This site is about 3/4 of a mile from home and can be an excellent place to go looking for birds in the spring, or insects and plants in the summer.
It’s not surprising how many cranflies we find since there are over a thousand species in eastern North America. It is somewhat surprising how few I can actually identify to species. That’s th case with this large one.
Right now flies are both abundant and diverse in species. The fly on the left is a Quadrant snipe fly, yes its head is mostly eyes. The beetle on the right is a “firefly” in the genus Photuris.
This nasty little beetle is a Lily leaf beetle. These can wreck havoc on ornamental lilies.
A couple of the moths that we found were a Speckled Renia moth on the left. A lot of moth names refer to the plants that their caterpillars eat. That’s the case with the Oak leafshredder Moth on the right. Fortunately there are a lot of oaks around.
The cute little bug on the left is a Dogwood spittlebug, obviously without its “spittle.” The fly (remember I said abundant and diverse) is in the genus Homoneura.
Some moths just stump me. Susan is better at identifying the small moths. But this one has me stumped.
I believe that this is an Acorn moth.
Long-legged flies have always proven popular with students since they are both attractive and relatively easy to identify.
This might be a Barbery geometer. Even the bigger attractive moths can be tough to get down to species.
More tomorrow when I attempt to get caught up on the past few days.
Michael's Place 