#light traps

I do a lot of moth nights each year with some of my naturalist friends. This was my third year participating in the National Moth week activities. Mothing is really fun to do. All you do is put out a UV or some other light that has different wave lengths than regular household lights and a white sheet or a mesh netting and see what you can find. National Moth Week is not all about moths it is all about the nocturnal world when most of us are asleep in our beds. It is a celebration of the creatures of the night. Here are a few that I photographed during this years NMW. 

First up is the Sad Underwing Moth. I saw this species about four times. This one was found in broad daylight though. This one was at Elmer W. Oliver Nature Park on a tree. I was volunteering with a bunch of others during a kids science camp. The two in the back pointed it out and I just happened to have my camera on me. I took a few shots just to add it to my favorite app and site called iNaturalist which is a sight I use to keep track of all my nature observations. These guys are pretty hard to see sometimes. You can easily walk right past them. They sit on the side of a tree and it can take you several seconds to see it. If you know what to look for you can see them all over once your mind adjusts. For first time spotters it can be a little trickster. This species loves to suck down to the tree and say hidden leaving very little shadow so predators wont nab it for a snack. This moth species is about two to three inches in length and is one of my favorites in the Underwing family. 

I went to Twelve Hills Nature center in Dallas for one of our events and even though it was not a moth it was still a pretty cool observation. Here we have a Yellow and Black Garden Spider. These are one of the better known spiders that in most cases can be picked out of a line up. They are very large spiders and make very beautiful webs. The spiders you see on the webs are always females. The males are very tiny you can barely see them. That happens in a lot of the orbweavers and other spider species. This spider also makes an elaborate zigzag pattern called a stabilimentum. This is seen a little here in this photos. We are not too sure what this structure is used for. It is just something that a lot of spiders in the genus Argiope do. These are so cool to look at. I almost didn’t see the web until I was called to see it. 

One of the many insects we had come up to our light traps was this Eight-spotted Flea Beetles. I have been trying to get a good photograph of one of these for a long time. They have always seemed to escape me every time I see one. They are one of the many leaf beetles we have in Texas. This one is one of the larger ones. It is dark with some red and little white dots on the wing coverts. It will eat a lot in a garden and is considered an agricultural pest. 

One of the coolest beetles we found during one of the three moth nights for the week was this guy. This is known as the Fiery Searcher. Some of you may have seen it on one of my other posts around the City Nature Challenge time. These guys are one of my favorite beetles. They are swift and always hungry. They specialize in eating caterpillars. They are a pretty large beetle and when angered they will release a highly pungent odor that will throw you for a loop. They can also deliver a very painful bite if miss handled. Probably not enough to break the skin but it can hurt for a good while so I am told. I have been lucky not to have been bitten but as they say their is a first time for everything. It is just one of those occupational hazards we have to face from time to time. 

 Another cool beetle we saw during National Moth Week. This one is in the Genus Mallodon and is known as the Hardwood-stump Borer Beetle. This guy is almost as big as the Fiery Searcher and has a mighty set of jaws of its own. That yellow stuff you see is some kind of fuzz that it has. This is the first time I have observed this beetle. This monster gets pretty larger and it was kind of daunting to get it into a petri dish to better observe it closer. Petri Dishes come in handy when you do insect photography for science purposes. It holds them in and you can get closer shots in the clear plastic. It is just one of those things I picked up along the way during my time as a naturalist. This guy is one heck of a beetle I will tell you that. I think it may just be one of my new favorites all because of its cool Genus name. Mallodon sounds so much like something from a space adventure show. 

A cool flying beast we saw at the Parr Park National Moth Week night in Grapevine. This sucker is known as an Eastern Dobsonfly. This guy was one that was on the rocks near one of our more powerful set ups. This is a female for it has small stubbier jaws. The males have much larger ones that overlap when at rest. This thing can get up to four inches. It has two pairs of wings which overlap and in the good light they almost look plastic. The larva to this insect is called a Hellgramite. These flies are used often by fly fishers. The Fishfly is a close relative of these guys. This thing if not handled right will also bite and can break skin. This one was picked up out of harms way and almost bit one of my friends. It can swivel its head in many directions so it is constantly on the alert from predators. 

Another beetle that looks like the Fiery Searcher. It is very closely related and is in the same line. This guy is called the Black Caterpillar Hunter. It is almost the same size as the Fiery Searcher. This guy is one heck of a beetle. A few of my friends found this guy halfway up a tree when they spotted him. They called me over and I took this shot. This was taken at Parr Park in Grapevine Texas. This is one of my favorite shots. Just look at all the grooves in the wing coverts. This is a very cool predator. I really enjoy mothing and looking for the animals of the night. You see some of the wildest things at night. 

One of the deadlier observations on my list of highlights was this Southern Black-widow. This is the first one I have seen that has that infamous red hourglass on the underside of its body. We made it with out anyone getting bitten which was a good thing. We were all very careful to not disturb it. She was just minding her own waiting for something to walk into her web trap. She was an absolutely beautiful spider. I really enjoy photographing spiders and other arachnids. The funny thing is I used to hate arachnids but after a while of being a naturalist and hiking among them I started to see them in a new light. I saw that they were devoted parents and sophisticated web artists. They are very amazing and some are so beautiful. Strange some maybe but they are just doing what they have to, to survive in the wild. This little thing was really cool. I have now observed two Southern Black Widows. 

Come play with Brown + RISD STEAM on April 12 and build a plankton light trap!

We'll start with hands-on crafting to make our traps, test drag them in the river, then explore our catches using the Nature Lab's microscopy room to see the gorgeous phytoplankton and zooplankton that come out in spring! Finally, we'll compare to see if different glow stick colors attract different types, species, or quantity of plankton. 

*Event capped at 18. Register here! http://bit.ly/1d7wUbv