Broken twig porch moth

Because that's what I thought it was at first. A little piece of broken twig lying on the threshold of my front door.

It had bark on the outside, and you could see the wood in the jagged, broken part.


But if you look carefully, you can also see legs.



And a cute little face.

I looked on BugGuide to ID it, but there's too many zillions of moths and I got tired of looking. So for now, it's the Broken Twig Moth.

Eucalyptus Leaf Beetles

I checked a likely-looking Eucalyptus tree with some fresh new growth and found some beetles and small larvae.





These cute little brown beetles do a lot of damage.



Some tiny beetle larvae.

I'm not sure what this is on the beetle eggs. I will try to investigate further.

You can see my older Eucalyptus beetle posts here.

Nature walk this morning

This magnificent snail was crossing our path. I have never been on that trail early enough in the day to see these snails when they're not asleep. Until today :)











There were a lot of these black beetles in one area. Many were paired up and "spooning" like these two.


The single ones were diggin' around in the soil. I think this was the tailings of a gopher mound.

Yellow sulphur caterpillars

A couple of moms with their little kids arrived at the arboretum too late on Sunday and missed the worm class. I offered to take them on a mini bug safari, and we found a senna plant filled with bright yellow caterpillars.

Green porch moth

This beautiful little moth on my porch this morning was about the same size, but much greener than the one I found in 2007.

Earthworms with a side of Pseudoscorpion

Our "worms" class at the arboretum went very well. Lots of people are interested in vermicomposting. The kids just like worms because they're cool. But I saw something in the worm bedding I'd never seen before.


A tiny pseudoscorpion!



It was hard to photograph it because it was so tiny.

So you can better appreciate how miniscule this critter was, here it is posing next to a grain of rice.

More pictures and information on Bugguide.

A handsome snail

A handsome snail

Recent monarch favorites

Recent monarch favorites

Fly with prey

This small fly was outside my car window, and it was eating another fly (or maybe it was a little treehopper).

Some rainy day leftovers

From last week when it was wet outside:


a pale slug.





A bluish snail.