So, a few days back we finally got out and found some decent fall colors, emphasizing just how widely variable the area is. A week earlier, the ineluctable Al Bugg and I had visited a spot on a river just a handful of kilometers north, and found most of the trees by the water well past peak and, in fact, bare. Then
Tag: Carolina mantis
Make mine a double
The other day I commented that the immortal (so far) Mr Bugg had failed to beat me to the punch in posting something from our mutual outing before I did. What I was forgetting was that he apparently lives across two international date lines, so while it was Sunday here, it was Friday there. Thus, he still managed to post a day ahead of me, we just had to wait another day to see it…
Regardless,
Get your mind out of the gutter
Since I had to get up early this morning, naturally I was up late last night checking out the little pond in the yard. The larger frogs have all moved on, to be replaced by five smaller frogs (all green frogs, Lithobates clamitans, I believe,) and a huge number of tadpoles and newborn minnows. But the thing that captured my attention was, once again, an insect.
Atop the leaves of the pond plants
Mantodea reditum
That means, “return to the mantids.” Maybe. Probably not – it’s Latinish, one of many languages I have mastered not in the slightest form whatsoever.
Lest you think something has terrible happened to my mind, I hasten to assure you that I have been keeping tabs on the mantises, even when I haven’t been posting anything. There is now a vast size
A tiny bit of diversity
The hatched Chinese mantises (Tenodera sinensis) that I posted about earlier – and near-perpetually on this blog, really – have spread out across the front yard to some fairly remote locations remote, at least, for something that measures 10mm in body length. Above, one stalks among the leaves of a creeping jenny plant, while at left
A year-end retrospective
Two years ago at the last day of the year, I posted a series of pics intended for blog posts that had simply never made it, and I am doing the same again this time, with one small addition: I am posting a photo taken within each month, and adding a link to my favorite post(s) for each month as well. It’s kind of like those TV programs that can’t be bothered with new
Still not over
When the weather wasn’t bad, I was tied up, and when I had free time, the weather was terrible. Plus, the terrible weather was enough to take the leaves from the trees in most places. Thus, the autumn color season danced away from me this year, but I think it avoided a lot of people, so I’m not going to feel too badly about it.
So when the clear skies and my availability finally synchronized
Green day
Not today – today has been rain all day. These are all from a few days back, and noticeably had the green thing going on, so…
Over at the pond nearby, a pale green assassin (Zelus luridus) like the one seen a few posts back posed in shadow on the pod of a buttonbush (Cephalanthus occidentalis.) While I’ve been seeing them from the start of the insect season this
Around the pond
Just a few photos from the nearby pond, mostly recent, without a lot of exposition to go along.
An unidentified orthopteran, what I suspect is a meadow katydid, poses atop a button bush that’s showing the impact of the lateness of the season and the sparse rain in the past. In the thin line of undergrowth bordering the pond right below it, I was spotting various mantids and
Not inspired
Once again, I observe that the posts are thin, which is a shame because I am/was well on the way to a record in number of posts, having already passed the total for both 2014 and 2012 (not combined, mind you.) A lot of that had to do with Monday color, which I’ll leave it up to you whether that should be considered cheating or not. But at best, they added five photos per month to the number