Like a preternatural being skulking in shadows dark and deep, she waits, beautiful and beguiling in her silken home, her image reflected about her silhouette.
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A funnel weaver in the Agelenidae family.
Lurking
Category Archives: Photos
The little things
One need not look far and wide to see natural beauty, for nature hides her splendor everywhere, even in the little things.
What looks like a bee represents mimetic adaptation, a robber fly (Laphria saffrana) wearing the apparel of a stinger to protect itself from predators, all the while hunting with the expert skill of a true killer.
A butterfly alighting within a sandy clearing stops to partake of minerals on the earth’s surface, the question mark (Polygonia interrogationis) appearing to most as a resting insect when in fact it hungrily consumes what it needs.
Upon a cloudy windowsill a blue mud wasp (a.k.a. blue mud-dauber; Chalybion californicum) lingers, waiting for sunlit warmth that will never come, still as petrified wood hoping no danger notices its lethargic morning.
Wings spread to soak up sunny warmth, a common buckeye (Junonia coenia) is all but invisible from the side. At least until you stop to look.
A male regal jumper (a.k.a. regal jumping spider; Phidippus regius) holds fast to its moth breakfast, even in the face of photographic invasion, and both circle the gate hidden from prying eyes… at least prying eyes that fail to see.
In shadows deep to avoid daytime heat, a waved sphinx moth (Ceratomia undulosa) lingers in rest, waiting for the dark of night when it can pursue its only adult desire: mating.
No, one need not look far and wide to see natural beauty, for natural beauty can be found even in the little things.
Is it safe?
A five-lined skink (a.k.a. blue-tailed skink or red-headed skink; Eumeces fasciatus) peeking out from a crack in a railroad tie. The spritely critter spent the afternoon hunting termites, an activity that kept it bold and obvious despite my presence with a camera.
Making the move to East Texas has meant losing access to the plethora of wildlife in the midst of which I lived in Dallas, yet my relocation has also provided a veritable smorgasbord of wildlife, some new and some familiar, for my new home is well removed from city life and buried deep in the bucolic heart of the Piney Woods.
Like this busy reptile, I’ve been taking my fill of the wildness around me.
Ambush in the Piney Woods
Deep in the Piney Woods of East Texas, late instars of the buck moth caterpillar (Hemileuca maia) have begun wandering. Covered with hollow spines attached to poison sacs, they represent one of the fewer than twenty North American caterpillar species capable of stinging, though buck moth larvae do not inflict the kind of harm that southern flannel moths deliver. Despite that, they remain well protected by their chemical defenses.
Variations in color do not hide the telltale white dots or the prominent spines; as aposematic warnings go, these are sufficient for predators to know the danger involved should they grab one of the caterpillars.
But the second-growth woods of East Texas offer more than the usual hunters, more than those who must deal with poisonous weapons covering the insects. Yes, deep in the Piney Woods an ambush has been set for the buck moth caterpillar, and the perpetrators have no fear of these natural weapons.
Small enough to slip in under the caterpillar’s defenses, spined soldier bug nymphs (Podisus maculiventris) lie in wait on a tree limb as a lone caterpillar ventures forth, a wanderer from this usually gregarious clan. And upon that limb, one predatory stink bug at the rear and one in front, the buck moth larva realizes too late that its built-in protection offers little help against attackers who can move beneath the spines and who target the insect’s undefended underside.
Each nymph, not yet an adult, knows to keep its proboscis extended, a weapon and feeding tube always ready to pierce the soft flesh of the caterpillar. They move in, stab, eat, move back when the insect flails in the false hope that it can defeat this ambush. Its only escape is to let go of the branch and fall to the ground, but it cannot reason well enough to know that. So it stands its ground against the marauders, feeling each stab in its legs and belly, whipping its abdomen and head from time to time but accomplishing nothing.
When I leave behind this scene of nature’s amoral persistence, the bugs have once again attacked the caterpillar’s legs, one at the end and one nearer the front. For its part, the caterpillar sits still, then flails, then sits still, then tries to escape, a cycle that repeats without effect, for the ambush is unending, unflinching, unyielding. So long as they remain on the small branch, the attackers will prevail.
Deep in the Piney Woods of East Texas, death is a way of life, a way to survive, and chemical defenses mean little when an ambush strikes when and where you are most vulnerable. Yes, deep in the Piney Woods an ambush plays out, and one dies so two may live.
The Wasn’t Winter
Balmy temperatures keep grass green and growing. Bats fly nearly every night. Some trees budded as early as the first week of February. And insects remain active and obvious. Welcome to the wasn’t winter.
Southern lappet moths (Phyllodesma occidentis) join crane flies and beetles and wasps and bees, along with a laundry list of insects, all of which remain quite active and obvious.
The lack of major freezes this season portends a bad mosquito problem, not to mention other unpleasant critters. And if it indicates anything about future temperatures—as in regarding this summer—then the news is bad indeed, especially in light of last summer’s record heat and misery.
But luna moths (Actias luna) are always welcome visitors, just like the other unusual winter guests, so I won’t complain.
Well, I won’t complain much I mean, since I love cold temperatures and wintry weather, neither of which we’ve had this year.
As we head into spring, the weather need not change to indicate a new season, and it’s clear insects are more than ready for the end of the wasn’t winter.