Archive | October 2013

Weekend Expedition 33: Fall in Stanley Park

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Here we are, it is already  Arachtober, and fall weather has definitely arrived. While the rains last week kept me from going out shooting, this weekend we had a beautiful Sunday, perfect fall weather for some photography in Stanley Park.

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Migration season has arrived, and all the Canada Geese are definitely in flying mode. There are takeoffs and landings every few minutes on Lost Lagoon in the morning. Go south, oh poopy ambassadors, and spread your green, cylindrical, gifts across America!

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This may very well be my last jumper of the year…I found her under some bark on an old cedar stump.

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A Snowberry leaf makes a nice perch for this spider.

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Termites are of course still to be found in rotting wood. I hope all the Entomology students pay attention: if you do not have these in your collection by now, you aren’t looking hard enough!

 

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A couple crow shots, because i can’t help it…

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Flipping logs is something I have been doing since I was a little kid…And this Ensatina is a good reason why!

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Ensatina eyes are some of the prettiest of salamander eyes. They are almost like the eyes of a doe.

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This is a very odd fungus I found on an old stump. I wonder if it might be a really young fruitbody of a Hericium species.

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A tiny Uloborid spider, likely Hyptiotes gertshi.

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Looking elegant, stretched out on a grass blade. Metellina?

 

I don’t get out much…

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Seriously, I don’t get out much! The recent rainy weather has made photography and pretty well all other outdoor activity really unpleasant. In addition, it seems more and more work is piling up that requires my attention. Because we had a rare sunny break yesterday, I went out on the campus for an hour to see what I could see. And what I could see was soggy! The summer insects are gone, and seemingly the forest is once again the realm of water, fungi, dampness and decay.

Update: I read this line in a novel this morning: “In the distance… Simon Fraser University rose up on Burnaby Mountain, a cluster of grey-slab buildings, miserable and gloomy, saved from utter desolation by the surrounding patches of evergreen trees.”

From “A Thousand Bayonets” by Joel Mark Harris.

Seems appropriate!

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Some nice Mycena.

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Witches’ Butter! This is a weird basidiomycete that grows on woody debris (and sometimes bark).

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This is not predation, but just photographic conjunction of an amaurobiid and a millipede.

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The damsel bugs can be found through much of the fall.

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Some kind of Coprinus.

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Chicken-of-the-Woods! This is an older fruitbody, but I probably would have grabbed it when it was younger (if I got out more).

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A hardy orbweaver sits in her tiny web.

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I may not get out, but sometimes insects come in! This Western Conifer Seed Bug came into the lab. looking for an overwintering spot.