This was the desktop background of my lab computer for well over year, so folks have probably seen it. It looked much better on my 19” LCD screen than it did on that computer, so I’d figure I’d post it.
It turns out though, that’s it’s another fly, which I always assumed was a Tipulidae. I’m not sure if they have painted wings though, and it’s much more fun to post it here than look it up on Wikipedia.
If plant-insect interactions are cool, plant-insect photographs are cooler.
I wonder if any lichen specialists frequent my blog. If so, how are lichens categorized? Certainly the individual fungal and green algal/cyanobacterial species are ‘clearly’ described, but are lichens themselves able to be characterized and described in the own right? For example, if the mutualisms are usually formed between single fungal and algal species, can a particular pair be classified? If pairs are not usually species-specific in this way, but more general lineages of either the fungal component, the algal component, or both do form more generalized groups of lichen, do these ‘groups’ behave similarly? Would a particular group likely inhabit a vertical slate cliff in Western New York, while another likely inhabits the forest floor? What types of adaptations in lichen groups fit these habitats?
What if this photograph isn’t even a lichen and I’m totally incompetent?
Also, what if I had just gone to the damn Wikipedia site before I wrote all that.
So what’s this one?
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I’m learning a lot about my camera and lenses still. Here’s an example of aperture adjustment.
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What family does this fly belong to? I discovered it rested on a unknown shrub rooted on the bank of a stream.
| The mosquitoes are getting out of control. Walking through parts of the wetland, I litterally have difficulty seeing my feet, not because they are underwater, but because there are thousands of freshly emerged mosquitoes dodging my boots.
It seems that this is the second generation of mosquitoes, with the first potentially being left-overs from the dry season. It’ll be interesting, to say the least, to experience the exponential growth. |
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After capturing this rattlesnake, Boa fed it a mouse, which it recently released as a brown, moist mush that appears to have permanently stained the bucket it was in with a horrible stench. The snake is a juvenile, and didn’t even have any rattle segments. It is the only one we’ve seen so far.
I’m not certain about the common name in that (1) my source (the Internet) isn’t really reliable and (2) there was nothing long about this snake. (Don’t look into ‘2’ too much)
Two dung beetles rolled their ball of delicious fecal matter into between the buttresses of a tree. One appeared to begin searching for a hole that had been made previously, while the other waited.
I learned a little about depth of field with my camera today… so maybe next time, both dung beetles will be in focus.
