Plymouth Elementary update

I've checked up on some of the wood I've moved in there, and added some additional wood. I didn't see any specimens underneath the logs despite my efforts to provide a damp microclimate protected from insolation*, but at night the usual largebodied invasive urban bugs (Armadillidium, etc.) show up to stroll around on it. They've already eaten all the splitgill fruiting bodies, apparently. Guess I'm not gonna attract any fungus beetles any time soon.

Not sure about how the native termites that came with one of the logs are doing because lizards/mammals keep shitting on/around that one and I can't be bothered to get my hands dirty. Also, Xylocopa and other native bees were in the area but showed no interest in using the wood either.







*In soggy and cold European countries where a lot of saproxylic organism research is conducted sun exposure is important for many threatened taxa, but what little research literature I could find on stuff in Mediterranean climates suggests the opposite is true where I live. It sounds intuitive (too hot + no water = all the bugs die of thirst) but that doesn't explain why weirdo hyperthermophile insects don't seem to be interested. I mean, there's Psocodea in the garden that can live their entire lives in dead marcescent leaves crisping in the sun, "magically" summoning liquid water from vapors in the air or something like that. How are things like those refusing to eat my log? I don't get it.

asterello aster jello

 

Don't mind me, I'm just posting a pic for my personal records (note 2 self: Deukmejian sample).

Also, I don't feel like checking to see whether I posted about it before but I have the annual-looking Santa Fe Dam dodder in culture again. Sadly my portion of the Cuscuta subinclusa (perennial species) is still dead (unless there's a dormant endophytic nub I'm unaware of), and I'm hoping the acquaintance I gave a piece of that C. subinclusa clone to manages to get it to put on enough biomass that he can safely give me some of it back; right now his portion is also ailing and I'd rather he not return any pieces to me yet, for fear of them dying in transit.