(Note: All links below are to external websites and leave the UWM website.) Howdy, BugFans, The BugLady walked in the woods, recently, on an unseasonably warm, spring day, accompanied by Mourning Cloak and Eastern Comma butterflies. It’s so cool to …
(Note: All links below are to external websites and leave the UWM website.) Howdy, BugFans, While we’ve been quietly going about our business during this way-too-long pandemic (you know things are bad when you fantasize about going to a board …
Season’s Greetings, BugFans, The BugLady can tell that the Christmas Season has rolled around because the Dr. Who marathon is about to start, and once again, Paul and Mary are showing us how easy it is to concoct showstopper desserts …
Howdy, BugFans, The BugLady saw her first monarch butterfly about 10 days ago, and today saw the first on her property. Here’s a rerun from two years ago on the status of the monarch, with different pictures, and a few …
The leaves are starting to fall here in God’s Country, the birds are moving, and as of yesterday it’s officially autumn (Yikes!). But there are still some bugs out there – like wildflowers, some species of insects bloom in the spring, some in the summer, and others in the fall. The imperative to reproduce is strong as the days get shorter; most insects live for about a calendar year, mainly in their immature stages, with a short-but-productive adult stage. Most leave behind eggs or pupae or partly-grown offspring to weather the winter.
The BugLady hopes that you’ve been getting out on the trail and drinking in the lushness of the summer. Subjects of this summer’s survey include wasps, aphids, syrphids, and katydids.
Gray Hairstreaks are the most widely distributed American hairstreak, and they spill over into Canada, Central America, and the northern edge of South America. They’ve been seen in more than half of Wisconsin counties. Why “hairstreak?” These small butterflies have one or two slim (hair-like) tails on the lower “corner” of each hindwing.
Northern Metalmarks are subtly beautiful, with patterns of silver/metal/rust on dark wings. NMs like open/dappled stream edges and meadows near woodlands with shale, limestone or serpentine rock barrens or outcroppings close by. Their historical range is believed to have been much larger. Multiple factors have led to their decline, and it’s mostly a familiar chorus.
This wonderful caterpillar dropped down onto the railing the other day while the BugLady was eating breakfast on the porch. The Silver-spotted skipper was mentioned briefly ten years ago in a general BOTW about skippers, in which the BugLady confessed, not for the last time, that she is Skipper Challenged (Brock and Kaufman, in the Field Guide to Butterflies of North America, say that “Beginners are often driven to despair by the skippers because there are so many of them and because they are so subtle, so challenging to identify. Experienced butterfly watchers may love the skippers for exactly the same reasons.”). It deserves an episode of its own.
OK – it’s September, but the bug season isn’t over yet. Outside of wetlands, if there’s anything better than a walk on the prairie, surrounded by Big Bluestem grass, with big Common Green Darners and Black Saddlebags dragonflies overhead, the BugLady hasn’t found it yet. Here is another batch of summer images, mostly from prairies.
