Images

sora, feet, dc

This is an odd Genus of bee from Kruger National Park where I traveled with Jonathan Mawdsley to South Africa to collect bees in the park. While a poor shot in terms of the antennae...if you look closely one of the antennae is broadened like the bowl of a spoon (thus the genus name Spatunomia) while the other is simply broken off.

Here we present a series of pictures of Polistes wasp nests with lavae, pupae, eggs, and interlopers.

Ah, such an interesting plant for bees. Pontedaria cordata....Pickerelweed. Lives out in fairly deep water, emerges in the spring...sends up a spike of blue flowers in mid-summer. This plant is very attractive to long-tongued bees which have to reach way down to get nectar and pollen.

Japanese Beetle, Maryland, Beltsville, Popillia japonica, July 2012, pretty spiffy for a pest we never both to look closely at

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Arizona poppy pollen on Protoxaea gloriosa. Yep, the fluorescent orange Kallstroemia grandiflora, has fluorescent orange pollen and this bee loves it and becomes also fluorescent orange.

Just a white oak leaf bud from several years ago. Botanists, at some point, realized that many plants go through a period of time where they have no leaves. So, being clever (and having no leaves to look at) they have devised alternative strategies to identifying plants using things like buds, leaf scars, patterns of pith, color of bark, and so forth.

Peromyscus leucopus, the white-footed mouse, this one dead from one of the many traps in our lab, where we fear the number of bees one mouse can eat in a day. Photo by Hannah Sutton.

A couple more prickly ash photos taken by Helen Low Metzman.

Xenoglossa strenua. People who know something about native bees often know about the "Squash Bee" Peponapis pruinosa. However, there are other native squash bees, and here is one. This is Xenoglossa strenua.

Xenoglossa strenua. People who know something about native bees often know about the "Squash Bee" Peponapis pruinosa. However, there are other native squash bees, and here is one. This is Xenoglossa strenua.

A lovely dark Xylocopa from Kyrgyzstan with shimmering dark iridescence of wing and abdomen. Photography Information: Canon 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.

Of all the pictures I took up at Laurence's this is by far my favorite. I love the geometry, the complementary colors, the contrast between the texture of the abdomen and the texture of the wing, and just the lushness of the whole thing. Here we have a Xylocopa from Kyrgyzstan to thank.

A lovely yellow yellow yellow Carpenter Bee from India. The brown wings and yellow hairs show extremely good taste. From the Packer Lab Photography Information: Canon 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.

Kruger National Park presents a native South African: Xylocopa lugubris. This carpenter bee was caught cruising around the park while along on Jonathan Mawdsley and James Harrison's expedition. Lots of fun avoiding poisonous snakes, lions, and leopards and other big things. Photo by Erick Hernandez.

Kruger National Park presents a native South African: Xylocopa lugubris. This carpenter bee was caught cruising around the park while along on Jonathan Mawdsley and James Harrison's expedition. Lots of fun avoiding poisonous snakes, lions, and leopards and other big things. Photo by Erick Hernandez.

Tylopelta gibbera, a wee, brown, spec-like, treehopper. This species runs from Central America north where it quietly sips sap from the tick-trefoil plant group.

An unknown, very small fly, note the size of the insect pin point in the picture. They head shot was taken at 10 X and the full body shot was taken at 5X.

The Madagascan sunset moth, yes indeed a Moth not a butterfly. Endemic to the Island of Madagascar. Large, migratory, and day flying it is another example of Nature's breaking of the rules. The colors are not created by pigments but by the structure of the scales themselves (look it up...very cool).

Anticarsia gemmatalis - Velvetbean Caterpillar - Soybean eater....this species can't overwinter in most of North America but moves north to populate bean and legume fields in large enough numbers to become a major pest, but like our other pesty moths...pretty sharp looking when you get to know them personally. Specimen provided by Benzon Research.