Simple geometry, complex biology

Back in the day, homes were often aligned east/west, north/south I guess.  Being built in 1936, my house is oriented to the east and the equinox sun rising aligns with the driveway.  It's cool, but really just simple geometry in action.  There is a week or so either side of the equinox the sun spends in our driveway, then will move on toward winter.

Meanwhile, spiders have ripened with the autumn and can be found hanging in mid-air, hopefully not by your face.  This orb weaver positioned herself below the acacia cultriformis tree at daybreak.  Insect and arachnid life is adapted to adjust life cycles to the changing seasons, many species becoming sexually mature in late summer and autumn and switching gears from feeding and growing to breeding and dying off, or aggregation and over wintering.

Humans, affected by the changing quality of light, pull out boots and sweaters even though the daytime air temperature still hangs in the high 80s.  We'll begin gathering things and stashing them away for the deep of winter. We light candles, hang wreaths, prepare our homes for the coming dark.  We drink pumpkin ale, celebrating the slightest hint of crispness in the now officially autumn air.

Leucophyllum in Crazy Bloom

Next to the front porch our Texas Ranger, leucophyllum frutescens, is blooming large.

This drought hardy plant needs little water, can survive our average summer without supplemental irrigation, 

but the surprisingly substantial rain we had a month ago seems to have ramped up the flower bud production way beyond normal.  Leucophyllum usually blooms late summer but this year is ridiculous in its bounty.

In Texas, some refer to their state flower as the 'Barometer bush', due to its response to increased humidity and/or summer rain with eye-popping flower production.  Some say the buds often burst open before the rain, serving as a weather prediction.  

Our ranger is covered in blooms right now, I thought because of the soaking it got last month.  But maybe rain's on the way.  Eventually?  Meanwhile, it makes a pleasant bower where it meets up with the Acacia iteaphylla over our front porch entrance.  As they age, the flowers drop off and sprinkle the walk below, and anything else that happens to be there like our concrete fawn.

Bees love it, and many early mornings their loud buzzing greets us as we step under the bower and begin our day.  

Notes on Transition through Spring

Hello again.

Found this dead moth in the planter 'neath the mailbox.  It's a white lined sphinx moth, Hyles lineata.    The larval food includes elm; could this moth have grown as a caterpillar way up in the elm canopy over the mailbox and planter of its ultimate resting place?  Or did it feed on the portulaca growing in someone else's yard.

Either way, it's spent adult body is now food for ants.  My last post on this species was almost exactly one year ago; I guess that means something.

Dried tulips from a funeral bouquet rest atop my rust-colored metal mesh table.  I didn't know tulips would hold like this, but must have suspected or dreamed they would hence: my attempt to dry them.

The putative rabbitbrush showed its first bud today or yesterday; I don't know since I've been kind of busy.  Anyway, soon it will be covered in bright yellow heads of flowers like last year and the year before that etc.  We had fair to middling success propagating this plant and so there are now more of them populating the parkway strip in the hopes of transforming it into New Mexico.





Notice one winged aphid there among the juicy grey leaves:  harbinger of infestation or forerunner of ladybirds?

Just one crane fly I've rustled from the underbrush this spring?  What the heck, it must be dry out.

I was remarking to the offspring very recently about how mourning doves have not been frequenting our estate in recent years.  So, this morning what do I hear but the squeaky wings of one dove landing atop our canopy.  Maybe a pair will decide it's safe to nest in the yard again.  Or maybe the damned unleashed and uncontrollable bird killing neighbor cats will keep them at bay.

Pelargonium carnosum blooms.  Enough said in a small way.




Wisteria blooms.  Enough said in a very large way.  In fact the neighbors wisteria is threatening to take over our middle-ground and we must retort with sharpened clippers.

I noticed a monarch caterpillar feeding in the milkweed a few days ago.  This morning as I passed by it was no longer feeding so my eyes began searching the nearby shrubbery and found it in the last stages of its final molt to pupa as the sun's path was approaching equinox.  Significant? or just fortuitous.

This article contains a lively discussion of the seasonal significance of the March equinox.  Bear in mind:  it's British, but peruse the comments for an interesting cross section of opinion, misinformation and surprisingly relevant insights into the annual occurrence.  Some folk still paying attention to celestial geometry.

2013 Winter Solstice Bug Hunt and Count

Whew!  It's a lot of working trying to find buggies in the scorching winter weather we're having here in SoCal.  Didn't quite get to the count on the 21st . . . sorry traditionalists (which btw includes myself)!  Yesterday and today have been in the 80s with a dry Santa Ana wind blowing.  Typically I get some out of the ordinary bug sightings in any season with a strong wind.  I guess when you weigh that little you get blown around a bit. Not this time, really, as the count is full of the usual suspects:

SPIDERS:
Lots of funnel web spider webs in evidence, and I saw three of the spiders, Hololena curta, outside their funnels.

Found 2 very small orb weaver spiders.
Possibly metepeira.
Under some bark chunks were 2 Under Log Spiders, appeared to be male and female just hanging out;
and a very tiny tan spider attacking a smallish beetle larva.  The tiny spider ran around the larva, then jumped on it apparently biting judging from the reaction of the larva.
Near some small decorative desiccated mushrooms:  1 very tiny jumping spider not seen in this lovely mushroom photo.

1 whirligig mite, Anystis baccarum, found running around in circles.  Have you seen how fast they are?
So a lot of arachnids without much identification.

ORTHOPTERA:
1 greybird grasshopper, Schistocerca nitens, adult male.

2 bush katydids, Scudderia furcata, 3rd instar nymphs, this one hanging out on the senna artemisioides which is just coming into bloom.  Flowers of all types are these guys' favorite foods.

TERMITES:

Or at least evidence of them in the woodpile.  Yikes.

BUGGIES:

1 black scale insect on a thick fennel stalk.  See the semi-circular marks on the stem near the insect?
Looks like the movement of the insect made these marks in Slo mo.
Aphis nerii, oleander aphids, by the 100s on two colonized plants.

1 Green leafhopper.
1 myrid plant bug of the all-black persuasion.

NEUROPTERA:
2 Green lacewings, Chrysopa sp.

HYMENOPTERA:
Grrrr.  There are still 100s of the neighbor's ants, possibly one of the so-called field ants.  I'll call them Formica parkwayii var: Cameronsantos for now.  Despite our efforts to poison and dissuade their colony, they continue to pour out from under our neighbor's house, march down our driveway an on into the parkway jungle where they travel several houses down and climb trees in search of honeydew and sap.  It wouldn't annoy except they climb onto me when I step out of the car at night, then wait until I'm comfy to bite me.  And they stink mightily of ant.
Only 4 honeybees, Apis mellifera, were out perusing the rosemary, acacia and lavatera flowers when I was looking.

LEPIDOPTERA:

Ding ding ding!  The adult butterflies were the stars of the count this year.
At least 3 separate cloudless sulfur, Phoebis sennae floated past my line of vision.
2 cabbage whites, Pieris rapae.
1 mourning cloak, Nymphalis antiopa, flew by in the top of the elm tree . . . hopefully laying eggs.
1 monarch, Danaus plexippus, seen flying and 1 that had recently eclosed under the cold-stressed leaf of the night blooming cereus.

FLIES:
Last but never least.

1 syrphid fly, Eupeodes sp. attracted to a basket
1 green bottle fly, Lucilia sericata resting on a leaf.
2 muscid flies of undisclosed persuasion doing what muscid flies do.
.

Slim pickings, like last year.  It's ending up to be our driest year on record here, with no predictable rain in sight.  Oh wait.  The Old Farmers' Almanac sez:

 DECEMBER 2013: temperature 54° (avg.); precipitation 2" (1" above avg. north, 0.5" below south); Dec 1-5: Rain, then sunny, cool; Dec 6-10: Heavy rain north, showers south; cool; Dec 11-15: Rainy periods, cold; Dec 16-21: Rainy periods, some heavy; cool; Dec 22-31: Clouds and drizzle, cool north; sunny, turning warm south.

JANUARY 2014: temperature 53° (1° below avg.); precipitation 8" (5" above avg.); Jan 1-3: Clouds and occasional drizzle, cool; Jan 4-10: Heavy rain, then sunny, chilly; Jan 11-14: Heavy rain, mild; Jan 15-16: Showers; Jan 17-19: Heavy rain, mild; Jan 20-24: Rainy periods, cold;Jan 25-27: Sunny, cool; Jan 28-31: Rainy, cool.

We, the plants, the birds and the buggies and the publishers of the Old Farmers Almanac can only hope.

Thank You Everything

So it's Thanksgiving Day, and as much as I like eating turkey in general, I made no plans to slave in the kitchen cooking a feast.  Got some taters to mash and a pre-cooked turkey breast, add salad, voila:  thanks very much for the easy dinner.  And no, I have no plans to queue up for shopping tonight.

I did get up early though:  needed to start soaking birch twigs . . . more on this later.  Took our usual walk this morning:  just another typical glorious southern CA fall day.  Found a gob of toyon berries, red grape leaves along the trail and brought them home for decorations.  Pit stop at the coffee shop along the way for a bite: thanks for being open!

Met up with the munchkin for wreath making (involving the now very flexible birch twigs) and a chat.  I kept wandering around the garden and bringing clippings of dried things, berries, etc to add to it, including a super attractive grasshopper exuvia but my daughter is more of a minimalist and wisely chose only some of my offerings and so her wreath turned out really nice.

Shot the breeze with the neighbors.  Mr Cardui washed the daughter's car, then cleared up the headlight lenses with that stuff you see on TV.  Really works!  He then had a go at the neighbor's car's lights and it was amazing.  Everyone was suitably impressed.

Did a bit of work (you know, that stuff we do for money?) which involved driving on the delightfully lightly trafficked freeways.  Day continues to be outstanding, weather-wise.

Listened to music, including the CD my son's band made back in 1998.  Emailed the family. Lit a fire in the woodstove, ate the turkey and taters, and watched (again) Avatar.  We saw this in the theater when it first came out around Christmas, and I guess that reminded us of Thanksgiving.

Couldn't wish for a better day.

Two Months Before the Desk

The best month of the year has passed by and then some without a word from me here.  It was a glorious October, by the way, full of golden sunlight and tagetes.  Stuck here locked in blogger's block--No!--I've been working on other things but my thoughts and feet always wander back to the bugs and plants.

Stapelia blooms in late autumn and did again this October.  I caught a nice group of green bottle flies   on this fully open blossom.  Bugguide uses the name Lucilia sericata for this species, while "Phaenicia sericata" rolls off the tongue of Hodgkins on Bones ("phaenicia sericata.  early stage of colonization. no eggs or maggots present. Oh look! one of them is dead") with charming regularity.  Not sure which is most correct or if there is a difference.  Nevertheless, yes there IS a dead one there on the flower.

Stapelia puts out a stink very much like that of rotting flesh, attracting flies to the flowers where they can't help themselves from laying copious amounts of eggs.  The eggs hatch and the maggots are doomed.  Yay.  Natural pest control for your estate, just position the plants far from outdoor eating areas.

The flower buds are pretty in a pinkish bloated sort of way, and the open flowers are covered with fine hairs which enhance the visual similarity to rotting moldy flesh.  The flies of course are the pollinators for this plant (Stapelia gigantea) and its related carrion plant species, which are members of the milkweed family.

I have an interesting story about flies and milkweed, but not now.  Suffice it to say that green bottle flies also frequent milkweed to their doom.  Bwa ha ha.

Late but not forgotten

2012 Winter solstice bug count was performed on 12/21/12 shortly after the world did not end.

We are happy to be able to finally get around to reporting the findings here.

Thank you for your patronage.

8th Annual Winter Solstice Bug Count

Ye doggies, I've been doing this for 8 years now?  Time flies when you're geeking out over bugs.
Anyway, it was a clear and cold middle of the day on the solstice and these were my finds:

ARACHNIDS--8 Legs!
1 labyrinth orb weaver, Metepeira [labyrinthea?]

These gals are so cute with their huts made of local-sourced building materials!












1 very small, shiny brown jumping spider.

6 Funnel web spiders mostly hiding in their lairs in the cracks on my porch ceiling, Hololena curta.

1 Anystis baccarum, predatory mite aka whirligig mite.  I interrupt this recitation to clarify that this count does not by any means purport to be an exhaustive nor complete inventory of the buggies on my estate.  Seeing and recording just the one mite running crazily over and under the concrete birdbath in the front garden merely indicates that the species Anystis baccarum is represented, albeit thinly, in the fauna on this particular day.  Probably there are many more of them . . . somewhere.  Or, their eggs.  And that goes for all species listed here . . .
Lots of Aceria granati, pomegranate leaf curl mites.  I haven't yet solved this pest problem on my poor poor pomegranate tree.

HEMIPTERA--Suckers, hoppers and true bugs!

100s mealybugs adult and nymphs on the pittosporum and Juan's aeonium.
Lots of pittosporum psyllids on, what else?, pittosporum.
1000s Aphis nerii, oleander aphid, covering the nearly bare stems of the milkweed plants.  Winged and wingless forms were both plentiful.

10 or so scale insects on the fennel.  Often the ant colony that lives under my neighbor's parkway strip sends troops north along the gutter to this fennel plant to harvest honeydew from the scale ranch they operate here.  This day no ants were at work in the fennel, however.
3 small black-ish leaf hoppers, maybe Scaphytopius sp.

Just One of each of the following true bugs:
small milkweed bug, Lygaeus kalmii; 

LARGE milkweed bug, Oncopeltus fasciatus;
and pirate bug,Orius tristicolor.

NEUROPTERA--Lacewings!

1 Lacewing egg and 1 adult green lacewing, Chrysopa sp

ORTHOPTERA--Jumpers!

1 bush katydid nymph, Scudderia furcata

LEPIDOPTERA--Flutterbys!

1 monarch adult, and 15 larvae, Danaus plexippus.

Some of the caterpillars are dark-looking.  Are they infected with OE parasites?  This website describes some findings that suggest caterpillars that are dirty-looking, have indistinct stripes or malformed "antennae" could be signs of infection.  Other sources agree that monarch caterpillars are normally often darker colored in winter so they absorb more heat from the sun.  It would be nice to know.
7 Stigmella rosaefoliella mines on rose leaves . . . Rose leaf miner.  This is a first observation of this in my garden.  The mines, which are remarkably similar in shape to each other, are the result of the feeding of moth larvae.  Here is an image of the moth.

DIPTERA--Flies!
1 Green bottle fly, Lucilia sericata.
3 Flesh flies of some sort, Sarcophaga sp.
10 Syrphid flies, Allograta obliqua.  These guys are so attractive, and it's nice to see them on the job parasitizing aphids.

And, several to many different types of unidentified flies.  One of these looked lot like boatman fly, but wasn't.

HYMENOPTERA--Stingers!

100s of ants.  Still don't know what species these are.  The typical worker is larger than an Argentinian; has reddish thorax and darker head and abdomen.  They stream from and back to the colony entrance under my neighbor's parkway into our yards and trees.  Often they climb onto my foot, and end up biting me.  They smell strongly (to me) of ANT.
3 Apis mellifera, honey bees.  This one is nectaring at the one red buckwheat (eriogonum grande rubescens) flower unseasonably available . . . Why?

Where did all of them go that were swarming the willow wattle just a few days ago?
1 Paper wasp, polistes exclamans.

Quite a few empty nests of same or similar.

BEETLES!
Ladybirds that is.
1 spotless ladybird, Cycloneda sanguinea.

1 Asian ladybird, Harmonia axyridis.

8 undifferentiated ladybird pupae

and one ladybird larva that appeared to be consuming another.

Maybe I'm jaded, but this count seems like slim pickings compared to years past (well, the cannibal ladybirds and rose leaf miners were exciting . . . ).  Did the weather have anything to do with that?
The average high and low temperatures for Dec the past 4 years recorded at our nearest CIMIS station (75--Irvine):
2012 high 62.8  low 44.7
2011 high 65.5  low 40.8
2010 high 64.6  low 44.7
2009 high 67.1  low 45.9
would seem to indicate this solstice about average.

But closer examination of the daily data reveals we had a freeze or near-freeze the two nights preceding my bug count.  We know that freezing temperatures (or in our case, the lack of them) effects pest insect population spread.  Could two nights of just barely frost have a noticeable effect on insect activity in my garden?