Spring minor updates

Brown Male sure enjoys its sunbaths

- Pomacea diffusa specimen is now feeding actively again!

- The green discoloration previously mentioned on red mystery Herpothallon appears to be yellow now; whether this is caused by improper misting, sunburn, or conditions outside my control is unclear. Red regions also appear to be fading in color. A Candelaria(?) thallus also appears to be yellowing for the wrong reasons; during an unexpected artificial-shade failure it presumably became sunburned too (and since it was acetone rinsed its natural bright yellow sunscreen was washed off, so presumably the new yellow is from moribund algae). The blackish jelly lichen displays no apparent ill health though, even though such things are supposed to throw violent tantrums during air pollution. In any case, since all red mystery thalli survived for a suspiciously long period of time under extreme hydration frequency before showing signs of thallus damage, and since some reds still appear healthy, I suspect that the experiment is not a failure yet. Some of the mosses on the largest red's wood block are still green and seemingly fine.

- After several embarrassing incidents the brown Scudderia mexicana male has lost its semi-tameness but fortunately I compensated it with some extra desserts. I have continued failing miserably at filming courtship behavior due to a lack of receptive females, and will not be watching the male regularly any longer.

More fun misadventures with Scudderia

brown male eats pollen with a green female

Recently I have found that Scudderia mexicana habituates to tactile stimulation during strong winds; it fails to react to even severe battering by nearby swaying leaves and likewise fails to react when scooped up in the hand:

same female as above

Interestingly today I have also found that even during nonwindy days it is possible to hold them, as long as pollensticks are provided as bribery (and sudden movements are avoided). Several reports exist of captive-raised Scudderia spp. becoming permanently fearless; I encourage keepers of other long-lived Tettigoniidae to experiment with desensitization training too. Unfortunately Phaneroptera nana does not currently seem to be active in my area for some reason, so I was unable to test my ideas on it.


S. mexicana is, as previously mentioned, a highly sedentary animal when sufficiently satiated (even during the night); I have recently been playing with a brown and slightly bowlegged (harmless mismolt?) male, which currently seems to shuttle between two semiclearly defined perches in my front yard every large handful of hours. I have seen the same specimen in the distant past, so evidently the sunny CA weather has allowed it a long life.

As with other specimens, it is quite incompetent at selecting camouflaged locations and even more incompetent at holding onto food detached from its host plant:

Fortunately all specimens somehow apparently suffer little mortality risk even when sitting on weirdly colored succulents for days or eating the bright pink/yellow pollensticks I have provided, even though hummingbirds and small brown/yellow birds regularly fly around the area.


My current attempts at obtaining a receptive female for it and documenting courtship are quite unsuccessful;

(note the exposing of dorsal abdomen by the male)

In any case, it is pleasant to be able to interact with a bunch of wild hoppers without inducing stress! Updates soon, if I succeed in courtship documentation.

Lost specimen returns (and promptly leaves)

deformed male

Today I caught the missing Scudderia mexicana deformed male! Previous attempts had been thwarted by the animal, which refused to eat my baits and positioned itself in a heavily tangled region where its songs bounced off the leaves (making it impossible to locate by ear).

I found it in a conspicuous position on a palm frond; there was another rose pruning today and this may have disabled its auditory camouflage. Fortunately, the species seems largely oblivious to danger unless touched/blown on and I easily caught and repositioned it to a shorter rose bush. It calmed down and resumed singing very soon after I left it alone with a pollen cluster.




Edit: after the sun set, I saw the katydid slowly approaching a nearby taller bush and then making an attempt to fly onto it. It landed near the tall bush's basal stem (too deformed to fly) but I failed to recapture it. Evidently the short bush is not suitable for some reason; perhaps the animal somehow senses that the foliage is insufficiently dense? I have also previously seen females feeding on the short bush's roses and then promptly fleeing after satiation.

I both win and lose the staring contest

The lethargic Scudderia mexicana  deformed male has vanished for the past several days. I still cannot find it and probably never will.




Assorted news:

I have discovered another "aphideating party" composed mostly of what appear to be adult Cycloneda sanguinea.

Phaneroptera nana lives in my area! I thought it was a small pure green Scudderia sp. until a Bugguide expert corrected me yesterday. Today I took some more pics of nana and have put them below. They are on the same bush as the coccinellids.

Unfortunately I will probably be unable to do any katydid or coccinellid posts for quite some time due to troublesome circumstances relating to the front yard.

Phaneroptera nana male

Same male

Nearby inseminated female

Same female (note spermatophore)

Staring contest continues

News:

Scudderia mexicana deformed-wing male (pictured above) is still doing fine. Yesterday the rosebushes were pruned and nearby resident female(s) have moved elsewhere. The male simply relocated itself to a taller bush next door.

Night walks have been unremarkable; surprisingly, the katydids seem very lethargic even in the darkest hours, although they do wave their antennae near-constantly once the sun sets. The deformed male often assumes an odd nighttime position in which it sits on a tall stem with head down and two front legs slightly in the air; perhaps this is a mate-searching behavior because scarabs have been known to use the same posture. I also did see a few small carabids (mostly Tanystoma maculicolle) and a pillbug with abnormally large yellow splotches, but the carabs failed to perform interesting behaviors.

No more coccinellid posts for a while; their aphids are all gone

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