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Do you know your plants?
For my Leafminers of North America project, I periodically need help identifying hostplants I find in my travels. You can peruse photos of them at iNaturalist. Thanks!
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Tag Archives: puparium
Life in a Wingstem Stem
On May 8 last year, Julia and I visited her family’s land in Hocking County, Ohio (which we’ll be doing again today, as it happens), and for whatever reason, a little clump of dead wingstem (Asteraceae: Verbesina alternifolia) stems from … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged Agromyzidae, Asteraceae, beetle, Brachistinae, Brachistini, Braconidae, Cecidomyiidae, Coleoptera, Diptera, Figitidae, fly, gall, gall midge, Hymenoptera, larva, Melanagromyza, Melanagromyza vernoniana, Mordellidae, Neolasioptera, Neolasioptera imprimata, parasitism, parasitoid, Platygaster, Platygastridae, pupa, puparium, stem borer, tumbling flower beetle, Verbesina, Verbesina alternifolia, wasp, wingstem
4 Comments
An Underexplored Microhabitat
Although most of what used to be my lawn is now an untamed meadow interspersed with gardens, fruit trees, and berry bushes, once a month or so I do break out the ol’ battery-powered lawnmower to maintain a network of … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged Coboldia fuscipes, Diptera, Drosophila, Drosophila busckii, Drosophilidae, Fannia, Fannia canicularis, Fanniidae, fly, larva, puparium, Scatopsidae
5 Comments
The Yard List(s), Part 5
Back on May 5, spring was cooking along; flowers were opening on the Virginia bluebells that I had completely forgotten we had planted among the ostrich ferns under the old apple tree last year. But a few days later we … Continue reading
Life Lurking in Lousewort
Not long after we started to let our lawn go wild, a couple of blue-eyed grass plants (Sisyrinchium montanum) popped up in one area. Blue-eyed grass owes its name to its grass-like leaves; it is actually in the iris family … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged Agromyzidae, blue-eyed grass, Cecidomyiidae, Chloropidae, Clinodiplosis, Diptera, Endothenia, Endothenia hebesana, flower, fly, frit fly, gall midge, Gimnomera, Gimnomera cerea, Hymenoptera, Iridaceae, Lamprotatus, Lepidoptera, lousewort, Lyrcus, Orobanchaceae, parasitism, parasitoid, Pedicularis, Pedicularis canadensis, Phytomyza, Pteromalidae, puparium, Scathophagidae, Sisyrinchium, Tortricidae, wasp
4 Comments
Foiled Again
Now that I’ve put most of my bugs in the fridge for the winter, I can get back to catching up on sorting through my backlog of photos, which goes back to September of last year. I just reached the … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged Agromyzidae, Asteraceae, Diptera, Eucoilinae, Figitidae, Heliopsis, Hymenoptera, larva, leaf mine, Liriomyza, parasitism, parasitoid, puparium
5 Comments
Life in a Pinch of Duckweed
Five years ago, in June 2014, I was conducting a natural resource inventory for the Maine Coast Heritage Trust on a property in Perry, Maine (just across Passamaquoddy Bay from New Brunswick), when I came across this interesting little wetland: … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged Diptera, duckweed, Ephydridae, fly, Hydrellia, Hydrellia albilabris, larva, leaf mine, Lemna, Lemna minor, Lemnaceae, Maine, puparium, shore fly
3 Comments
Discovering New Species Along the Driveway
In this photo from May 2015, I was celebrating our newly installed solar panel’s generation of its first kilowatt hour. But unbeknownst to me at the time, the photo also shows where I collected the type specimens of two new … Continue reading
Leafminers Awaken!
As I mentioned, on February 25 all the overwintering bugs got taken out of the fridge, and last night’s check of all the vials revealed the first two emergences. They both happen to have come from leaf mines in the … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged Acrocercops, Acrocercops astericola, Agromyzidae, aster, Asteraceae, calico aster, chalcid, daisy fleabane, Diptera, Entedoninae, Erigeron, Erigeron annuus, Eulophidae, Eurybia, Eurybia divaricata, Gelechiidae, Gnorimoschemini, Gracillariidae, larva, leaf mine, moth, parasitoid, Phytomyza, puparium, Symphyotrichum, Symphyotrichum lateriflorum, wasp, white wood aster
3 Comments
Beggarticks Stem Dwellers
Last August, on one of my visits to Nantucket for my survey of gall-making and leaf-mining insects on the island, I spotted a conspicuous gall that was new to me, in a beggarticks (Asteraceae: Bidens) stem. I broke off the stem … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged Asteraceae, beetle, beggarticks, Bidens, Bidens borer, Chloropidae, Coleoptera, Corticariinae, Elachiptera, Epiblema otiosana, frit fly, gall, larva, Latridiidae, Melanophthalma, minute brown scavenger beetle, Nantucket, Phalacridae, puparium, shining flower beetle, Stilbus apicalis, Tortricidae
6 Comments