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| Margined calligrapher, Toxomerus marginatus, on a pasture rose, Rosa Carolina |
We had a great time at this year's Missouri Prairie Foundation Bioblitz on the newly named Thoh-Dah Prairie in St. Clair County. One of the many sessions was an insect program guided by Eric (aka Bugeric)* and Heidi Eaton. With 14 sets of eyes we were constantly making new finds. Unlike when we are out on our own, we had immediate identification down to genus and species.
There are 860 crambid snout moth species north of Mexico so we didn't dive into identifying them to species. MDC has more details here.
Watching an experienced entomologist work was a joy. I still struggle with how to hold insects like a grasshopper. This orange-winged grasshopper, Pardalophora phoenicoptera, held in the right hands makes it easy to photograph for identification. I would have a handful of parts if I tried to show its parts in detail. Here is an expert demonstrating the vivid colors of the inside of its leg.
Likewise this looks like an "orange wing" to me but Eric can show it to be a totally different species, the Plains yellow-winged grasshopper, Arphia simplex. This may look like a small detail when we are walking on the prairie but it is critically important to the male grasshopper.
There were lots of smaller insects to be found. One of my favorites was this family of aphids, not identified to species. The adult was agitated with the disturbance and flapped its wings in annoyance at the lack of privacy as seen here.
Finally we saw this deadly predator hop into its burrow to avoid our heavy feet. Our herpetology expert, Jamie Leahy, identified it as an American toad, Anaxyrus americanus. It was licking its lips at the prospect of eating some of our finds as seen here.
The Missouri Prairie Foundation is a dynamic organization, not only preserving prairies but running Grow Native! and The Missouri Invasive Plant Council. They have an excellent set of informative videos at this link. A good place to start to sample these is this Betsy Betros session. You may be familiar with her book, A Photographic Field Guide to the Butterflies in the Kansas City Region which is our go-to resource.
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*Eric (Bugeric) Eaton has a blog listed in the sidebar of this page. He and Heidi have just moved to the midwest and we hope to see more of him. Meanwhile his book Wasps is full of details about their rich life and is highly recommended. His Insectopedia has just been published and I am awaiting my copy in the mail any day. His current blog has even more on the Thoh-Dah prairie bioblitz.