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June 9-10, 2012
Sarpy County, Nebraska
I'm skipping this week's Backyard Butterfly series due to a disturbing lack of butterflies. Last week's count will appear at the end of this diary.
Lately, I've been really into photographing beetles. There is a remarkable diversity of beetles and I was curious how many different species I could find. I decided I would try to photograph at least 100 different species of beetles by the end of the year. After a couple of weeks, most of which was spent not really trying, I decided I may have set the bar too low.
Yesterday and today I went on hikes in two different areas looking for beetles. Yesterday was primarily deciduous forest, today, grasslands. Here are my spoils.
Three beetles I knew would be easy to get were Convergent, Spotted, and Multicolored Asian Lady Beetles. Surprisingly, the first too were the easiest. The first beetle I found on my hike in the woods was a Convergent Lady Beetle.
The next was a Spotted Lady Beetle
It was a few miles of hiking before I found those two and I was worried I wouldn't find much of interest. I hiked on, and my persistence was rewarded. I came to a clearing at the edge of a marsh and found these two Common Shore Tiger Beetles near the shore, of course.
I turned around and headed back into the woods and a little later found this Rustic Borer Beetle resting on what I though was stinging nettle. I had to reposition the plant to get a good angle so was prepared to take the stings, but it never did.
I travelled up this hollow and found a sumac flowering on one of the banks. It was occupied by this really nifty Flower Longhorn Beetle.
As I neared the end of my hike, I came across two as yet unidentified Tiger Beetles, one green and one blue. I'm not sure if they are different species or not, but they are both striking.
This morning's hike was in a primarily grassy area. Unfortunately, the wind was blowing a constant 20mph, with gusts up to 30mph, so I knew photography would be difficult. Still, I soldiered on. There was lots of milkweed and goldenrod in the area, and they were covered with Red Milkweed Beetles and Margined Leatherwings, but I already had good photos of those, so I mostly ignore them. Later I saw a plant with clusters of small white flowers. I went to check them out and found another Flower Longhorn Beetle
I hiked on a found some Verbascum. I checked the leaves out and found two tiny weevils. I'm not sure I'll be able to get an ID on these, but they still count.
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A little farther on and I found a patch of wild roses. There were small red weevils on the roses. Some were feeding on them, others were not.
One of the beetles I had hoped to get was Dogbane Leaf Beetle. I was not disappointed.
Later, one of the numerous Red Milkweed beetles I had seen landed on my arm. I indulged it with a photo. You can really see it's four eyes which gave it the name Tetraopes tetraopthalmus. Yes, I have hairy arms.
Most of my hike was on a trail intended for horseback riding. How many horse turds do you think you have to flip over before you find a dung beetle? It's a trick question! You don't find dung beetles by flipping over horse turds, you have to dig through them. This first one is called Scooped Scarab, I'm guessing because of the scoop-like projection behind it's head.
This other one I have yet to identify. I couldn't get a really good picture because it kept digging its way back into the dung. Both dung beetles were found in the same dung.
I did find a Multicolored Asian Lady Beetle on today's hike, but the picture did not turn out well, I'm sure I'll have other opportunities. These are the beetles I found over just two days. If you'd like to see more beetles, there is a guy at Project Noah, who is also trying to photograph 100 beetles, who has created a mission for beetles. Many of his beetles are remarkably similar to my beetles.
Here is last week's backyard butterfly count:
Butterflies:
Cabbage White(2)
Pearl Crescent(1)
I'm really not sure what is going on. I haven't had a lot of time for observation, but I was in the yard last Sunday and only saw two butterflies. Yesterday there were none. That is despite the fact that the Coneflowers are blooming and the Butterfly Bush is blooming. It is a bit disturbing. Will have to see how it goes next week.
So, what's going on in your area?