Summer Nectar 2 - Japanese Knotweed

The most popular source of food for nectarivores at Halibut Point in mid-August is the flowering Japanese Knotweed. It bridges a nutritional gap for them between the seasons of meadowsweet and goldenrod.

Japanese Knotweed, Polygonum cuspidatum 

Knotweed is an assertive plant on the Least Wanted List among invasive species. It thuggishly resists removal from refined gardens, but its verdure and flowers persevere admirably through drought and poor soil. Alongside this meadow its spreading tendencies are kept in check by woods to the rear and by lawn mowing to the front. Here insects find a mid-summer nectar bonanza.

Four-toothed Mason Wasp, Monobia quadridens

The knotweed clump hosts a great convergence of feeding insects, wasps prominently among them. At no other time or place have I seen such a varied concentration of wasp species on Halibut Point.

Square-headed Wasp, family Crabronidae

The Crabronidae  family of wasps is considered by entomologists to be the evolutionary forebear of bees. While wasps are generally carnivorous at least in provisioning their young with captured insects, bees have developed the ability to live exclusively on pollen and nectar at all stages of their lives.

Jewel Beetle Wasp, Cerceris fumipennis, family Crabronidae

Many adult wasps depend on flower nourishment. Though most of them lack the body hairs or special receptacles with which bees transport pollen, wasps still potentially contribute to the fertilization of some plant species.

Mexican Grass-carrying Wasp, Isodontia mexicana

Seen under magnification, wasps in the genus Isodontia look particularly furry.

Yellowjacket, Vespula maculifrons

Unlike bees, many wasps have the ability to sting repeatedly when preying on other insects, or when defending their nests.

Blackjacket, Vespula consobrina

They are a benign presence foraging in the knotweed flower community.

Bald-faced Hornet, Dolichovespula maculata

'Hornet' seems to be a term reserved for larger, chunkier wasps. All hornets are wasps, but all wasps are not hornets.

Northern Paper Wasp, Polistes fuscatus

Some species of wasps nest together socially by building papery homes from masticated materials.

Great Black Wasp, Sphex pensylvanicus

Like all insects, wasps have a hard exoskeleton which protects their three main body parts, the head, the mesosoma (including the thorax and the first segment of the abdomen) and the metasoma. 

Thread-waisted Wasp, Ammophila nigricans

Wasps have distinctly narrow waists joining the first and second segments of the abdomen. These 'petioles' are particularly conspicuous in the thread-waisted group. Their two pairs of membranous wings are held together by small hooks. The forewings are larger than the hind ones.

Gold-marked Thread-waisted Wasp, Eremnophila aureonotata

Wasps possess mandibles adapted for biting and cutting, like those of many other insects, such as grasshoppers, but their other mouthparts are formed into a suctorial probiscus which enables them to drink nectar. 

Rusty Spider Wasp, Tachypompilus ferrugineus nigrescens

In addition to their large compound eyes wasps have several simple eyes known as ocelli which are typically arranged in a triangle just forward of the vertex of the head. No doubt this accounts for their hunting abilities when roaming at high speed over meadows and shrubbery, searching out insect and spider prey.

Summer Nectar 1 - Sunflowers

Helianthus divaricatus, Woodland Sunflower

Tucked within the name of Halibut Point's native sunflower is 'divarication', which means branching and spreading but sometimes with an inelegant sense of sprawling. Happily for Park visitors and pollinators Helianthus divaricatus divaricates through the moors holding golden flowers above the tangled briers and shoreline panorama.

Cabbage White butterfly

This sunflower has attracted a variety of butterflies in what has otherwise seemed a slim year for everybody's favorite insect.

Little Glassywing

American Copper

Monarch

Pearl Crescent butterfly and Bumblebee

The sunflowers provide nectar to an eclectic group of pollinators. Interestingly, this very seldom includes honeybees, but various native bees relish the offering. 

Furrow Bee, Halictidae

Plaster Bee, Colletes inaequalis

Small Carpenter Bee, Ceratina

Metallic Sweat Bee, Halictidae

Some bee look-alikes in the Flower Fly family Syrphidae also show up for the banquet.

Toxomerus geminatus

Epistrophe grossulariae

Syrphus torvus

Eristalis transversa

None of these nectar-seekers is bothered by wasps that join in the nutrition-for-pollination barter with the plant, although many wasps hunt other insects as food for their developing larvae.

Ammophila nigricans, Thread-waisted Wasp

This Thread-waisted Wasp has paralyzed a caterpillar larger than itself, that it is carrying off to feed its young in a burrow.

The wasp deposits eggs in the still-living caterpillar. As its larvae develop they slowly consume their slowly dying host.

Meanwhile the plant, which originates the cycle by converting solar energy to organic life, displays its sunflowers to the pollinators that help perpetuate it.

The Nature of Nymphs

 The spirit of renewal visits Halibut Point in the nature of its nymphs.

Neonatal nymphs need protection while innocence and power fuse in their formative days.

In pandemic times their tutelage begins warily, peering into perils fully masked.

Then grace stirs their true nature

and they emerge to thaw stony circumstances,

to lighten the weighty gloom.

Nymphs make magic with what they find at hand.

Nymphs make merry with what they find at heart.

Enchanting Nymphs

In the dappled light of a glade at Halibut Point the bug observer noticed an apparition around the edge of a leaf. Its unlikely form and fantastical colors were unlike any previous encounter in this world of miniaturized wonders. He photographed it to consult with sober authorities on the nature of the sighting.

The lovely enigma provoked discoveries of an adolescent stage previously unknown to him. The mystery seemed unapproachable through books. How could he understand revelations without a guide? Seasoned observers confided he had met a nymph.

Scudderia nymph, a young Bush Katydid

Some time later he encountered a similar creature with budding wings. He learned that nymphs go through a series of instars on their way to maturity. Their development is not continuous within a supple skin. Moira, the supervisor of fates, has them molt from an inflexible exoskeleton at every stage.

One nymph instar of a Twice-stabbed Stink Bug, Cosmopepla lintneriana

Another instar of the same species

A nymph might emerge into successive instars looking very little like the previous stage, and possibly with a different diet.

A Green Stink Bug nymph, just beginning to develop wings

Moira may finally usher the nymph to maturity with little resemblance to its pubescent forms.

An adult Green Stink Bug, Chinavia hilaris

For protective reasons a nymph may blend into its surroundings or be boldly patterned to warn those who would do it harm, of unpleasant tastes or consequences.

Nymph of a Four-lined Plant Bug

And so it speckles the glade in bright innocence with its harlequin destiny.

An adult Four-lined Plant Bug, Poecilocapsus lineatus

With every molt the nymph ascends to adult powers in fulfillment of Moira's temporal allotment, perhaps only days or weeks in duration.

A Planthopper nymph of the Nephesini tribe

Young Hoppers regale in acquiring the ability to leap and fly.

A Leafhopper nymph, Jikradia olitoria

A second nymph of the same species, Jikradia olitoria

From earliest times their acute vision develops in outsized eyes, for the sorties they will make through the air.

Nymph a Leptoglossus Leaf-footed Bug

 

The visitor to the glade admires the vestments that Moira has provided her progeny.

A spiny Asian Lady Beetle nymph

The visitor steals glimpses of processes procreating through beautiful forms to the irresistible call of life.

An adult Asian Lady Beetle, Harmonia axyridis