Images

More shots of a shiny bright blue/purple Hoplitis fulgida. This one from Yosemite National Park, collected by Claire Kremen's group. This one is a female.

A large Hoplitis from the West Coast. Specifically from Yosemite National Park. Am still mystified by this genus, they are always around in small numbers, but never seem to be a "player" like some of the other genera, if you know what I mean. The specimens were collected for a project done by Lauren Ponisio - Study led by L.

Sometimes male bees depart from the standard antennae shapes for some sort of new performance specs. No body seems to be studying why this might be, but there is substantive research on how incredible antennae can be at detecting just a few molecules.

Colors. You know, bees are so interesting sometimes. Here is Hylaeus pictipes. Jason Gibbs found this species up in Ontario, Canada where it did not belong since it is a bee of the Old World.

A couple more shots of the mysterious female masked bee Hylaeus sparsus. These collected by Jessica Rykken in Shenandoah National Park. Rarely collected by found across hundreds of miles of North America. Makes you wonder what we are missing, my guess is we are missing a lot because no body is actually looking.

a lovely lady Hylaeus from Kenya, one of the specimens from the Packer lab that did not make it into the upcoming book. It was a very dirty specimen originally, lots of dust and pollen, thank goodness for photoshop. Also experimented with using the augmentation brush to pull light into dark spots, darken off excess eyeshine, and help with pin removal.

One of the native species of Maui, here unusually found at lower elevations on the island during surveys last spring. Normally this group is restricted to upper elevations that retain at least a large component of the native flora.

One of the native species of Maui, here unusually found at lower elevations on the island during surveys last spring. Normally this group is restricted to upper elevations that retain at least a large component of the native flora.

A series of shots of an unknown jumping spider from the Patuxent Bee Laboratory. Wish I knew more about spider id......

Unknown Jumping spider, August 2012, Beltsville, Maryland, Benjamin A Coulter helped narrow this down to perhaps an immature Thiodina sylvana

Catterpillar of Endangered Karner Blue butterfly Lycaeides melissa samuelis, almost ready to pupate ...a.k.a. a fatty

Pupae of endangered Karner Blue Butterfly Lycaeides melissa samuelis

Birch Catkin Bug (Kleidocerys resedae) on a fish hook, Dorchester County, Maryland, lovely color and sculpturing patterns. Determination by Thijs de Graaf

Its just endless, the number of species of bees at Fossil Butte National Monument and the number of Lasioglossums Sweat Bees in the world. This one is L. prasinogaster. Pretty much looks like all the rest...mostly a Rocky Mountains thing...but a few found in the Pacific Northwest.

Ladybird pupa, White Oak leaf, Beltsville, Maryland, August 2012, determination by speech path girl

A series of 6 pictures of 3 species of very uncommon beetles that are new records for the region from George Washington Memorial Parkway unit of the National Park Service. Collected by Brent Steury. Hallomenus scapularis is a beetle of polypore fungi. There are 2 color forms which may or may not be different species.

Another Chrysidid wasp (cuckoo wasp) from the Hart-Miller Dredge Spoil site in Baltimore Harbor, collected by Eugene Scarpulla, photographed by Brooke Alexander Identification by Lynn KimseyCanon Mark II 5D, Zerene Stacker, Stackshot Sled, 65mm Canon MP-E 1-5X macro lens, Twin Macro Flash in Styrofoam Cooler, F5.0, ISO 100, Shutter Speed 200, link to a .pdf of o

One of the first woodland plants flowering in the spring....am looking forward to the plants waking up this year and the cycle starting anew. Specimen and photography by Helen Lowe Metzman.

Dominican Republic,floating in hand sanitizer in a cuvette Heteropteran, species unknown

A bee with a fat leg, or at least a wide one. Which is the most distinguising feature of this bee that sadly looks like a whole bunch of other Lasioglossum species. The name? = ...Lasioglossum callidum. i Photograph by Brooke Alexander.

Such a lovely blue and relatively unusual in the Genus Lasioglossum. At least in the East there is no other Lasioglossum so extensively and uniformly blue. So blue that it is often mistaken for an Osmia. This species is associated with woodlands, feeding on the vernal flora of the woods and nearby fields and nesting in rotten wood.