By about this time in the past few years, I would have posted roughly four thousand mantis pictures. I am definitely behind those numbers this year, so let’s see if we can rectify that.
To begin with, I was super-prepared this spring, having ordered a bunch of Chinese mantis (Tenodera sinensis) egg cases – called “oothecas” if you want to get technical or simply confuse
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
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,
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
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
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
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
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
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
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