Garden Creatures: Predators, Pollination, and More

I think of my backyard garden as its own little ecosystem, and I'm constantly amazed at the diversity of creatures that choose to make their homes there (usually because they want to eat the flowers or leaves, or because they want to eat the things that eat the flowers or leaves). Here's a small sampling of the creatures (mostly insects) I've noticed in the garden over the past two weeks. It's a jungle out there!

Flowers are a big deal in the garden, and there are always plenty of bees around. This bumblebee has its head buried in a bean flower and the pollen baskets on its legs are brimming full of collected pollen (I just learned about this part of bee anatomy, and I think it's super cool):
 

In addition to the flowering plants I actually put in the garden on purpose, a huge Pokeweed plant has sprung up in one shady corner, and I let it grow because I think it's quite attractive. Lots of flying insects apparently like it, too. This very small wasp is enjoying the Pokeweed's little white blossoms:
 

And this much larger wasp (probably a Four-toothed Mason Wasp, Monobia quadridens) is browsing over the Pokeweed blooms as well:
 

In the leaf-eating camp, several leafhopper-type bugs make their homes here (in small numbers, so I'm not worried about them damaging the plants). This fancy leafhopper (Graphocephala versuta, I think) is very pretty in subtle green/blue/yellow stripes, and as I watched it, it seemed to be exuding some sort of liquid and collecting the droplets with its legs. Weird!
 

I see these Citrus Flatid Planthoppers (Metcalfa pruinosa) pretty frequently, and I quite like their powdery gray outfits:
 

Baby leafhoppers look super strange. This leafhopper nymph was showing off its weird semi-translucent body on a bean leaf:

This stocky planthopper nymph (possibly genus Acanalonia) was eying me warily:
 

This next leaf-eater I am definitely not happy to see, as it takes huge chunks out of my bean leaves. Go away, Japanese Beetle, I don't want you here:
 

A few times now, I've noticed a strangely symmetrical bit of dried leaf, and then realize... oh, it's a moth! This is an Omnivorous Leafroller (Archips purpurana), I believe:
 

And speaking of leaf-like creatures, this Greater Angle-wing Katydid nymph (Microcentrum rhombifolium) does a fantastic job of blending in with these soybean leaves:
 

This creature isn't quite full-grown yet, but it's still pretty big -- about the size of my thumb. I've seen it several days in a row in the same spot, and I have to admire it every time. I love its mottled green skin, and those tiny baby wings are sooo cute:
 

When I saw this katydid most recently (I'm 99% sure it was the same individual, with that same missing leg and the same pattern of dots on its back), its little wings were bigger! Grow, baby katydid, grow:
 

Other cool creatures include this little cricket with antennae so big I couldn't fit them in the frame (they're about two or three times longer than this picture shows):
 

And this tiny adorable jumping spider who couldn't decide whether to focus more on the giant camera lens looming over its head...
 

Or the huge pink blob (i.e., my finger) that had invaded its home leaf:
 

The little spider was probably keeping an eye out for a meal, and there are tons of other predators all over the garden. Long-legged flies are particularly prevalent, little sparkling jewels in green, blue, and orange that cruise around looking for even tinier bugs to eat:
 

Mmm, this one got something!
 

But the long-legged flies can become meals, too.... This one wasn't very lucky, but I bet the spider's happy with its catch!
 

Robber flies are common predators around here, too. This one was hanging from the Pokeweed stem and munching on a nice fat beetle:
 

Finally, speaking of predators, I was very happy to find an American Toad living in the garden. I took this picture with my phone (I clearly need to always have my camera with me) in early July, but I saw the toad again last week, so I'm hoping it's sticking around:
 

This individual has just the most wonderful deep brown/maroon color, the likes of which I don't remember ever seeing on a toad before. I think it's a gorgeous creature, and I love that it's been out there on bug/slug patrol. Eat away, lovely toad!
 

Whew, so many things to see, and I don't even have to leave my yard! Summer is such a lively time, and I'm looking forward to meeting more cool creatures in my garden as the season continues.

Really Weird (and Less Weird) Bugs

There have been some really strange insects showing up in our yard recently. And by "strange" I mean creatures that I can't immediately put a name to, not even a really broad family name like "bee" or "fly." Take this bug that I found on our front porch this afternoon, for instance:
 

What in the world is that?! With that long body and those long shiny wings, it looked a lot like a big wasp. It even moved like a wasp, cleaning itself with quick, graceful motions, and starting up at me menacingly when I got too close:
 

But what are those hard shells in the middle of its back? And those aren't a wasp's antennae, nor is that a wasp's face...
 

It was actually those square-shaped shells that tipped me off as to what type of insect this creature might be, and pointed me in the right direction toward identifying it. Those shells are elytra, the hardened forewings of beetles that usually cover their entire abdomen. And searching for "beetle with short elytra" led me to the rove beetles (family Staphylinidae) and the probable identification of this creature as the species Platydracus maculosus. It's a beetle! Totally weird!

Another bug that I didn't have even a general name for has shown up in the garden a few times this year, and I spotted it again today:
 

I don't remember seeing anything like this before, and the body shape seems utterly strange to me. But those long hind legs suggest something in the grasshopper family, and indeed, with some looking around, this turns out to be a nymph (juvenile) of some sort of tree cricket (possibly Neoxabea bipunctata).
 

Tree crickets are supposed to live, well, up in the trees, so I'm not sure what this little guy is doing in my garden. Maybe it'll stick around as it grows up, and then I can see what an adult tree cricket looks like.

I'd seen a Fishfly (genus Chauliodes) last summer, otherwise I would have also been stumped by this individual who came to our porch lights last week -- what a monster!
 

And although very familiar to me by now (since there are always a few hunting in my garden), Robber Flies do still bring a certain weirdness factor, especially the big ones:
 

Finally, I wouldn't call these last bugs "weird" (at least, not in the same sense as all the previous creatures in this post), but their bright colors make them pretty unusual compared to most other insects around here. I like these fancy leafhoppers a lot, so I was happy to see them in the process of making more leafhoppers!
 

Just when you think you have a handle on bugs, there are always crazy new creatures waiting to appear!

Garden Bugs Up Close

Well, the garden's up and thriving, which means that there will (hopefully) be yummy food in our future. It also means that there's a whole jungle of amazing tiny creatures right outside our door! I've been taking my macro lens out into the garden for the past few days to put it through its paces (and try to learn how to really use it), and I've seen some very cool bugs in the process. Here's a sampling!

Long-legged Flies (family Dolichopodidae) are very common in our garden -- small hunters zooming around and sporting iridescent costumes in green or orange. The hunting must be good here, because so many of these creatures were munching on smaller bugs when I saw them, including this one:

This next Long-legged Fly seems to me to be striking a heroic pose -- off on an adventure, are we? (I admit that I'm probably crazy for thinking this.)

Another winged hunter, this larger Robber Fly (family Asilidae) paused on a sunny rock between flights:

And a small pretty beetle (species unknown) watched me from its mint-leaf platform:

Do you want to see an aphid up close?

We have Flea Beetles on our potato plants, but thankfully not enough to do any serious damage -- they just leave a few tiny pin holes in the leaves and pose for dramatic pictures:

This little Potter Wasp (possibly Parancistrocerus perennis) was inspecting the area:

And a leafhopper (family Cicadellidae) tried to hide behind a stem:

Speaking of leafhoppers, this Red-banded Leafhopper (Graphocephala coccinea) was absolutely the fanciest thing around:
 

I love that we have these gorgeous little creatures here -- they look like they should be somewhere tropical, not in my back yard:
 

This individual was very patient with me, and eventually I left it in peace in its nice hiding spot beneath the potato buds (where it seemed to practically glow in the shade):
 

I had to go back to a regular lens to take a picture of this last creature -- a lovely big Ebony Jewelwing (Calopteryx maculata), a type of damselfly, and identifiable as a female because of those white spots on her wings:

I've been seeing one of these creatures in the garden for several days in a row now -- could it be the same individual? Perhaps she's also finding the garden to be a good place to hunt. Such a pretty girl:
 

I have one more garden bug (well, spider) to share, but she's just too cool and so will need her own post. Stay tuned!

Garden Hunters: Robber Flies

I guess I've been on something of a bugs-in-the-garden kick recently. With the hot weather and long days, I haven't been making as many extended trips to the woods, and it's just so easy to bring the camera out to the garden and find crazy creatures there. So here's another garden-bugs post, featuring a new type of insect that I've just learned about, and which was making a strong presence in the garden this morning: robber flies.

These are some scary-looking creatures, but the only things that need to be afraid of them are other insects, like the smaller fly being munched on in the picture above. Robber flies are hunters, zooming around and catching insects to eat. Apparently they can bite humans, but they'll only do it if you try to grab them -- and they don't sting, despite that imposing-looking ovipositor on the female (at least, I think it's a female) in this picture. This robber fly was pretty big, probably about an inch long. Also, I love the big fuzzy mustache on this girl, which you can see better if you click the picture to zoom in.

Here's another type of robber fly, even bigger than the first -- and I can make a species identification for this one: Asilus sericeus. I watched this fellow chase a medium-sized white butterfly around the yard for a minute or so (it didn't catch it), before it settled onto a leaf to clean itself. Do you see that little yellow knob-shaped thing just below the base of this creature's wings? All flies (order Diptera, i.e. "two wings") have those, and they're actually a modified second pair of wings, called "halteres," which help with balance and other important stuff during flight. How cool that this robber fly is so big, so I can actually see these funky little body parts clearly!

So robber flies seem to be pretty big-time hunters around here, but I don't think they're going to help me with these guys:

This is the first Japanese Beetle I've seen this year, and I'm crossing my fingers that I won't find too many more.... I think most people know about these bugs because they're so pest-y. They're a pretty good example of a species that gets introduced to a new place, finds itself without many natural predators, and then goes to town eating all the yummy plants in sight.

Still, I've found an overwhelming number of good/interesting insects in the garden this year, and relatively few harmful ones. Here's hoping the balance remains tipped in my (and my plants') favor!