Japanese Beetle - Popillia japonica

It seems they're having a banner year in our backyard.  Here they feast on the leaf of red raspberry.

-Tom

Female Common Whitetail - Plathemis lydia

Our yard isn't a mecca for dragonflies.  They seldom visit, but every once in a while, they do make an appearance.  This common whitetail was a surprise as it hovered in and out of the bottlebrush grass.  Since I had been photographing absolutely tiny insects, pointing the lens toward this dragon made me feel I was shooting a giant.

-Tom

Red Aphids- Genus Uroleucon?

This year, I haven't found any of the yellow colored, non-native Oleander aphids, but we do have a fairly nice colony of these red aphids.  Perhaps these belong to the genus Uroleucon?  It seems there isn't much information readily available about aphids. Perhaps aphids are the next big thing.  Do I see a aphidapalooza festival in the future? Probably not, but they are fascinating creatures, though. These individuals are feasting on my double flowered green-headed coneflower, Rudbeckia laciniata 'Hortensia'.  This Victorian era "heirloom perennial" has been passed through our family- our clone originated from relatives in northeast Indiana.  Calling it an heirloom perennial seems to be a bit out of place, however, since I also read that it was affectionately known as "the outhouse plant".

-Tom

Red Milkweed Beetle

This year we are hosting at least one Red Milkweed Beetle (Tetraopes tetrophthalmus, I believe).  Up close, they sort of look like some type of deranged teddy bear.  This individual has been feasting on swamp milkweed, seriously stunting the plant.

-Tom

Common Eastern Firefly - Photinus pyralis

I suspect that the humidity was so high this evening, that this "lightning bug" had to prepare its wings for its nightly flight.  It took several warm up runs leading up to sunset.  Each time I thought it would take off, but no, it was just getting ready.

Also- check the previous post, I've updated it with the help of www.bugguide.net

-Tom

More Insects from the Backyard Native Plant Gardens

Hyphantria cuneata - Fall Webworm Moth - Hodges #8140

Dark-Winged Fungus Gnat (Sciaridae)

Glyphipterigid sedge moth- possibly the genus Diploschizia

All awaiting I.D.'s via www.bugguide.net

-Tom

Leaf Miner Fly

While most gardeners despise a pest that takes advantage of a prize plant, I relish it.  In fact, I plant natives to provide homes for things like this leaf miner fly in the family Agromyzidae.  Thank you to John Carr for helping place this to family.  Isn't is fascinating?  This tiny fly is resting on the tip of a leaf blade of Mondarda fistulosa, wild bergamont.  I've never observed it before, but it is tiny, no more than a few millimeters from head to folded wingtip.

-Tom

A Syrphid Fly Saturday Night

-Tom

Syrphid Fly

Syrphid fly.

-Tom

Some Type of Plant Bug with Red Eyes

This one is pretty cool!

That's it for now.

-Tom

A Yellow "Inch Worm"

10 points to the whomever guesses what plant this little bugger is eating.  He wasn't any thicker than a mechanical pencil lead.

-Tom

Common Green Bottle Fly

It's time to look for bugs in the backyard again.

-Tom

Three Turtles at Clifton Gorge State Nature Preserve

Northern spiny softshell, northern map turtle, and a midland painted turtle bask in blue hole of the Little Miami River.

Inniswood Metrogardens

Inniswood Metrogardens is a plant lover's paradise. We're lucky to have this sanctuary of both the natural and cultivated located in Westerville. In addition to the snapping turtle and red-eared slider (an introduced species), we saw several pairs of eastern bluebirds. The boys had a blast exploring the various little structures around the grounds. Weston even turned a large gazebo into a rocket ship. It's a great place to spend a Saturday morning. -Tom

It's National Parks Week

I received a nice e-mail from the National Park Foundation reminding me that National Park Week is going on now.  During my winter hibernation riding the spinning bike in the basement, via Netflix, I watched the entire Ken Burns' series The National Parks: America's Best Idea.  We tend to take for parks granted as something fundamental to our nation, but Burns clearly lays out that was not always the case.  In Ohio, we're lucky to have one of country's 58 national parks merely miles from where I grew up- Cuyahoga Valley National Park.  I've been remiss to explore and photograph the park- I need to spend more time there.

One of my favorite National Parks trip was a 2010 trip to Yellowstone.  I have shared a few images from that trip below.



Cherish our National Parks and the people that had the foresight to set aside these areas generations ago so that we could experience some semblance of what a wild North America may have once been like.

-Tom

Easter 2014

-Tom

Slate Run Historical Farm

The Columbus Metroparks' Slate Run Historical Farm is a gem of the Columbus area.  It's close enough to the city to not be too far away, but distant enough that you feel like you're in another world.  An 1880's world. It's one of our favorite places to visit.  If you go now, you'll see a bunch of baby lambs- they were certainly the highlight of this trip.

-Tom

Let's Reset

This is the kind of stuff we do on a cold winter evening!

When I started writing here, I was dating Megan.  We've now been married for 7.5 years.  Brody, our youngest, just turned 3 and Weston will be 5 on Sunday.  I had my 35 birthday on February 16.  How's that for numbers?

As I wrote about here, in 2010, I accepted a position with our state's wildlife agency after seven years with the Ohio Natural Heritage Program.  Although this move was not a move that I chose to make, I set out to make the best of it. Ultimately, my body could not hold up to repeated 2 a.m. wake-up calls and in February 2013, I accepted a position with Ohio's State Nature Preserves.  Remember all the Delaware County posts? I'm now back in the central office surrounded by late 1960's era apartments which have turned into quite the melting pot of Columbus.  

The bottom line is that I am quite happy to be with Ohio's State Nature Preserve System.  I manage its Facebook Page.  I've taken my blogging expertise and poured it all into growing that page.  Ultimately, it fulfills my need to share writings and photographs of nature in the great State of Ohio as well or perhaps better than this blog once did.  

After honing my photography skills, I have finally got my online galleries up and running- I'm quite proud of this body of work. In addition, I have developed a Facebook page that features my photography- please visit and like if you want to see more. 

I'm not slamming the door shut here.  But I want to at least put something here, and let you know where you can see my more recent work.  Thank you for reading.

-Tom

Piping Plover - Litchfield Beach - South Carolina

This past August during our vacation to coastal South Carolina, I awoke early one morning to walk the mile and a half or so to an inlet where a great amount of birds hang out.  I didn't come back with great pictures for my effort that morning, but as I was reviewing my work last week, I stumbled across this banded shorebird.  It was mixed in with a bunch of other things, including many semi-palmated plovers, but this bird looked different.

I'm not up on piping plovers all that much, but I do know they are listed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service under the endangered species act.  It turns out that there are two listings for the species- The birds that nest along the Great lakes are listed as endangered, while the rest of the birds, including the prairie nesting birds of the northern great plains and those that next along the Atlantic shore are threatened.

Now, if you look at the bird above, it's a bit of a crap shoot trying to discern what exactly the colors are on the left leg.  Purple?  Blue?  Orange?  Red?  The green on the right leg is a little easier.  Being fairly uncertain that this even was a piping plover, I sent the above image to researchers at the University of Minnesota.

Sure enough, I received an e-mail back from Alice Van Zoeren, and after a few exchanges, she did confirm that this bird was a piping plover from the Great Lakes Population.  By identifying the color band combinations, she was able to tell me that this bird, a female, was hatched at North Manitou Island in Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore in 2012 and returned and returned to breed in Leelanau State Park in 2013, a site which had not seen breeding activity for Piping Plovers in 10 years.

It's always a good idea to pore over all your bird photographs, even those that normally wouldn't be a keeper, to check for bands.  You never know what you might find.  And now, three months later, I can add another bird to my life list.  Plus, I've added just one more bit of information to help the researchers understand more about the Great Lakes populations of this tiny little bird.

-Tom

Want to take a look at the whole uncropped image?  How many species do you see?  Which ones?

A Wider View - Purple Pitcher Plant

July 2013

Looking down into a purple pitcher plant growing in a sphagnum hummock.  Otisfield Maine.

-Tom