More from Whetstone Prairie

I took my "Communicating Science Through Photography" students to Whetstone Prairie yesterday. It was our first fieldtrip of the semester, and the prairie was the perfect place to do nature photography. Late summer is the time for sunflowers, grasses, Queen Anne's Lace, ragweed, a variety of cone flowers, and many other prairie species to be in bloom. The goldfinches and hummingbirds were very active in the prairie, and we saw a huge variety of insects and spiders.

Here are a few of my favorite photos from yesterday:

Chines mantis - a species introduced by accident in 1896 (a Philadelphia nurseryman). This is a female who was at least 5 inches long - and these large individuals can catch and eat a small hummingbird.

A megachilid bee, I think. I love the iridescent appearance of these small bees.

Same bee as bove - foraging on Rudbeckia (black-eyed susan)

Chauliognathus pensylvanicus - Goldenrod Soldier Beetle.
One of the many species of beetles that do "mess and spoil" pollination in the prairie.

Acanalonia bivittata - I love pant hoppers! This one was inside a developing  infructescence of Queen Anne's Lace.

Insects from Whetstone Prairie - 2014

I've been finding mostly the same insects around my garden, so I decided to branch out and visit Whetstone Prairie. The variety of plants there is very good, which means that there should be a good diversity of insects as well. I didn't spend a lot of time since we had a party to go to Saturday evening, but I managed to find some different beetles and bugs, and lots of activity on the flowers. I'll have to spend some quality time there later on this summer.  I also need to get the identifications on most of these insects. I'll post an update when I have some names to go along with the photos.

Here's a sampler of what I saw at Whetstone Prairie:

Bombus on purple coneflower. The pollen load she's carrying is a wonder to behold.

Unidentified beetle - very colorful

Honeybee on beebalm

Carpenter bee on beebalm

 (blister beetle - Epicautus sp.)

Honeybee on purple coneflower

Conopidae flies and  passenger - not sure what was going on here, but it certainly caught my eye.

Another beetle

flesh fly

Some type of bug - in the literal sense of Hemiptera - the true bugs. I like the white stripes along the edges of the carapace and on the legs. Very elegant. (White-margined burrower bug: Sehirus cinctus)

cricket nymph

Asian multicolored lady beetle. Many of our native species are disappearing, so every  time I see a lady beetle, I try to photograph it to see what species it might be. I've not seen a native species in Ohio after a few years of looking. You'll notice some fungus on the wing covers - apparently this doesn't seem to bother the beetle very much.

Another true bug of some sort.

another species of beetle

Yellow-faced bee, I think. (Hylaeus modest us)

A shield bug - not the invasive brown marmorated stinkbug, though.

False Milkweed bug - Lygaeus turcicus

Lightning bug - I saw several of these beetles perches like this - maybe releasing pheromones?

A nymph of some species - looks like an interesting insect. It's on a grey coneflower.

Diabrotica cristata

I was glad to see so many honeybees at work.

A plant hopper of some sort