Depresso updates

 

Peppertree dodder: devoting most of its energy to making flowers, most of the vegetative portions seem to be wilting for some reason. I hope it's not making flowers because it's about to kick the bucket (I've noticed that stressing it induces flowers).

Lace bugs (pictured): they vibrate inaudibly. I have been staring at some in hopes of finding some complex dynamics of interest, but I haven't been able to make heads or tails of the situation despite watching them for hrs. Although in other lace bugs they are used in various maternal care behaviors the species I have around here don't use them for any clear function. I've tried everything I can think of: disturbing specimens, introducing foreign specimens, watching courtship behavior (which doesn't seem to involve the vibration type I'm investigating and isn't very exciting to watch it seems), even trying to see if there's any vibrational correlate to leaf lushness. No luck. I do know that both nymphs and adults do it, that specimens may occasionally vibrate even when on my hand or otherwise frightened (but do not seem to use it as a distress signal and typically do not vibrate when alarmed), that adults sometimes fan their wings during vibration bouts, and that specimens do not tend to visibly react to others' vibrations or wing fanning, but not much else.

Casebearers: Cryptocephalus sanguinicollis grubs seem easy to rear and eat a wide variety of rotten plant matter. They also accept nonrotten fare, including grocery vegetables and rose petals. They don't do much besides eating and walking.

Millipedes: haplodesmid-type things definitely getting out of hand. Also if I didn't mention this before sometimes they make egg nests with only one egg inside (these nests don't seem any smaller than the ones with around a half dozen eggs). Inspected the gut of the new Griffith Park macrosternodesmid-type thing and it's still dark, implying it's still feeding on rotten matter in captivity. It's nice that (since its body is translucent) I can see the animal's digestive system without killing it. Added some white rot wood to both macrosternothing localities' cups, because I suspect brown rot may not be the right type of rot to feed them.

Asterella californica: grows slowly, doesn't do much.

Eleodes carbonaria: doesn't do much either. Hisserdude said it seemed male, which was my suspicion too.

More tenebs moved, plus commentary on invasive natives

 Elysian Park is closer to NHMLA than Griffith Park is, although I assume that before the surrounding land was urbanized their darkling populations were genetically connected. Anyways, I booked a taxi ride to Elysian today and caught about 20. Tenebs from there will be posted at the same link as the one in the previous post.

Also, while strolling around Santa Fe Dam recently I saw a small, localized population of tidytip daisies and purple-houses and several other species of so-called native plant that are common in commercial native wildflower seed mixes. I mean, I have trust issues from rampant mislabeling of flora in the horticultural industry (sometimes the mistakes aren't discovered until many years later), but some of the other questionable things in there were the same morphospecies as Gilia tricolor, G. capitata, and Collinsia (likely heterophylla but I can't be bothered to check). These are not locally native here at all, and given that the population seems to be self-sustaining without irrigation, as well as spreading into patches of truly native annuals, I think we're dealing with an incipient intra-state invasion here. The nature center didn't look to have planted them (none of those plants are in the nature center's official garden, which also contains locally nonnative flora, albeit not the same ones; I fear the nature center sunflower bushes may engage in maladaptive introgression with wild Encelia), but Californian plants have been known to do intra-state invasion things of this sort before; just look at Lupinus arboreus and the havoc it's wrecked (note that arboreus does not appear to be present cultivated or feral in my area; I am merely using the lupine as a talking point).

It's a shame that no one on the internet seems to be talking about the potential problem Gilia and co. pose. Some other questionable choices I've seen elsewhere include the wrong Eriogonum species/subspecies (this is particularly problematic since some insects have been proven to die if consuming the wrong genotype of an otherwise suitable host Eriogonum), the Californian orange poppy Eschscholzia californica (which has already invaded Chile, has explosively dispersed seeds, and can grow in sidewalk cracks, and seems to be hated by almost every insect here, even Apis mellifera, which visits it only reluctantly), and various Nemophila/Clarkia. Again, there's pretty much nothing on the internet warning against them; some websites even claim they're locally native here. So it's no surprise even the world-class botanical institutions* are doing these for their native gardens, as opposed to popcornflowers and Zeltnera venusta and Linanthus dianthiflorus and Camissoniopsis. L. dianthiuflorus and popcornflowers are barely even commercially available. Sigh.

*I know the NHMLA is doing this on purpose for its own reasons, and while I don't entirely agree with that (mostly I fear it will cause shenanigans related to insect microevolution) I'm going to let it off the hook. On the other hand, I'm giving the Huntington's semi-"free-range" Nemophila and Gilia population a rather concerned glance, although they're unlikely to escape compared to the ones around Peck Road Water Conservation Park.

Update re: Griffith teneb transplant

 Luck was had. Here is every live individual caught for the transplant.

Also I found some feather millipedes under a really unpromising-looking log only a few yards away from Griffith's irrigated lawn (I didn't keep the pedes of course, they are notorious for dying in culture). But it was neat that such a sensitive specialist is still managing to survive in such a terrible-seeming habitat. There were no visible macrofungi and the wood smelled awful, as seems to be typical for wood in this county.

New pet

 

Was messing around at Santa Fe Dam and found this Eleodes carbonaria individual under a wood chunk. Although rather plain-looking, I knew at first sight that this was one of the rarely-encountered Eleodes species but it wouldn't hold still so I put it in a vial to photograph later.

Well, guess who accidentally brought themself home a darkling? Yeah, you guessed it. I totally forgot about the vial and went home and, well, then I was stuck at home with a darkling in a vial.


I've noticed that this species doesn't run around rabidly in circles like E. acuticauda and gracilis (and Coniontis) do. Instead, it sleeps most of the day and most of the night, and when it does come out (usually to eat fruits and vegetables) it seems pretty calm. Also, I'm really a fan of the way its elytra and pronotum have matching textures, and how its gait is smooth and fluid instead of clunky like acuticauda/gracilis and a lot of the other long-legged darklings. Was this thing custom made to appeal to me?

Anyways, it's certainly no fun watching a beetle that spends much of its life asleep, but I like its not-circling behavior so I'll keep it captive for now in hopes that maybe I'll be able to captive breed a colony and release specimens to places in need of darkling repopulation. Also, speaking of which, I'm heading to Griffith Park to catch some darklings (to throw into NHMLA) tomorrow, wish me luck. I'll probably avoid tossing non-Griffith ones into NHMLA for the sake of local genetics, just in case the museum decides to build a wildlife corridor all the way into the hills one day far into the future.

Added more cactus to Plymouth

 Also a Dictyobia I caught died from overheating even tho I gave it shade (apparently the mere air was too hot). Ouch.

I'm trying out hosts that aren't white sages to see if dicty will become less tantrum-prone on them.

C. sanguinicollis grubs hatched a few days ago

They lack the obnoxious climbing obsession of the adults. I've been following standard Cryptocephalus care protocols for them, and they've been making holes in brown rose petals, lettuce, etc. Of note is that the lettuce was eaten while still green.

I've kept them too humid and their shit shells have been getting moldy, which is not good, but other than that they all seem to be doing pretty ok.


Also did a checkup on the macrosterno-things. The two that were alive are still alive; bigger one has gut full of wood/leaf and acts like a normal bug, smaller one has unfilled digestive tract and was curled up, almost but not entirely unresponsive. Not sure if latter in premolt, some sort of aestivation, or is about to die.

P. vert? to Huntington

 Title says it, pretty much. Read up on metapopulation dynamics and water-mediated herbivory effects, released more sunflower bush leaf beetles at Huntington. Gave acquaintance more scrubland Anthonomus.

Plagiognathus verticalis? introduced to Plymouth

I accidentally killed one because it squeezed itself into a tight end of the bag and got squished until the juice came out. Not sure how it died, given that I was careful not to pinch the tight ends, but now I know not to carry squishy insects in non-rigid containers. Really need to reduce the death rate, it makes me feel bad and also can be problematic for practical reasons when target insects occur at low population densities. Anyways, the survivors fed on a sunflower bush's sunflower and stayed on it for at least a while, on the other hand one I put on a yarrow tried to probe it but quickly gave up and flew away.

Of note is that P. moerens has high dispersal ability and can fly large distances from suitable reproductive hosts (undoubtedly aided by an ability to consume nectar from nutritionally inadequate secondary hosts) and that P. verticalis doesn't normally if ever occur in urban/suburban native plantings. Maybe this is like how Oncopeltus has a tendency to unwittingly fly over small patches of milkweed? Or if we're going to be pessimistic maybe the artificial native gardens simply don't have the right living conditions.