Arkansas wildlife

Cassin's 17-year cicada

We took our annual trip up to northwest Arkansas this past week. Along the way, I took photos of interesting wildlife I met along the way. Take a look!

Metallic crab spider

Soldier beetle

Spangled fritillary

Genus Lucidota, a firefly

Zebra swallowtail

Silvery checkerspot

Some cute wildlife!

James rescued a HUGE earthworm on a sidewalk!

Hackberry emperor landed on me!

A woolly aphid

Odd caterpillar

Mother Nature has the most interesting and unusual cast of wild characters. When I found this little guy, I was really mystified. With help from iNaturalist friends, we identified this as a wedgling moth larva (Galgula partita). Here's what an adult looks like. Yes, I've observed the adults numerous times in our Wildscape. Cool!

My photo of an adult

Interesting ant....NOT

This little guy caught my eye last month (April 27). Looks like an ant, right? Wrong. It's a velvet ant, most likely Ephuta sp. (Velvet ants are wingless, solitary wasps.) I thought it was especially interesting to see how it held its abdomen up in the air as it crawled (see video).

 

 

New toad to me

Ever seen one of these before? I hadn't. James unearthed it from our mulch pile last month (April 30). Meet a western narrow-mouthed toad (Gastrophryne olivacea). I got some photos, then James released it in the ditch. That brings our frog and toad species list up to five now: Blanchard's cricket frog, Rio Grande leopard frog, Gulf Coast toad, and Cope's gray treefrog.

Blanco fifth graders and spiders

Last Wednesday, I spent most of my day with fifth graders at Blanco Elementary School. I lightened up my "Spiders of Central Texas" slide program and presented it to four science classes. Thank you for inviting me, Mrs. Blenden! I hope we make this an annual tradition. P.S. She told me later that day that her students were already saving and identifying spiders on campus! Time well invested, I'd say.

UPDATE: Look! Oh, my goodness, I'm so touched and very impressed! Mrs. Blenden's students hand wrote me thank-you cards for my spider presentation! Many of them told me their favorite spiders (jumping spiders mostly and a few wolfs) and what they learned. How thoughtful! I enjoyed my time with them very much. Thank YOU!

Day in the Park 2024

What a great day yesterday! James and I–along with Mary Jo H. (above with us) and many other Texas Master Naturalists from the Highland Lakes chapter–for the day hosted third graders from Blanco Elementary School at Blanco State Park. The kids rotated from station to station, which included my "Spiders" station along with monarchs, art, fish and a few others. A little drizzly but everything went fine.