Category: lepidopterans

Readers’ wildlife photos

September 3, 2026 • 8:30 am

Today’s arthropod photos come from a visit to Poland from reader Jan Malik.  Jan’s captions and IDs are indented, and you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them (once or twice):

During my visit to Poland in June this year, I spent a few hours with a macro lens, looking for arthropods in three different habitats: a xerothermic dry meadow, a subalpine bog, and an alpine zone in the Tatra Mountains. I did my best to identify the species, but I can offer no guarantees as they were new to me.

First, the dipterans from the hoverfly family, all Batesian mimics of the more ferocious Hymenoptera. The Common Drone Fly (Eristalis tenax) resembles a honeybee or a small bumblebee quite convincingly; it even buzzes like a bee. I believe this is a female, judging by the widely spaced eyes:

Another hoverfly, this time a wasp mimic, is possibly a Sphecomyia vespiformis. Like all Diptera, its antennae are short, but here, to increase similarity to a wasp with long antennae, they grow from an elongated column on the insect’s face:

Rounding up the order Diptera is a possible Marmalade Hoverfly (Episyrphus balteatus). This female is a peaceful pollinator as an adult, but its larva is a predator of aphids:

Moving over to the order Lepidoptera, the first is a moth (genus Gillmeria); at first sight, I thought it was a crane fly, but long antennae place it firmly as a plume moth, even though I’m not sure which species it is. When at rest, these insects are masters of camouflage, resembling dried-out twigs:

Possibly a Ringlet (Aphantopus hyperantus), which is common in this part of Europe:

A final lepidopteran is a skipper (family Hesperiidae), but it is difficult to pin it down to a species. Possibly a Small Skipper (Thymelicus sylvestris), going by the orange tip of its antenna?:

Now for Coleoptera (beetles): a Black longicorn beetle (Spondylis buprestoides). Both adults and larvae have powerful jaws which they use to chew through the wood of dead trees, accelerating the carbon cycle:

The next insect, from the same longhorn beetle family as the previous one, is a Black-striped Longhorn Beetle (Stenurella melanura), probably a female. The larvae feed on rotting wood, but adults prefer pollen:

Another coleopteran is a Common Red Soldier Beetle (Rhagonycha fulva). Its red color is an honest warning—when disturbed, they exude a fluid containing defensive acids that can cause chemical irritation. Here it feeds on pollen, but like other soldier beetles, if an aphid or a caterpillar is found, it is also eaten.

The last coleopteran, hiding in a flower during the rain, is a leaf beetle from the genus Cryptocephalus (I will go out on a limb and say the Dead-nettle Leaf Beetle, Cryptocephalus aureolus). The genus name originates from its head, which is tucked below the protective chitin armor:

Now for the arachnophiles amongst the readers, an orb-weaver spider (family Araneidae) having a meal out of a fly. Orb-weavers are highly variable in color, changing them to match their surroundings. They recycle their webs often by eating them and spinning new ones:

Another araneae, possibly a Wasp Spider (Argiope bruennichi), is a close European cousin of the common American yellow garden spider. Like its New World relative, it spins a ladder-like structure called a stabilimentum. The discussion is ongoing as to what the adaptive purpose of this structure is: possibly a UV reflector to lure bees or flies, or a warning for birds not to fly into it and destroy it, much like our window decals to prevent bird strikes:

The spider waiting inside the flower is a flower crab spider, likely a pale variant of the common Goldenrod Crab Spider (Misumena vatia); I believe the same spiders are also abundant in North America. The flower could be a bellflower (genus Campanula). These spiders also change color, from greenish to yellow to off-white, matching the flowers where they sit in ambush:

Now for a few Hymenoptera—possibly a Black Garden Ant (Lasius niger) tending to a dense colony of Black Bean Aphids (Aphis fabae). Like many other ant species, they tap aphids with their antennae, and if the sucking hemipteran is ready, it releases a drop of sugary honeydew. In return, ants act as bodyguards, protecting the aphids from predatory hoverflies and ladybugs:

A parasitoid ichneumon wasp, possibly a Hoverfly larva parasitoid wasp (Diplazon laetatorius). It lays eggs in hoverfly larvae or eggs, and the wasp larva waits until its host grows big enough to become a substantial meal, then devours it from the inside. This species is said to be mostly parthenogenetic, with males being a rarity:

Another hymenopteran, a sawfly, is probably the Common Green Sawfly (Tenthredo mesomela). These sawflies are active predators of other small insects:

Lastly, I didn’t expect a Red-banded Froghopper (Cercopis vulnerata). Its two chief weapons are a nice red and black aposematic coloration, a habit of making itself scarce via powerful jumps, and joints in its legs that ooze a foul-tasting hemolymph if a predator decides to bite. Did a scientist actually taste that fluid to report on its bitter taste, or are we still waiting for a volunteer?:

Readers’ wildlife photos

August 5, 2026 • 8:15 am

We have only a few batches left, and I am baffled about why few submissions are coming in. Please, if you have photos and appreciate this site, send me some good ones. Thanks!

Today’s photos come from Marcel van Oijen in the Netherlands. His captions and IDs are indented, and you can enlarge his photos by clicking on them.

A Dutch Garden in Summertime

Marcel van Oijen

This summer we spent two weeks in the Netherlands, looking after the house of Nellie and Roel who count as both family and close friends. The following nine pictures were taken in their garden in the small town of Woudenberg, in the central Dutch province of Utrecht. Even though the Netherlands are just 700 km away from us (we live in Scotland on the opposite side of the North Sea), temperatures were about ten degrees higher there which made for much more varied wildlife.

This is a Willow Emerald damselfly (Chalcolestes viridis), recognisable from its brownish eyes. We never see damselflies or dragonflies in our garden here, so this was a huge and pleasant surprise:

Small White butterfly (Pieris rapae). Very common on both sides of the pond:

Vagrant Darter dragonfly (Sympetrum vulgatum). The species can be identified from its yellow-black legs, and its overall yellow colour tells us it’s a female;

Red Admiral (Vanessa atalanta). A very common butterfly also here in Scotland:

Another Pieris butterfly, a Green-veined White (Pieris napi). I find the various Whites often difficult to photograph because they are so restless, but here they took their time feeding, maybe because the heat was too much even for them, or the flowers contained more nectar than usual?:

This European Garden Spider (Araneus diadematus) was a joy to follow during our days in the garden, when it was making or repairing its web, or scurrying toward the foliage whenever I got too close. Here it is wrapping up some prey (a hoverfly perhaps) for dinner later.

The sky was not really this featureless white, but I overexposed this picture of a Blue Tit (Cyanistes caeruleus) by two stops to make the picture look somewhat like a Chinese print:

And here is its larger cousin, a Great Tit (Parus major), with tiny prey:

We finish with one of the most common hoverflies in Europe, a Marmalade Hoverfly (Episyrphus balteatus). This photo was taken while sitting at the breakfast table in the garden, where they would be hovering near the same flowers every morning, so I could focus the camera first and then simply wait for one of them to appear in the right spot:

Readers’ wildlife photos

June 11, 2026 • 8:15 am

Mark Sturtevant has been kind enough to send the last batch of photos I have, some lovely ones of arthropods. Mark’s captions and IDs are indented, and you can enlarge his photos by clicking on them.

The various arthropods shown here were all photographed from my area in eastern Michigan. Most were taken outdoors where I found them, but a few were staged shots. Let’s begin with spiders.

First up is a species of Hammock Spider, Pityohyphantes sp. These make a small but densely tangled web across leaves and branches in the woods.

Next is an Orchard Orbweaver spider (Leucauge venusta). This is as I found her along a forest trail, but usually they are in their web at an angle where it’s awkward to photograph them. I don’t know what the growths are on the leaf:

The next two pictures are staged focus stacks from the ‘ol dining room table. First is a male Long-jawed Orbweaver (Tetragnatha sp), followed by a slightly older picture of a female for comparison. I favor staged settings for these spiders since they are extremely flighty, and I just don’t have the inclination to lay down in the tick-infested grass near water where they are abundant. What I always say about these very elongate spiders is that their startling appearance is simply because they use their long chelicerae and fangs as delicate chopsticks for handling prey, and they are as harmless to you as a piece of Dandelion fluff. The extra gnarly chelicerae on the male are further modified for mating. During that dangerous time, the pair will grapple face to face with their fangs, and the male uses those upward spurs to hold open the fangs of the female. His very long pedipalps are meanwhile needed to transfer sperm to her genital openings which are waaaay back on her abdomen. This can be seen in the linked picture:

Moving on to insects, next up is an Ichneumon wasp. With the help of iNaturalist, I am inclined to identify this parasitic wasp as Coelichneumon navus:

The common woodland fly in the next picture is possibly a wasp mimic, but it is certainly a predator. It is a species of Robber Fly belonging to the “Laphria canis complex” of very similar species:

The moth shown in the next picture is in the Tiger Moth family (Arctiidae). This is the Isabella Tiger Moth Pyrrharctia isabella, but possibly everyone knows the caterpillar, which is the famous Wooly Bear. The moth came to the porch light one night:

I can’t identify everything, even with the considerable help of AI. All I got for the caterpillar in this picture is that it is some species of “inchworm”, family Geometridae, but I already knew that. The dark puncture mark on the body may mean that it has been parasitized, and if so then it is doomed:

The next picture is a first for me. This is a Pennsylvania Ambush Bug nymph (Phymata pennsylvanica). I have seen high hundreds of adults, which are sit-and-wait predators on flowers and decorated to resemble flower parts. But like my failure to ever see a live Cornish hen (has anyone?), I have never seen a juvenile Ambush bug! I believe that the youngsters stay down low in the foliage:

The insects in the next two pictures are commonly called Red-banded Leafhoppers (Graphocephala coccinea). This species is polymorphic in that some are green and red, and others are a lovely blue and red, as shown with the mating pair. That picture is about 10 years old, but I’ve brought it back for comparison. The picture was taken with my olde camera that had a simple 50mm lens converted to a macro lens with extension tubes. If anyone wants to try out macrophotography, you really don’t need a true macro lens. At least not right away:

The final picture is a species of planthopper that I have not seen for a long time. I call this the “White Derbid”, after its color and its family name Derbidae. The species is Otiocerus coquebertii, and like the other odd -looking members of its family, it may be found by slowly walking along forest trails and peering under the leaves of tree:

Readers’ wildlife photos

May 17, 2026 • 8:15 am

Send in your wildlife photos! I am almost out. Thank you in advance.

Today we have miscellaneous photos from the Catskills taken by reader Jan Malik. Jan’s captions and IDs are indented, and you can enlarge them by clicking on them.

Here is another batch of pictures from my hikes in the Central Catskills this April and May. They are not too artistic, given the fast pace that a weekend backpacking hike demands, but they give a sample of what common animals a casual hiker can see in these “mountains” (the Catskills are an eroded plateau and, despite being steep in places, they are too low to have an alpine zone).

White‑tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus), right in the parking lot at a cloudy sunrise. It was slurping water from a muddy puddle despite a clear stream flowing nearby, so it must have been leftover salt that attracted this ungulate. Woodstock residents like their roads well salted. One has to drive carefully at dusk around Woodstock, as there are many deer browsing on lawns and gardens.

In the woodland, I found the first of many red efts of the Eastern newt (Notophthalmus viridescens). This is an intermediate land stage of development between the aquatic larva and adult forms. Red efts have lungs, but air exchange through the skin is also important, supplying 30–40% of their oxygen demand. They travel through the forest litter when it is humid enough—after rain or in the early morning:

This is probably a blue‑headed vireo (Vireo solitarius), collecting nesting materials. If my identification is correct, then it is not possible to tell a male from a female, as they are sexually monomorphic and share rearing duties almost equally. Interestingly, however, a female may desert the nest just before fledging to mate with another available male:

Possibly an Eastern comma (Polygonia comma), found at higher elevation:

Black‑and‑white warbler (Mniotilta varia). I think this is a male. If so, he may be led by a female into the territory of another male to provoke a fight and allow her to judge his fitness. These birds occupy a similar niche to nuthatches and brown creepers; they climb and circle tree trunks to find arthropods:

Eastern towhee (Pipilo erythrophthalmus), male. These colorful sparrows hang around the edges of forest clearings:

Eastern American toad (Anaxyrus americanus americanus), hiding in a ramps patch. I wonder whether they would prey on red efts or if the efts’ foul taste would be a deterrent:

While passing through oak woods rich with acorns, I heard many alarm chirps from Eastern chipmunks (Tamias striatus). Most made themselves scarce as I approached, but one remained on guard duty:

Not a good picture, but here is a dark‑eyed junco (Junco hyemalis). These are hardy birds, staying year‑round in the forest. In winter they form close‑knit flocks with a few dominant individuals and a strict pecking order:

Chipping sparrow (Spizella passerina) on the side of a quiet road. These migrate to more southern states in winter and in summer nest closer to human settlements:

Mourning cloak (Nymphalis antiopa). There were a couple of them in the area, continuously jousting in the air for control of the territory. I see them every spring in that exact spot, but this year they were too engaged in battling each other to stay still, so this is a picture taken a few years back:

Brown creeper (Certhia americana), shown here just a moment after eating a couple of mayflies. They are common enough, but I rarely see them due to their near‑perfect camouflage. Without directly comparing the bill length it is difficult to tell a female from a male:

No readers’ wildlife today; instead, we have my own photos from 2004-2006

February 26, 2026 • 9:15 am

Sadly, the tank has run dry.  To proffer some content today, I’ve dug into my personal photo bank and will post a few miscellaneous shots with brief captions. Click to enlarge the photos

Galápagos marine iguana, Amblyrhynchus cristatus, 2010:

Same trip, baby Galápagos sea lion, Zalophus wollebaeki:

Woman collecting land snails for dinner, São Tomé, 2004:

BBQ dinner at City Market, Luling, Texas, 2004. Brisket, sausage, and the trimmings (beans, potato salad, and the mandatory white bread):

Death Valley and a rare post-rain desert bloom, 2005.  Where do the insects come from since these blooms occur only about once a decade?  (If you can ID the lepidopteran, do so.)

Usually there is only saltbush and creosote growing on the land, but in a bloom all sorts of flowers emerge from dormant seeds:

A rare Jewish cowboy, photo in the Eastern California Museum in Independence. The last time I went the photo was gone and nobody knew about it or even remembered it. I’d kill to have it:

Mugging in the Alabama Hills, California:

Doing flies, 2005. This is what I spent most of my time doing before I retired.

Flying onto a glacier at Denali (Mt. McKinley).  They were dropping off two climbers in a four-seater bush plane, and I hitched a ride there and back. I got to sit next to the woman pilot. From Talkeetna, Alaska. The peak in the center is Denali.

After we landed on the snow-covered glacier, the pilot had to make a runway to take off from, going back and forth on the snow about ten times to pack it down:

The famous polymorphism of color and banding within the snail Cepaea nemoralis, studied intensively by evolutionary geneticists for years. Despite that work and subsequent population-genetic analysis, we still don’t understand the significance of the variation. For some reason the field was covered with snails; these were on a fencepost. Dorset, England, 2006:

The cottage where poet and author Thomas Hardy was born in 1840 and grew up. Upper Brockhampton, Dorset, 2006.

When Hardy became famous and wealthy, he moved to a house he designed (also in Dorset), Max Gate, where he lived from 1885 until he died in 1928.  In the garden by the house are the burial sites of his beloved dogs and cats.  Here are two graves of his cats, Snowdove and Kitsy; I was told that they were inscribed by Hardy himself, who had worked as a stonemason when younger, but I can’t vouch for that story:

A draft manuscript of the famous novel Tess of the d’Urbervilles  in Hardy’s hand (taken at the local museum):

T. E. Lawrence‘s (1888-1935) final residence the cottage called Clouds Hill. He lived here after he gave up his fame as “Lawrence of Arabia” and served in the RAF under the pseudonym “T. E. Shaw” beginning in 1935, commuting back and forth to the airbase on his motorcycle.  The cottage was very spartan, and had no electricity. As Wikipedia notes,

In a 1934 letter to Francis Rodd, Lawrence (who had changed his surname to Shaw) described his home thus:[5]

“The cottage has two rooms, one, upstairs, for music (a gramophone and records) and one downstairs for books. There is a bath in a demi-cupboard. For food one goes a mile, to Bovington (near the Tank Corps Depot) and at sleep time I take a great sleeping bag… and spread it on what seems the nicest floor… The cottage looks simple outside, and does no hurt to its setting which is twenty miles of broken heath and a river valley filled with rhododendrons run wild. I think everything, inside and outside my place, approaches perfection… Yours ever, T. E. Shaw”

Lawrence had an education in the classics, and is one of my heroes as he was both a man of action and a man of learning. Here’s the inscription in Greek over the door above: οὐ φροντὶς (“why worry”), taken from Hippoclides.

Lawrence’s bathtub and shaving mirror:

Lawrence died in a motorcycle crash on May 13, 1935, soon after leaving the RAF. Heading home on his motorcycle, he didn’t see two boys on bicycles ahead of him because of a dip in the road. Swerving to avoid them at the last moment, he crashed his bike, sustained a serious head injury, and died six days later.  A study of his death by a neurosurgeon who tended the dying Lawrence eventually led to the use of helmets by motorcyclists.

The crash site is a km or two from Clouds Hill, and my friend and I scoured the road on foot looking for the crash site, now marked by a memorial (I saw no dip in the road). We finally found the stone:

Ironically, there had been a car crash at the site right before we found the memorial:

When he crashed, Lawrence was riding a Brough Superior SS100 motorcycle. Here’s a picture of him from Wikipedia riding one (clearly not the death vehicle) that he called “George V”. If you go to Clouds Hill, you’ll see several of his motorcycles in a small garage. 

Lawrence on George V, Wikimedia Commons, author unknown

Readers’ wildlife photos

February 14, 2026 • 8:30 am

These are the last photos I have, and I’ve gathered singletons in a potpourri of photos. Please send me any good wildlife photos you have—otherwise there will be a LACUNA tomorrow. Captions are indented, and you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them.

From Pratyaydipta Rudra in Oklahoma.

This is a Pine Squirrel [Tamiascirus sp.], photographed in Rocky Mountain National Park, CO.

From Adrian:

Here’s a picture of a European Pine Marten (Martes martes) from the shores of Loch Duich, near the Isle of Skye, Scotland:

From Guy:

Taken in Lake Saint Clair Metropark in Michigan a few years back by my 12 year old son Nolan at a bird-banding station where we volunteer. I think it’s a Blackpoll Warbler (Setophaga striata) with the image taken in the fall (so I don’t really know if it’s male or female):

From Robert Lang, whose house and studio burned to the ground during the California fires last year; both are being rebuilt:

Our gardener found this California native tarantula (Aphonopelma sp.) while clearing some fire debris at my former studio and, knowing that my wife had a pet tarantula and was helping the Eaton Canyon Nature Center in its fire recovery, he left it for us at our temporary home in a little plastic bottle. (Umm…the tarantula was in a little plastic bottle. Not our home.) After we determined that ECNC didn’t have a place for one yet, we released it locally, but I took this picture before it wandered away.
When we got home from the release, there was another plastic bottle on the porch with another tarantula inside.

A Hummingbird Moth (species unknown) from Marty Riddle:

The Hawk Moths, aka Hummingbird Moth, love the nectar in resident maintained gardens at Brooksby Village Peabody, Massachusetts:

And a cat/bird encounter from Barry Lyons:

For years now, I’ve had mourning doves  [Zenaida macroura] alight on my air conditioner. Some of them are regulars, and what interests me is that they haven’t taken the next obvious step: pecking at the window.
What I mean is that a dove arrives and then stares into my apartment, sometimes moving its head back and forth: “Are you in there? Ah, there you are!” And then I get up from my chair and go feed them.
But when will a dove start pecking at the window to alert me that he’s there? Why hasn’t it figured out that it’s something it can do? And at no cost to his safety because he can still fly away.
And look at this photo. The dove seems to understand windows. Every time a cat goes to the window (I don’t own a cat; I cat-sit) it flares its wings instead of flying off, as if to say, “Ha ha, you can’t get me. I’m out here, you idiot.”

Readers’ wildlife photos

January 20, 2026 • 8:15 am

Regular Mark Sturtevant (as opposed to Irregular Mark Sturtevant) has sent in some lovely insect photos to fill the nearly-empty reserve of pictures. Please send any good wildlife photos you have. Thanks!

Mark’s captions are indented, and you can enlarge his photos by clicking on them. Be sure to check out the female Tussock Moth caterpillar with vestigial wings (it’s the eighth photo).

Here is another dispatch of local insects and spiders, all photographed either in area parks near where I live in eastern Michigan, or as staged shots at home. Let’s start with a couple of dragonflies. First up is a Green Darner (Anax junius), which ranks pretty large among the dragonflies found here. As is almost always the case, this individual is a female, since they perch frequently and are much easier to approach than males, which I only rarely manage to photograph. Do you see the tiny yellow critter on the dragonfly? That is a Globular Springtail, and it must have walked or jumped onto the dragonfly from nearby foliage. There may be a few more of them in the picture as well, though I’m not certain. Springtails are tiny soil arthropods, and they are extremely abundant. When seen up close, Globular Springtails are arguably adorable, as you can see in the linked image. I’ve searched for them for some time but have only rarely encountered them, despite claims that they are exceedingly common. Perhaps our local species spends more time up on foliage rather than in the soil, meaning I’ve been looking in the wrong places!:

The next dragonfly is a male Skillet Clubtail (Gomphurus ventricosus), named for the large, pan-like club on the end of its abdomen. I have to drive a few hours south to a particular park to see them, and of course this one is perching on poison ivy which covers much of the area there. That park hosts 8 or 9 species of clubtails according to a dragonfly documentation site called Odonata Central. I’ve photographed most of those species with only two left to find:

A field near my workplace has a ridiculously high population of Chinese Praying Mantids (Tenodera sinensis). I suspect this is the lingering result of someone having released a large number of egg cases several years ago, combined with a robust population of grasshopper prey. Shown here is a young June nymph. I can return later in the summer to find several large adults in no time at all:

Next up are some lepidopterans. First is a Hackberry Emperor butterfly (Asterocampa celtis). They are often common along forest margins where their host Hackberry trees [Celtis occidentalis] are concentrated. Their caterpillars, however, seem to be quite secretive, as I’ve seen only a few of them:

Next is an inchworm caterpillar, though I don’t have an identification for it. Do you see the tiny mites?:

The insect shown next is a moth, although it makes a very convincing wasp mimic. This is the Eupatorium Borer Moth (Carmenta bassiformis). The larvae feed on the roots of Ironweed and Joe Pye Weed, both of which are highly valued native wildflowers because they are very much favored by butterflies:

The flamboyant caterpillar in the next image is a White-marked Tussock Caterpillar (Orgyia leucostigma). I’ve tried several times to get an acceptable focus-stacked image of one of these. What makes them difficult is the combination of all those oddly angled sticky-out bits, which challenge the shallow depth of field inherent in this kind of photography, along with the fact that these caterpillars absolutely will Not Hold Still. As a result, the stacking is done on the fly, followed later by long hours of manual reassembly of the jumbled focus stack. This image is by far my most successful attempt:

I kept this caterpillar in hopes that the moth emerging from the cocoon would be a female. Why? Well—check out what came out! It was a female! Females have barely visible vestigial wings, and I had never seen one before. She will sit here, unmoving, until a male finds her. This strategy saves a great deal of energy that can instead be used for laying eggs. The winged males are unremarkable, and while I’ve probably seen them, I don’t think I’ve ever photographed one:

Finally, here are three images of jumping spiders I’ve been wanting to share together for quite some time. The Dimorphic Jumping Spider (Maevia inclemens) is a species I regularly see around the outside of our house. The name refers to the males having two distinct color morphs. The images below are manual focus stacks, photographed in staged settings on the ‘ol dining room table. First is a female with long-legged fly prey, which conveniently provides a sense of scale since the fly is about the size of a mosquito:

Next are the two male color morphs. The first somewhat resembles the females, while the other is very different and comes with distinctive hair decorations. This is an older image, but I’m bringing it back so all three forms can finally be shown together. It’s surprising that they are all the same species!

I recently learned that the two male forms use different courtship displays for females, yet are considered equally successful in the mating game. I’m sure Jerry can steer things in the right direction if I am in error here, but having different male forms with different mating strategies does not seem unusual in the animal kingdom. Examples I’m familiar with include lizards, crustaceans, and fish, although in those cases the different males include those that are aggressive and territorial, and others that win by being sneaky. But here, I don’t see how either male is territorial, and apparently both have courtship displays for females.

One of my goals for next season will be to try to document their different courtship behaviors. That seems do-able, since I can expect to find several of them again next summer.