don't know.