It has been precisely a month since I last posted (I hadn't even noticed, the past thirty-so days have been so busy), and I feel obliged to inform you of the numerous new additions to our family.
Starting off, we have an Antheraea polyphemus moth that emerged from its cocoon. It's a boy! (You can tell by the "fuzzy" antennae.) As you can see in the above picture, when he came out, his wings needed to be spread, so I put the little flopping bundle of joy on the top of its cage to fully spread his wings. Like a small child, it responded to my kindness by profusely defecating on my hand and desk
--I was just trying to help!
Here he is after he let his wings expand naturally. However, I noticed that they were not flat enough for my liking, so I decided to kindly help him out. After placing him in the freezer for about a week to keep him limber and fresh, I brought him to school and helped him spread his wings more thoroughly--and more permanently. That's what one gets for defecating on my hand.
A second baby boy came a few weeks later, and met a similar fate.
Fate was kinder, however, to the uncountable hordes of praying mantises that squeezed their way out of their ootheca over the past few weeks. I have no idea how many have hatched (I have seven live ones, have released over twenty into the wild because of space constraints, and more than five have died, so probably around thirty so far). There supposedly can be up to four hundred hatchlings per ootheca, so many more might be released into our local ecosystem.
The first to emerge.
Eating off my hand like a good baby! (Pay attention, A. polyphemus.)
Unfortunately, some of them are not able to get out of the egg case before their bodies harden and they become stuck. With their legs glued together, they have no hope of survival, so it would not be by any means immoral to just put them in ethanol. I will not state whether or not I put them in ethanol immediately, as I would prefer not to feel judged.
Sawfly larvae are also hatching, like these Xyela sp. I found rolling about on our trampoline. In addition to making a fine addition to my collection...
...they make wonderful snacks for the kiddos.
I just came back from a vacation to Alabama, where we saw Bellingrath Gardens and found many, many spiders--but upon entering my room, I discovered a terrible sight:
One of the seven mantises I have room to keep had died. From his position and the fact that he was literally stuck to the floor of his container, I inferred that he had drowned in a small droplet of water and dried out with the water. None of the other babies suffered this fate, fortunately. After scraping him off with a piece of pine straw, I found a replacement among the eighteen mantises that had hatched while I was out of town. The rest of them had to go to the garden, except for the three that had died. Baby mantises have a surprisingly high mortality rate.
On the subject of death, all these fine fellows succumbed to some mold or mildew or bacteria or something like that that was growing in their tank. They had survived the same plague many times before, and one or two of them showed signs of life for a few days, but when they all stopped moving, I had no choice but to dispose of the bodies of some of my best friends.
Some might be disposed to blame me for their deaths; after all, I allowed the tank to get to fatal levels of toxic growth. However, I had cleaned the tank out three days before, and the water looked perfectly clear from above--it was only after scraping the bottom that I realized what had killed them. It definitely wasn't my fault. No kidding. I'm a good insect parent.
On a combined note of death and life, I saw this at our local Science Museum.
The little dust specks under the stag beetle are signs of a carpet-beetle infestation (Anthrenus spp.).
This shed larval exoskeleton is also sing of an infestation.
I heroically informed the Museum curators, who were thankful for my careful observation. Would you believe that they even offered to hold a parade in my honor? You should. I, however, being so very humble, politely declined.
The reason I was aware of the problem of carpet beetles is because we have found some in our school's collection. We have yet to do anything about it, but we know they're there.
On the subject of damaged insects, the above image depicts a black-form female Tiger Swallowtail (Papilio glaucus) I found on the side of the Natchez Trace. Its left wing was undeveloped and it was cold, with no hope of it expanding naturally, so I picked it up and brought it home. Unfortunately, even though it hung from the ceiling of a jar for more than a day, its wing never expanded. There was no way it could have survived that debilitation --it wouldn't even eat when I placed flowers and mud into its cage (yes, swallowtails eat mud and even manure). Therefore, I put it in the freezer, where it still resides, until I can figure out whether I can still spread it.
On the happy subject of butterflies, I drew a Malachite (Siproeta stelenes) that I saw on a missions trip to El Salvador over the summer. Special thanks to my sister for letting me borrow her markers, but no thanks to her for constantly pestering me to give them back. Art takes time! I've only had them for three weeks now!
However, I got frustrated with another, larger butterfly drawing (on which I have spent five hours and gotten halfway done), and decided to draw a Glyphodes grandisalis I had seen in a photographic atlas of moths. It was fun being able to draw something in less than an hour!
Now, onto everyone's favorite part: the miscellanies.
At Bellingrath, we saw a Rough Greensnake (Opheodrys aestivus) that had been infected by Snake Fungal Disease. SND is a growing problems among snake populations in the States. I think it kills them (as most fungal diseases seem to do).
My brother also found a tiny Portuguese man of war, which I collected carefully in a vial and placed in ethanol later, where it rapidly changed from purple to clear. Chemistry is weird.
That's basically everything that has happened over the last month. I hope updates will become more frequent as spring approaches and my praying mantises grow!
