Enos Shenk posted:

Reposting for the new thread.

The other night I had a nice treat. My old man spotted a cicada molting on the leaf of a decorative plant. I had only seen it in person once before when I was little, so I fetched my camera gear. It was a great spot to set up on the tripod and really pull in close.



Wings at full size.

He/She stayed on the next leaf overnight, letting the exoskeleton harden. It took about 20 minutes from the start with just the head broken free to being completely molted. By the afternoon of the next day they were gone, off to start their adult life.

my cat is norris posted:

Be so kind as to link that image instead of posting in-line, would you, please?

Corvids are fascinating...you can't help thinking that was some kind of ritual for them. You sent me down a rabbit-hole.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ixYVFZnNl6s

Athanatos posted:

I had this visit me on my porch:



Which google says is a Variegated Fritillary Caterpillar.

They were a fantastic red color, the picture does not do them justice.

Synnr posted:

Almost ran face first into a big ol' web stretched over my back door. Saw this fellow/lady reeling in a snack




It's hard to get a decent up close fancy shot but it's pretty clear (to me anyway) it's a healthy sized spotted orb weaver. It's like 50 cent piece big.

I'll see if it's still there in the morning and let it feast tonight. Maybe scoot it over to the corner near the door if it's still there.

Rexxed posted:

A basketball sized nest of buzzy jerks moved in. I'm not going within 20 feet.

vortmax posted:

Also a water snake that stayed in the water and far from me


[central Arkansas]

poverty goat posted:

There it goes

McGavin posted:

No, but Aeshna is a widespread genus with a Holarctic distribution, and many of them look quite similar. Mine is probably a female Shadow Darner, Aeshna umbrosa.

CaptainSarcastic posted:

Spider vision is pretty cool - their eyes work cooperatively, and the different eyes are serving different purposes.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/06/science/spider-vision.html

poverty goat posted:

McGavin posted:

I'm going to say it's a Vine Sphinx, Eumorpha vitis. It lacks the brown bands along the leading edges of the wings that are indicative of a Banded Sphinx.

For reference:


Vine Sphinx


Banded Sphinx

Chard posted:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=61KHdwCekCU

i tried to send it to my mom and she said the same thing, so i have the video still in my messages. alternatively, this works great https://github.com/iamadamdev/bypass-paywalls-chrome

poverty goat posted:

My crows showed up every day through the spring, and would watch for me to look out the window and swoop over so I would see them and proceed with the ritual every single morning to get a breakfast of dogfood in fresh water. And in mid-june when their kids were flying they just stopped showing up regularly and hung out everyday with the larger group of local crows, which in my case totally ignores me, except right before garbage day when pickings are slim, when Mr. Crow all by himself would come by every other week or so if I looked out for a crow hanging out in a certain tree.

But now it is September, the tourists are leaving, and three days ago my crows started showing up every morning again just like in June. They hang out in one of a handful of spots, looking for me, and when they see me they fly straight over. And by they, I mean Mr. Crow with his gimpy foot and his mate. I'm so lucky that the crow that befriended me has such a distinctive feature or I'd have absolutely no clue, but his left foot is hosed and he walks with a limp on a closed fist, and since his combats with the hawk in June he is still missing a big clumb of tail feathers which makes him really easy to spot. And he's by far the chillest crow in the neighborhood around me. He's metal as gently caress and I'll give him dogfood as long as he wants, especially if he keeps raising his kids in my yard.

CaptainSarcastic posted:

Sorry, I might have landed under the "free articles" limit, or used one of my usual dumb workarounds to get to the article. I browse pretty much exclusively on desktop, and to get around the NYT paywall opening the article in an incognito window, then refreshing the page and stopping it before it fully loads usually works for me.

Chard posted:

alternatively, this works great https://github.com/iamadamdev/bypass-paywalls-chrome

poverty goat posted:

My crows showed up every day through the spring, and would watch for me to look out the window and swoop over so I would see them and proceed with the ritual every single morning to get a breakfast of dogfood in fresh water. And in mid-june when their kids were flying they just stopped showing up regularly and hung out everyday with the larger group of local crows, which in my case totally ignores me, except right before garbage day when pickings are slim, when Mr. Crow all by himself would come by every other week or so if I looked out for a crow hanging out in a certain tree.

But now it is September, the tourists are leaving, and three days ago my crows started showing up every morning again just like in June. They hang out in one of a handful of spots, looking for me, and when they see me they fly straight over. And by they, I mean Mr. Crow with his gimpy foot and his mate. I'm so lucky that the crow that befriended me has such a distinctive feature or I'd have absolutely no clue, but his left foot is hosed and he walks with a limp on a closed fist, and since his combats with the hawk in June he is still missing a big clumb of tail feathers which makes him really easy to spot. And he's by far the chillest crow in the neighborhood around me. He's metal as gently caress and I'll give him dogfood as long as he wants, especially if he keeps raising his kids in my yard.

poverty goat posted:

Almost all of the birds here have been wiped out by some bird plague since summer. It's apparently a thing on the east coast. Finches, cardinals, grackles, brown thrashers, mockingbirds- gone. I've had healthy year-round populations of all of those forever. There's no birdsong, and I had to pull my feeders. Here and there a lone finch or grackle shows up looking for food, and a significant number of them look unhealthy with patchy feathers particularly on their heads. I'm watching an unhealthy looking one-legged grackle peck around at old sunflower shells right now.

It's all very depressing.

poverty goat posted:

Pick a whistle to call the crows and whistle whenever you put nuts out there. And now that you know you have their attention you can start changing the rules of the game; go out and let them see you, but only put the nuts out when a crow comes closer to see what you're doing. Or at least start shifting the routine that way as long as they seem to be keeping up.

BlancoNino posted:

Helped this future bane of the pond across a busy road and gave it a rinse because it seemed dried out.

Very small snapper, maybe the length of my thumb.

CaptainSarcastic posted:

From earlier today, a short video of some of my corvid friends visiting for peanuts. I got some more pictures and videos from today that I haven't done anything with yet, but I think this is one of the better videos. I mostly have scrub jay buddies, but I also have Steller's that come by fairly often, as well as crows and squirrels. They all know that if they get my attention I'll put good peanuts out in the planter outside my front door.

The scrubs and crows tend to be circumspect if I'm too close to the door, but the Steller's don't give a poo poo, and the squirrels have gotten pretty comfortable.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LdFUYsuvR3w

poverty goat posted:

depressing bird plague spoilers
my crows are sick now and I am watching them waste away day by day. they still come by for treats when they see me and I still give them dog food and fresh water and then put it away when they're done, but they looked like poo poo today

poverty goat posted:

I've reported it to cornell and to the state agencies, but no, I've heard/found zero messaging about it in my area and heard nothing back from them yet. I'm near back bay wildlife refuge so maybe I'll call them tomorrow and see if they know anything.

I definitely saw two birds, a finch and a mourning dove, each looking disoriented with crusty eye in May/June- actually a swollen or crusty mound over one eye, but that's not specifically what I'm seeing now. The symptom I see now is around the eyes, beginning with what might be crust in the feathers below the eye in mild cases, proceeding to loss of feathers generally around the head and the back of the neck in extreme cases. That's where the crows are- big patches of pink bare skin in the vincinity of their eyes and around the backs of their necks. Two days ago it was just some mild crusting around one eye on one crow. There's been a grackle around in the same state, missing patches of feathers on his head. There are still lots of doves around but a couple of them have the mild symptom around one or both eyes. I suspect now that a finch and cardinal i identified the other day as having patchy, intermediate coloring might have been suffering this as well. another 4 or so species of birds are just missing from the property but I haven't seen any dead or sick.

but it doesn't seem like an exact match for the other stuff, no, though it's widespread and the eyes seem to be the thing

poverty goat posted:

Literally A Ghost posted:

So what the hell is this horror show of a creature:



The back legs were loving 2.5" long!!!


E: in coastal oregon

cheetah7071 posted:

I think your eyes glazed over the legs

Gunshow Poophole posted:

Help

What beetle

First instinct was a devil horse beetle, second was some sort of giant oil beetle. It was almost two inches long. I'm in upstate new york.



Further away, less phone lovely focus, more iridescence

Murdstone posted:

I bet they have figured that out, yes.

I wonder if the time change screwed up that one crow. It still thinks 7:30 is 8:30.

-Zydeco- posted:

Found this guy walking down the hallway at work. I let them go in my office so they wouldn't get squished.
https://i.imgur.com/lZYTLC8.mp4

Blood Nightmaster posted:

I found this lil guy having a real one across the street on a neighbor's porch the other day (do not skip the sound!)

Alterian posted:

I saw this toad yesterday.

Scarodactyl posted:

An anole visited our tree to do pushups and flash his colorful dewlap.

Blue Footed Booby posted:

Yeah, any time you see a funny picture of, like, a line of roads on a snake, those are male toads trying to gently caress the snake. They are not clever creatures.

Bored posted:

Lone Turkey in the yard.

Captain Hygiene posted:

Yeah, that definitely sounds more like an owl or some other type of bird to me. Coyotes I've heard have been higher pitched than that, and have a lot of yipping noises mixed in with longer yowls.
No idea exactly what it is though, I'm very curious.

Captain Invictus posted:

so a few years ago I think I posted in this or a previous thread about the trap I set to catch a squirrel in my attic, but when I went to get it, I found this guy inside it instead.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=emYrekO2YeI&hd=1

I released him outside the house, and he went from the back door to the forest edge in roughly 5 seconds, really impressive speed. Then over the winter, I saw him, now nicknamed Pop, hopping around in the snow and tunneling.

A few years later, this past saturday, and I was sitting on my front step waiting for a delivery when I saw movement out of the corner of my eye. Poking out of a hole in the ground presumably initially dug by a chipmunk, he was sticking out like a periscope, and the moment I turned my head to look at him, he leapt out of it and bolted around the corner of the house. I'm sure he's still got ways of getting inside the walls of the house, even with all the repairs and new siding we've had done, but I'm not too bothered by him getting in as I am chipmunks and mice, and him getting in the walls is honestly probably good for dealing with that since I'm sure pests like mice are dissuaded from entering an area with the scent of a predator like a weasel.

I'm just happy he's still around and doing his thing. god they're just the most adorable little murdernoodles.

deep dish peat moss posted:

According to Google it may not have been albino, apparently all praying mantises turn that ivory color after molting, which they do about 10 times in their life, and then as their exoskeleton hardens it turns green again So perhaps there's a lil' green mantis shell out there somewhere. Could also explain why it was just hanging out on a metal table in the afternoon arizona sun.