Category: insects

Spot the insect!

March 2, 2018 • 2:30 pm

Reader Robert sent a photo that hides some insects (I don’t know where they all are). How many can you spot?

Robert’s notes:

A slightly unusual entry for your consideration: This is the “Spot the insect” display at the Oxford University Museum for Natural History, used to show the gradual steps in the evolution of camouflage. I think it’s the same one used by Richard Dawkins in his 1991 Royal Institution Christmas lecture.

The full display has 30 insects in it, but this is only a part, and I’m not sure myself how many there are – I count seven.

I haven’t tried yet, but it’s a good way to kills some time on a lazy Friday afternoon. Click on the photo to isolate and enlarge it.

Spot the toad bug!

October 11, 2017 • 2:30 pm

Did you know that “toad bugs” existed? And that they look like their namesake, as you can see in the photo below (if you can find it!)?

Toad bugs are “true bugs”—in the order Hemiptera—and comprise about 100 species in the family Gelastocoridae. They’re also toadlike in that they are predators who hang around the banks of streams and rivers.

Here’s another photo:

In looking up photos for this post, I came across this article, which tells you about another very bizarre species, and one that interacts with amphibians.  Trigger warning: Nature red in tooth and claw!

Here’s the katydid!

July 28, 2017 • 1:00 pm

Did you find it? Here’s the original picture by Siggy, followed by the reveal, and then a photo of the insect on the lumber where he found it and on the lichen it seems to mimic.

Original:

Reveal:

On a board:

On lichen:

Siggy added this:

I found this PDF that seems to describe the same species as this as Lichenomorphus berezini.

 

Readers’ wildlife photo: spot the katydid

July 28, 2017 • 7:45 am

As I’m occupied today, there will be one wildlife photo, and it’ll be a “spot the. . . ” picture. It comes from reader Siegfried Gust, who sent other photos that I’ll include in the reveal. For now, spot the katydid, As Siegfried notes:

Greetings from Costa Rica.

I came across a lichen mimicking katydid the other day and thought that you might be able to use some pictures of it on your site. Here is a wide shot that shows just how well they blend in for one of your “Spot the _______” posts.

Can you spot it? (Click to enlarge.) I consider this one “hard”. The reveal is at 1 p.m. Chicago time:

Spot the mantid!

July 15, 2017 • 7:25 am

Reader Gabe McNett sent a hard “spot the mantid” photo. His notes and the photo follow (enlarge it to aid your sleuthing):

I thought I would share a few pictures for a possible “Spot the ….” entry to your blog. I saw this mantis in the field this morning, which I believe is a late-stage nymph of the introduced Chinese mantis (Tenodera sinensis). I would not have seen it if it hadn’t moved.

I rate this “pretty damn hard.” The reveal will be at noon Chicago time.