I stare vacuously at katydids

deformed Scudderia mexicana male

I have been feeling very lacking in sanity lately, but I have been watching and feeding pollenclusters to this deformed male since Thanksgiving; the local tettigoniid species here are quite lethargic, and rarely move far unless on dispersal flights or alarmed (allowing me to revisit the same wild individuals over amd over again). The male appears to have inseminated a nearby female when I was not looking. I was rather annoyed at having missed the full courtship sequence (I took great pains to relocate females for the male), but here are some more pics:

inseminated mexicana female

female eating spermatophore

clearer spermatophore shot

Coccinellids (as promised!)

Cryptolaemus montrouzieri grub

There are some hibiscus (well, at least they appear identical to hibiscus) bushes in a nearby parking lot; the violent pruning they regularly experience encourages them to constantly produce large quantities of young nutritious foliage. The large quantities of young nutritious foliage attract many small hemipterans (apparently these are mostly aphids/softbodied scales/mealybugs). Likewise, the small hemipterans attract many coccinellid beetles.

Unfortunately the coccinellids were not particularly cooperative today; I was only able to photograph the lethargic fluffy larva pictured. I have observed several interesting phenomena, though:

- Two coccinellids which visually appear to be Cycloneda sanguinea and Cryptolaemus montrouzieri apparently dominate the scene; in fact they often seem to easily outnumber any Harmonia axyridis present. During today's visit I saw no Harmonia specimens present. I suppose this may be additional evidence that H is not as "invasive" as many terrified native-coccinellid enthusiasts think. I also see a very small black coccinellid (even smaller than Cryptolaemus) every now and then, but it and the other three seem to be the only major ones. I think there were several sevenspot ladies around in the summer too but my memory is fuzzy.

- Around one of the less violently pruned bushes I saw a low-density swarm of male mealybugs or other waxytailed scales (I can't tell the difference) hovering erratically around (but rarely landing on) the leaves. It was quite beautiful; my phone could not photograph the tiny gnatlike things though (sigh)





Hopefully I can drag my blog out of dormancy with further observations of the hibiscus population dynamics; if everything goes well I should be able to produce a new post on the hemipteran-eating contest every week or two until it fizzles out

Various small updates

- The Domino campaign has run out of steam yet again. Research papers state that successful scientific outreach requires feedback from the audience so that techniques can be adjusted; despite all our (yes, "our"; this is a multiperson effort) attempts, feedback was too sparse to be useful.

- In several of my previous posts I have been complaining of problems w obtaining cocofiber. I still haven't used brick #2 (brick #1 turned moldy); I am in such a terrible mood that I am unmotivated to hydrate (the brick expands into soil-like shreds once wet) and put insects in the fiber.

- Coccinellid posts are planned for the future!