National Geographic: Japanese Hornets / Bees

It's war between bees and wasp! Who will win? Watch and find out!

Comments appreciated!

Parantica aglea

Here is some decent info from Wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parantica_aglea

Danaidae

Links:

http://www.gwij20.chat.ru/Danaidae/danaidae.htm

Has pics of a bunch of species. 98% of the species listed I've never heard of before. I must go a hunting for info!

Forest Monarch - Danaus Formosa

Forest Monarch Danaus formosa

Undisturbed wasps

I thought that this was cute. I found it via VL. Hope you like it!

One Spotted Prepona - Archæoprepona demophon

One-Spotted Prepona Archaeoprepona demophon

The One Spotted Prepona is a butterfly found in Mexico, Central America, the West Indies, and the northern portion of South America.

Food Plants:

The butterfly larva generally feed on plants of the Genus Annona.

Source: Wikipedia

I'll see if I can find any more on this beautiful butterfly.

Blue Nawab Info

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polyura_schreiberi

Blue Nawab

Zombie Snails

Something I thought you should see. I read about this in one of my books. Now I know what it looks like. Tell me what you think.

Love the snails hate the parasites!

Special Notice!

Special Notice!
____________

There will be insect and spider videos
posted on here from time to time as I
find more interesting ones. I'm very
happy about this since I think it will
give this blog something special and
more interesting.

I'm truly excited about this! Finally people
will get to see these insects and their relatives
in action while learning about their mysterious world
and realise that insects and their kin aren't all bad.

Also they're will be some funny ones on here too some with some language in them.
So don't say I didn't warn you about that one! Alrighty I think I'm done with this
announcement for today. I just thought you guys should know! n_n

One more thing before I go. Comments will be available to every one now that assholes
have stopped with their mean words. YAY isn't that great?! n_n

The Amazing Cataglyphis Ant

I found this on Youtube and it's amazing! Tell me what you think of it!

Male Mason Wasp......

.....can sting! Eeek! I just found out about that today via one of the insect and spider forums I'm on! WOW! *Faints from shock*

Two-lined Spittlebug Prosapia bicincta

Coming Soon!

Eastern Tailed Blue Cupido comyntas

Numbers:

One of 2 species in this genus in North America. 2 subspecies listed. comyntas, texanus.

Size:

23-28 mm wingspan in United States 16-26 mm in Canada.

Range:

Throughout most of the United States and southern Canada; abundant in the east. Uncommon to rare over most of its Canadian range; common only in southern Ontario.

Identification:

Adult: Male's wings above are iridescent pale blue with brownish-gray along the outer margin. Forewings have a short oblique black bar near the middle. The hindwings have a row of submarginal black spots and a small orange spot at the base of each projecting tail. The female's wings are larger with longer tails, gray above on the body and wings with 2 or 3 small orange spots with black dots mear the margin of the hindwings. Wings of both sexes below have silvery gray with small dark spots and a few orange spots near the margin of the hindwings.

Larva: The body is hairy, variably dark pebbly green or various shades of brown with darker brown middorsal stripes, dark oblique stripes, and a white lateral line. The head is small and black.

Rest of the info can be found at: www.bugguide.net/node/view/464

Cabbage White Pieris rapae

Cabbage White Pieris rapæ

Size:

Wingspan 30-50mm

Larvæ length to 35mm

Identification:

Adult: upperside of wings white or pale yellowish-white with black tip on forewing; upperside of the female forewing has 2 black spots and the male has 1. Both sexes have one black spot well out along the front margin on the upperside of the hindwing.

Larvæ: Green or bluish-green with a thin yellow dorsal line ( sometimes faint or absent ) and a lateral line composed of pairs of yellow spots. The anterior spot of each pair with a black central dot and the body is covered with short fine hairs.

Range:

Through out North America and many parts of the world.

Numbers:

Abundant in many parts of its range.

The rest of the info can be found at: www.bugguide.net/node/view/3259

God Bless Butterflies

YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY! See here!

Western Tiger Swallowtail Papilio rutulus

Pretty Right?

Sharpshooters

Sharpshooter Oncometopia orbona

Why They're Called Sharpshooters:

Sharpshooters tap into the plants for food since the sap is mostly water they have to go through lots of it to get enough of the nutrients. The part they don't use is expelled, often with considerable force. I believe that the sap preassure is also a factor: if they didn't release some of the liquid they might burst!

- Chuck Entz

More info on them here:

www.bugguide.net/node/view/5256

Planthopper Acanalonia bivittata

Info coming soon!

Little Yellow Eurema lisa

Info coming soon.

Mirid Bug Pics!

♥ Heterotoma merioptera
♥ Red Bug Deraeocoris ruber

Mirid Bugs

Some of my favorite insects in this family are sooooo interesting in looks, colors, body structure, and of course their life cycles. Here are some links about some of the different species that I find amazing in their looks and what ever else makes them interesting to me and to any one else for that matter.

Hope you enjoy the links and learn something from them as I have! :)

Miridae - Heterotoma merioptera

Links to info and pics

http://bugguide.net/node/view/94168

http://www.bugsandweeds.co.uk/bugs.html

For the last one on this you'll have scroll down a bit to get to it but I'll save you the trouble of doing all that by re-typing what the passage says. It does have a picture on it and it mentions it too:

This small member of the Miridae ( Capsid ) family
( only about 5mm long ) is quite common in southern
England. It is to be found on a wide range of vegetation
( seen here on White Dead Nettle ) and feeds on aphids,
other small insects, and also flower buds and unriped fruits.

When viewed directly from above, it appears to have conventional thin
antennae but, a side view reveals the broad paddle-like second segment
which readily identifies it. A second feature is that it appears to glide
over green vegetation as its green legs merge into the background.

There you go for that one. More? Sure!

Red Bug - Deraeocoris ruber

♥ Cambridge 8 Jul 2001
♥ Subfamily Deraeocorinae. Tribe: Deraeocorini
♥ Length: 7mm
♥ "Common in southern England & Wales. Larvæ and adults feed on small insects, especially aphids; they're found on many plants and bushes, particulary nettles. The amount of black and red coloring in the adults varies greatly but the males are normaly much the darker sex."

- Southwood & Leston

Source of info: http://www.gwydir.demon.co.uk/insects/miroidea.htm#heterotoma

This site also mentions Heterotoma merioptera. Pics of both the bugs mentioned will be in the next entry. :)

Agabus disintegratus

Agabus disintegratus The Disintergrated Diving Beetle:

Identification:

Adult: Head and pronotum reddish; elytra yellowish to brown with 3 blackish longitudinal stripes on each elytron, the middle stripe interrupted near the anterior end ( a distinguishing feature ).

Larva: Whitish with sclerotized areas yellowish-brown; head subquadrate, wides near eyes: antennae 4-segmented; abdominal segments 6 to 8 completely sclerotized; segment 8 with siphon one-fourth length of segment; 2 cerci 2 segmented; femora longer then tibiae.

The rest of this pasaage can be found at www.bugguide.net/node/view/13577

Random Bug pics

No ID is needed because I posted the pics before.

Bug Of the Month

Scarlet Plant Bug

Two-tailed Swallowtail - Papilio multicauda

Two-tailed Swallowtail Papilio multicaudata:

Size:

Wing span: 3 1/2 - 5 inches ( 9 - 12.7 cm )

Identification:

Upper surface of male forewing with narrow black stripes. Each hindwing has 2 tails hence it's commen name.

Range:

Western NA south from British Comlumbia, east to central Nebraska and central Texas, south through Mexico.

Habitat:

Foothill slopes and canyons, moist valleys, streamsides, woodlands, parks etc.

The rest of the info can be found at www.bugguide.net/node/view/2391

Bugs In Korean

나비 Butterfly

나방 - Moth

모충 - Caterpillar

얘벌레 - Larvæ

More coming soon! 옴더빨리!

Hestina assimilis

The Red Ring Skirt ( Hestina assimilis ) is the mystery butterfly I told you about some time ago. I just found what it is and lots of photos of it including some info! YAY! I found the following info on wikipedia and I will post more if there is more out there which I believe there is.

From Wikipedia:

Hestina assimilis, the Red Wing Skirt is a species of Nymphalid butterfly found in Asia. It is a large butterfly. The male is strongly territorial, always staying in high positions to defend it's territory.

And here is some info with pics of the larvæ, pupa, and adult:

http://ccs-hk.org/DM/butterfly/Nymphal/Hestina-assimilis.html

A New Month!

Aaaaaaaah it's June already! Time goes by so fast. I've been thinking about having some sort of Bug Of The Month thing. The post about it doesn't need to be on the first day of the month though so I have plenty of time to think about which one it would be. I'm also thinking of adding double post for the previous months because I didn't think of this until now.

As for what this month's bug will be I'm not sure yet but I'll think of something. In the mean time I'm going to go hunting.