Entomology Field Trip!

Is it just me or do the undergrads look younger every year?

A few years ago, I taught the laboratory for BISC 317, Insect Biology. Much as we impress upon the students to go out and collect hard and often in the few short weeks of summer left to them, they are usually slow to do so, so to help them out, the instructors take them on a collecting trip. This is a voluntary field trip that the instructors organize solely for the students’ sake, and it allows them to get a few orders in their collections they might not yet have found, such as stoneflies, mayflies and odonates. We go out to UBC’s Malcolm Knapp research forest, and hit both a pond and a stream habitat.

This year, Bekka Brodie and Antonia Musso are teaching the course, and I went along for the fun of it. I taught the course when Antonia took it, so it was great to see her out there leading the undergrads around. Bekka is the senior entomologist, having come from a Masters where she worked on Longhorns in the US, and she brought along Tavi, our favourite budding truck enthusiast/entomologist.

Bekka wrangles supplies and students

A veritable invasion of entomologists hits the shores of the pond.

We use dollar store nets for aquatic insects. they work pretty well!

Antonia explaining the superabundance of chironomid larvae.

Antonia figures out the quirky wash bottle.

Hoping for a mayfly…

Collaborative netting.

Searching for 3 caudal filaments.

Preservation in ethanol is the next step.

Another forest invertebrate.

Ah yes! A fat juicy stonefly, freshly plucked from the stream!

A whopping corydalid larva!

Tavi had all the netting he could handle and made his escape. Viorel is not amused.

On the way back, Viorel, Tavi and I checked out some honey mushrooms on a maple at a nearby river.

With some salmon in the water…

…and some on land as bear food!

Weekend Expedition 33: Fall in Stanley Park

Oct8

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.

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!

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

A Snowberry leaf makes a nice perch for this spider.

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!

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

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

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

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.

A tiny Uloborid spider, likely Hyptiotes gertshi.

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

I don’t get out much…

Oct4

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!

Some nice Mycena.

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

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

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

Some kind of Coprinus.

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).

A hardy orbweaver sits in her tiny web.

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

Some more crow portraits

Sep26

Some of my favourite photographic subjects to revisit periodically are crows. These bold black birds seem to me unusually expressive, with minor variations in posture and plumage conveying very different feelings photographically. I like to get in close, to show their eyes and plumage. In the following shots, you can see that some are molting countour plumes around the face. In another month or so, they will be at their sleekest and blackest, and I will probably go out for some more crow sessions.

Cover of the Canadian Entomologist!

Sep25

Sinodendron rugosusm, one of Canada’s few stag beetles, walks across the moss on Burnaby Mountain.

Have I finally arrived as an insect photographer? Well, one of my images placed 3rd in the ESC/SEC 9th Annual Photo Contest. That means that for a whole year, the image of the beetle you see above will be on the cover of The Canadian Entomologist!

Congratulations also go out to Guillaume Dury (1st, with an awesome jumping spider) and Bob Lalonde (2nd, with a bird eating a grasshopper), as well as the runners-up Steven Paiero, Tim Haye, Malcolm Furniss, and Francois Lieutier. For the top prize for entomologist in action, congratulations to Shelley Hoover!

Many thanks to the judges, Felix Sperling, Chris Cutler, and Rick West as well as Ward Strong for organizing this!

The contest allowed 5 shots per entrant, so the following were the images I chose and submitted. What do you think of the pictures?

A bee-like robber fly, genus Laphria perched on a stick. Robbers are just so cool!

A Goldenrod Crab Spider, Misumena vatia!

A Elderberry Longhorn, Desmocerus aureipennis cribripennis (on a willow leaf)

What is a Canadian insect photo contest without a mosquito? Here Culiseta incidens drinks my blood.

Weekend Expedition 32: Iona in the morning

Sep23

A Northern Harrier decides not to pose.

On Saturday I saddled up the bike in the pre-dawn hours to get out to Iona Beach, in the hopes I could find a sleeping insect smorgasbord such I I had previously found on Island View Beach. Iona has been productive for me in the past, especially for things such as jumping spiders and wintering raptors, and in previous Septembers I have found quite a wide range of Phiddippus. Saturday was not as productive as I had hoped, and I had trouble turning up many of the creatures I would normally expect this time of year. I did get some cool shots though. I hope you enjoy them.

Noisy high ISO shot of the moon from a moving bike!

UPS, delivering on-time and charging exorbitant brokerage fees. More on this in a future post.

My favourite shot of the day, a long-jawed orbweaver (Tetragnathidae), with the dawn light flaring the lens.

There were still quite a few lady beetles about, which stood out on the dying vegetation.

A freshly-moulted harvestperson.

Grasshoppers appeared to be basking in the morning chill.

I was hoping to find more sleeping wasps and bees, but only found a few Ammophila, later in the morning and way down the beach.

This Polistes dominula nest was fallen due to rain and the chewing of isopods, a common fate for nests in the late season.

The skies were dramatic, foretelling the crazy rain that Sunday brought. The beach was a bit desolate, but soon there will be wintering Short-eared Owls, not to mention migrating Snow Geese.

Just like Island View is the heart of black widow country, Iona has an amazing abundance of hobo spiders (Tegenaria agrestis). For some reason, their close relatives, the giant house spiders (T. duellica) are not as abundant.

Going to Guelph!

Sep18

Due to an unexpected change for our plans for a scouting/survey mission to Honduras, Catherine and I have suddenly found ourselves in a position to attend the Entomological Society of Canada/Entomological Society of Ontario Joint Annual Meeting in Guelph! I am not sure that our abstracts will be fit in for talks, but I sure hope so. If not I will probably bring a really cool poster. In celebration, I walked outside the lab, and what should I find but a handsome Western Conifer Seed Bug, Leptoglossus occidentalis, a species that our lab has studied in the past. Seems like these bugs have infrared sensors built into their abdomens that allow them to find the relatively hot maturing conifer cones on which they feed. This time of year, adults are seeking warmer sheltered locations in which to overwinter, and since they can’t go to Honduras, they often come indoors. I found this one perched on a still-warm hood of a delivery van outside.

Consider this blog post fair warning then, my eastern comrades, that like the Western Conifer Seed Bug, we are coming to Ontario in numbers, ready to rock your socks with some BC-style sciencing!

Stand Up For Science!

Sep17

Yesterday, I crawled my sick ass out of bed to meet Catherine and attend an important event in downtown Vancouver: the Stand Up for Science Rally. This Canada-wide action was a call to arms for citizens and scientists alike to protest the Canadian Conservative Government’s abysmal track record on science.

We heard from many speakers, listing the long dark tale of the Conservative reign over science policy: from backward steps like closure of the Experimental Lakes Area, gutting of the Fisheries Act, persecution of drug harm reduction programs, the list really goes on and on. The long and terrible record on science is explained in great detail at Confessions of a Science Librarian, where John Depuis has amassed a vast and depressing catalog of Conservative-led attacks on science in Canada.

Hopefully this event will raise public consciousness about the current threats to science and science policy in Canada, and our voices will be heard. Catherine and I were glad to do our part and felt the day well worth it. So sit back, enjoy the photos and click some links to find out about some of the great science advocates we have in this country.

Joe Foy of the Western Canada Wilderness Committee explains how exactly the Conservative War on Science will affect wildlands management.

Dr. David Suzuki, documentarian and geneticist (and a childhood hero from “The Nature of Things” lays into Harper big time!

NDP Deputy Critic for Fisheries Fin Donnelly explains the Harper-led destruction of federal fisheries protections.

Dr. Tzeporah Berman, author and activist from Greenpeace and ForestEthics, delivered a fiery speech outlining how Harper’s Big Oil love affair has landed us in hot water with our international climate commitments. I knew Tzeporah from way back when I was a forest protection activist during the 1993 Clayoquot Sound Campaign.

Dr. Sarah Otto of UBC makes the leap from evolutionary biology to science policy, by outlining the failure of the Canadian Government to take seriously the Species At Risk Act . Of over one hundred SARA submissions in the last 2 years, representing years of effort by conservation scientists, only 2 have made it to Cabinet.

Dr. Alexandra Morton, former whale researcher and now staunch defender of the wild coast, gave an impassioned appeal for unfettered research and science communication at the federal level. Her organization has had to undertake their own research and monitoring in order to help police the coast, something that the Feds should have been on long ago.

Dr. Thomas Kerr, an addictions specialist working with the BC Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS explains the Conservative-led attack against the proven results of Vancouver’s Insite safe injection site and other harm-reduction initiatives in Canada.

SFU’s Dr. Lynne Quarmby, algal researcher got everyone fired up about basic research and the unexpected discoveries that misguided policies cannot anticipate.

Bregitte DePape (a gutsy activist) and others from ShitHarperDid role play the Conservative antagonism to Science.

Protest Dogs

A super-cute puppy travelling with Alexandra Morton!

A seasoned protest dog, this venerable beast inhabited the steps right below the PA!

Keeping an eye out, in case Harper sneaks up from behind.

Social interactions!

Further shots from Island View Beach

Sep16

I wish I had a Weekend Expedition all shot and set up to show you, but the truth is I have been lying in bed all weekend, sick with a really bad cold. I attribute this to too much human contact at last week’s Bug Day!

Instead, here are some other, non-pinup, shots I took last week during fieldwork at Island View Beach.

A Tachinid fly waking up dewy at dawn.

Another view of Lycaena helloides, also called the Purplish Copper.

Termites in their tunnel.

A large cricket.

A female slender meadow katydid, Conocephalus fasciatus.

Wish they were all so colorful!

Sexual termite

An ichneumonid searching a flower

Ravens coming up the beach

This big peregrine falcon flew over Catherine’s head. This is a passage bird, a first-year bird on its first migration.

A male Giant House Spider on the prowl.

A female Wolf Spider under a log.

Here is what we were there to study: a male black widow, out walking the beach looking for a mate.

Ibycter Illustrated 2013 Beach Issue!

Sep12

ibycter illustrated-2

Welcome to the 2013 Beach issue! Here we bring out our best shots of the loveliest ladies relaxing at beautiful Island View Beach. The beauties in the next few pages had us stunned at our exotic field location on gorgeous Vancouver Island.

Cute Little Homewrecker

Coelioxys says she is really a nice girl at heart, enjoying the simple things in life: nectar, long flights on the beach and sunrises.

II chatted with this little cutie after the shoot, and she says the rumours about being a homewrecker are blown out of proportion.
“Where did you hear that? Megachile? I can’t help how she raises her larvae! She is probably just mad because she has a big butt! Did you know Coelioxys is Greek and refers to my sharp ovipositor and’slender tapered abdomen’? That’s me!”

“I am actually super playful!”

“sure, sometimes I drop some eggs in Megachile‘s nest occasionally, but she seems like the nurturing type! She is always working, so an extra mouth to feed will just give her a new challenge!”

“I just love to hang out at the beach and watch the sunrise! It is so romantic!”

Sand Lover

“I am just the girl next door. I enjoy simple things, like sand to dig in, caterpillars to paralyze, and a communal roosting site”

“My girlfriends and I like to hang out together. Preferably from a stiff dead flower stalk!”

“In the daytime, it is just go go go, but nighttime is our time to just relax, with our jaws clenched tightly on dead vegetation!”

The girls of Island View Beach!

Sometimes the girls like to hang out in a group situation. II was there capturing all the hot, yet completely motionless action.

“Cross-species sleepovers are fun”, Ammophila tells our reporters.
“You get to meet all kinds of interesting insects. It is funny how we have such different day to day lives, but at night we all like the same kinds of things, like allowing our bodies to reach low temperatures. It isn’t a party until you cannot even fly!”.

When the girls hang out together, nothing is sexier than a giant bee-wasp totem formation.

Copper beauty Lycaena helloides doesn’t mind getting wet!

I really feel like I have a lot in common with Coelioxys! We just have the same kind of liberated outlook. And we both like, kinda enjoy sticking our ovipositor in someone else’s stuff!”

“I have a love/hate relationship with sunrises. I like to dry my wings, but it means getting back to work, and possibly getting grabbed by a random male”