Tag: insect
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Dispatches from Somewhere #4| Antheraea polyphemus
Admittedly, this photo isn’t from any time recently. I took this during the summer of 2014 at Springbrook Nature Center in Fridley, MN. It was while I was working for a nonprofit organization called Tree Trust building a 180-foot swamp foot boardwalk with local high school students. It was also…
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Nature’s Pooper Scooper (Dung Beetles!) with Professor Marcus Byrne
Professor Marcus Byrne teaches us about the fantastical and unexpected world of dung beetles, their ecological importance, their connections to human culture and history, and how this lowly creature finds its way home by looking to the stars.
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Dispatches from Somewhere #1: What a Wasp
I’ve had this picture on my camera roll for almost a year now and I figured I should finally get to posting it. If you’re wondering what this scorpion looking flying insect is, it’s the Pelecinus polyturator, a type of wasp. The adults drink nectar and are pretty harmless, unless…
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The Wild Life of the Black-and-Yellow Lichen Moth
Order| Lepidoptera Species| Lycomorpha pholus Uh-ah, you know what it is—the Black-and-Yellow Lichen Moth! “Wait, black and yellow? They’re clearly orange-er, right?” Who knows what they were thinking. One thing’s for sure though, mimicry is their flex. As caterpillars, when they spend most of their time munching on a symbiotic…
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Is it a Worm? Is it a Wasp? No! It’s the Elm Sawfly!
This past weekend as I sat below an old oak tree while drinking my morning cup of coffee and looking out on a glassy Lake Darling in Alexandria, Minnesota, something fell from the sky and landed at my feet. Small and curled up like a slightly puff green and yellow…
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The Dragonhunter
In the skies across Minnesota (and much of the eastern US and southeastern Canada, for that matter), roams a fierce and agile predator, capable of taking down prey you would never imagine—and some many wouldn’t dare to try at themselves. Hagenius brevistylus, is a clubtail dragonfly known as the Dragonhunter,…
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Mud-Puddling: The Dirty Truth About Butterflies
Ever have a butterfly land on your skin and start licking you and thought “Awe, I’ve got a new best bro!” Well, you were wrong. Butterflies have a dirty secret!
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The Electric-Light-Loving, Scuba-Diving, Toe-Biting, Giant Water Bug
Toe-Biter, Electric-Light Bug, Alligator-Tick; people have come up with many names for the fascinating critter. It’s actual name is perhaps the most boring—the Giant Water Bug. They are the largest of the ‘true bugs’ and belong to the Belostomatidae family of insects.
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The Spotted Apatelodes
That’s the Spotted Apatelodes, Apatelodes torrefacta, a beautiful moth of the Bombycidae (Silkworm Moths) family which is commonly mistaken for the somewhat similar looking Sphinx Moth.
