Year in Nature Photography – Day 123

Body of what I believe is Red Yucca, Red Hesperaloe (Hesperaloe parviflora)

Mourning dove (Zenaida macroura) on a saguaro (Carnegiea gigantea)

Ants (family Formicidae)

Flowers of what I believe is Red Yucca, Red Hesperaloe (Hesperaloe parviflora)

Ants (family Formicidae)

Creosote bush fruit (Larrea tridentata)

Day 3 of Arizona backyard photography.

It occurs to me that when I write longer posts I might want to have the pictures first. First off we have a picture of a mourning dove on top of a saguaro. Mourning doves are one of the most abundant native birds in North America, as partly evidenced by finding them all over Tucson as well as back home in Delaware. They are native and popular prey for hunting but they continue to thrive despite hunting pressures and habitat change.

There were a couple of colonies of larger red ants than I’m used to back east. I thought they might be fire ants, due to their red color, but it turns out that Arizona is one of the states with greatest ant diversity with around 318 native species. There are native fire ants which sting but not as bad as the red imported fire ant. Either way I felt caution was in order and with the colony so active I was hesitant to get closer. To truly figure out what species I have here I’d need a microscope or true macro lens to see details. If you look at the link I have given and go to the species field guide you’ll see how remarkably different looking different species of ants look.

From animals to plants, we have a native red yucca which isn’t actually a yucca. Additionally there is a yellow variety of the same species, so we have another example of a misleading common name. The red flowers are popular with humming birds. I also captured an image of the fruit of the creosote bush also called chaparral. Like the saguaro the creosote bush can live for up to 200 years. The plant produces a pungent but pleasant fragrance and has been used medicinally by Native Americans as well as being investigated by modern science for anti-cancer properties. It should be noted however that consumption is not recommended, due to the fact that when taken as an herbal supplement, it has been linked to liver and kidney problems.

Creosote bushes often form circular clonal colonies (all genetically the same) and even though they produce abundant seed, only a very few seeds are able to actually germinate. One of these clonal colonies is found in Joshua Tree National Park in California and is known as the “King clone” and using radiocarbon dating and known growth rates scientists have determined that this colony has been in continual existence for an estimated 11,700 years! Because the colonies are slow growing and have low seed viability, wiping out a colony can mean that it will take many years to become what it was. My own Master’s research on native bamboos indicated that bamboos are much like creosote bushes in that they form clonal stands and have low seed viability. When a stand of bamboo is wiped out, unless there’s a surviving few plants they often can’t recover.

Still more to come!

Year in Nature Photography – Day 122

Day 2 of Arizona backyard photography.

For today we have another silhouetted animal, this time a lizard. Caught another lizard feeding on some rotting watermelon. These lizards are quite skittish and even movement at this distance will scare them off so I had to do some long distance ID for this one. Based on the color of the head and some of the patterning I’m guessing it is a desert spiny lizard which can have some quite brilliant scale coloring. The linked source indicates that females will have reddish/orangish heads during breeding season. Also apparently they can change color from light to darker to aid in the absorption (dark color) or reflection of light (light color).

In the deserts of Arizona most of the little rainfall they receive comes during the monsoon season. I’ll post about this later but this season brings out the paloverde root borer which is a member of the longhorn family of beetles and one of the largest beetles in North America. As the common name suggests, the larvae (grubs) feed primarily on the Mexican palo verde trees but will feed on other non-native trees as well. Despite their rather fierce looking mandibles (jaw, mouth parts) they seem to be vegetarian.

Cacti can be as difficult to identify as most other plants. A lot of details such as the number of folds, number of needles, how the needles are clustered, etc. distinguish different species. If you manage to catch it in flower you’ll have an easier time, unfortunately I seemed to have missed that event. All that aside, I’m pretty confident that I have a picture of a saguaro cactus with a hole in it. Saguaro’s can live for up to 200 years and many reach over 40 feet in height. They start producing flowers around the age of 55, which are borne at the tops of the ‘arms’ and main stem. The flowers bloom at night and are pollinated by birds, bats, and other insects. Some may have holes in them that may have been created by birds such as Gila Woodpecker and the Gilded Flicker for nesting. I’ll have more on cacti in later posts, but you can also see a fruit of a prickly pear type cactus.

Hole in a what I’m pretty sure is a Saguaro (Carnegiea gigantea)

Paloverde Root Borer (Derobrachus geminatus)

Difficult to know for sure but guessing a Female Desert Spiny Lizard (Sceloporus magister)

Lizard in silhouette

Gambel’s Quail (Callipepla gambelii)

Prickly Pear Cactus bud (Opuntia sp?) Could be the cow’s tongue again

Year in Nature Photography – Day 121

Day 1 of Arizona backyard photography. It’s going to be a challenge to ID things I saw on my trip, but fortunately my aunt had a book of “Plants of Arizona” which I browsed through so I have some direction to head. I have several pictures of critters that I saw from their porch and due to the bright sun gave me just a silhouette, which makes for an interesting picture but virtually impossible to identify.

Today’s pictures include a bird of paradise bush (this is at least one of the colloquial names and what my aunt called it), which despite the name isn’t related to bird of paradise flower, familiar in floral arrangements. This is why local and regional names can be confusing and why we use scientific names. There are a lot of prickly pear type cacti in their yard but this particular one seems to be a cultivated variety and is named for the tongue shape of the pads. I’ll talk more about cacti in another post. Also their yard had families of gambel’s quail running around.

Stay tuned, there’s plenty more to come.

Bird in silhouette

Bird of paradise bush (Caesalpinia gilliesii) bloom

Bird of paradise bush (Caesalpinia gilliesii)

I’m going to go with Cow’s tongue cactus (Opuntia engelmannii var. linguiformis)

Gambel’s Quail (Callipepla gambelii)

Bird in silhouette (sp?)

Year in Nature Photography – Day 120

Quite the back log of postings 🙂 My trip to Tucson Arizona was quite fruitful even if we didn’t do much sight seeing (Main purpose of the trip was to visit family and support my Uncle who is a professional photographer). There will be some slight discrepancy with timing due to the fact that my camera was set for EST and not PST. For today, three cellphone pictures from the plane. One of these days they’ll have it set up so you can figure out what you’re flying over while you fly domestic but we’re not there yet. Not all flights have wifi and it’s unfortunately not complimentary, though I don’t know if you’d be able to follow in google maps/earth even with a wifi connection.

View from the sky, not sure where we were over

Evening sky up high

View from the sky, of a river, not sure where we were over

Year in Nature Photography – Day 119

Dragonflies and another new butterfly species today. Also most likely a Laughing Gull in flight. The butterfly is an interesting one, it is most likely a red-spotted purple which is actually a different form of the white admiral butterfly. They were originally thought to be two different species but now are considered different morphologies of the same one and will “hybridize” creating intermediate forms where the two forms overlap. I put hybridize in quotes because typical hybridization is the mixing of two distinct species, although that leads to a discussion on the definition of a species which I will save for a later post as it is quite complicated. Interestingly enough the red-spotted purlpe is a mimic of the Pipevine Swallowtail (Battus philenor) which is poisonous and is distinguished in part by the “swallow tail” on the hind wing. I also have a picture of one in my very early posting of butterfly and moth pictures.

I do love Lepidoptera (butterflies and moths) but I also love Odonata (dragonflies and damselflies) and I got to snap a couple of pictures while out at Assawoman Wildlife Area part near Fenwick Island, Delaware. Thanks to a site featuring Odonata of Delmarva (Peninsula containing the state of Delaware and parts of Maryland and Virginia) I was able to give a more educated guess as to the dragonfly species I photographed. In general like the difference between moths and butterflies, most damselflies hold their wings along their bodies when at rest and most dragonflies hold their wings spread out at rest. Dragonfly adults and their nymphs (young) which are aquatic, are great insect predators important for eating mosquitoes and their larvae.

I will be away for a week in Tucson, Arizona. I’ll continue taking pictures but it may be awhile before I post them. It’ll be an excellent opportunity to see nature in a completely different ecosystem.

Red-spotted Purple or White Admiral 
(Limenitis arthemis)

Most likely a Laughing Gull (Larus atricilla)

Red-spotted Purple or White Admiral 
(Limenitis arthemis)

Dragonfly (order Odonata) possibly Seaside Dragonlet (Erythrodiplax berenice) female

Dragonfly (order Odonata) possibly Seaside Dragonlet (Erythrodiplax berenice) female

Looks like a Needham’s Skimmer (Libellula needhami)

Year in Nature Photography – Day 118

Not the greatest set of pictures today, and my lenses are in desperate need of cleaning. We had a bunch of isolated thunderstorms come through though, hence the cloud pictures showing my dirty lens. They all seemed to move north and south of our house here, though apparently one produced a tornado down the road from us, fortunately no one was hurt.

Caught this fast moving insect at our flowers but unfortunately it didn’t stay around long enough to get more than the one shot and it just goes to show that you have to just snap a picture while it is there and hope it turns out. This didn’t turn out real well but enough to determine that it was one of the Sphingidae family of moths. Some members of the family like this one, are hummingbird like in their ability to hover while they gather nectar. This adaptation occurs in these moths, hummingbirds, certain bats, hoverflies, servings as an example of convergent evolution. Convergent evolution is the development of similar biological traits in unrelated species. In this case the ability to hover but in general wings are an example of convergent evolution since most birds, insects, etc. have this ability but are totally unrelated.

Possibly a fly (order Diptera) on our basil (Ocimum basilicum ‘italian’)

More Clouds

Clouds

Not a hummingbird but apparently a type of moth (family Sphingidae)

Year in Nature Photography – Day 117

Today features 3 insects. You’ll have to pardon my lack of species today, insects are notoriously difficult to ID down to species unless you’ve captured them to look at details under a hand lens or even a microscope. The stink bug family itself consists of over 4,700 different species. There are more than 20,000 species in Orthoptera which includes grasshoppers, crickets, and katydids though family Acrididae is one of the more prominent families of grasshoppers. I got a better shot of two wheel bug nymphs today. Even though there are over 7000 species in the family Reduviidae (assassin bugs) only about 184 of them occur above Mexico and the wheel bug is pretty distinctive.

Well camouflaged grasshopper (order Orthoptera likely family Acrididae)

wheel bug (Arilus cristatus) nymph

Probably a stink bug (family Pentatomidae)

Year in Nature Photography – Day 116

More butterflies and another new species of butterfly today. The new one appears to be one of the duskywing butterflies which all sources online readily agree are difficult to distinguish without more thorough observation. The link is to a little video about the differences between several of the species. Aside from the duskywing there was a nymph with a bright orange abdomen, that I suspect is a wheel bug nymph due to their presence in the yard (day 58 and day 69) and not a leaf-footed bug nymph because the leaf-footed bug pictures online seem to have their entire body as orange.

Pretty sure this is a Wheel bug (Arilus cristatus) nymph

Pretty sure this is a Wheel bug (Arilus cristatus) nymph

Variegated Fritillary (Euptoieta claudia)

One of the Duskywings (Erynnis sp?)

2 Variegated Fritillaries (Euptoieta claudia)

American (Painted) Lady (Vanessa virginiensis)

Year in Nature Photography – Day 115

Taking a break from the butterflies. Found another green mantis crawling around. I also failed again to get a shot of any lightning but the sky looks neat. In case I didn’t mention this before, not all “praying” mantids belong to the genus mantis. There are several genera in the mantidae family. They’re able to turn their heads 180 degrees and it’s a true fact that the females will sometimes eat their mates after or during the mating process. So not only do they eat their own on occasion but they’ll eat a variety of other insects that they catch with their front legs that give them the the look of prayer which is where the name praying mantis comes from. Mantis is apparently derivation of a Greek word for “prophet”.

Mantis (Family Mantidae sp?)

Storm clouds beyond the trees, no lightning though

Mantis (Family Mantidae sp?)

Year in Nature Photography – Day 114

First day of summer, which means the most daylight hours of the year! Some more butterflies for you and the hibiscus blossom opened up. Identifying butterflies to species can be tricky as some members of the same family can only be distinguished by looking at the wing patterns on both the upper and lower sides. Some times you just can’t get a shot of the upper side, especially with the skippers which tend only lower their wings when in flight. Other species will hold their wings open momentarily while feeding or “puddling” which is when they gather around sources of water, usually a puddle. Still, I’m pretty sure that the little yellow butterfly is a Delaware skipper given location and pictures on the Butterflies and Moths of North America site that has been my go to guide for identification.

Variegated Fritillary (Euptoieta claudia)

Variegated Fritillary (Euptoieta claudia)

What I suspect to be a Delaware Skipper (Anatrytone logan)

American (Painted) Lady (Vanessa virginiensis)

China rose hibiscus (Hibiscus rosa-sinensis) blossom

What I suspect to be a Delaware Skipper (Anatrytone logan)