Today I joined the WGNSS Botany Group as we hiked a portion of the Whispering Pines Trail to look for a rare clubmoss, then bushwhacked back to the beginning and went off-trail to a nearby sandstone box canyon to look for rare ferns. We found the clubmoss—Diphasiastrum tristachyum (blue clubmoss)—growing in the shortleaf pine/scarlet oak forest atop a LaMotte Sandstone cliff. Though common in eastern North America and Eurasia, the area in and around Hawn State Park is the only known station for the plant in Missouri, and this population is highly distinct from the next nearest population in Te ..read more

I haven’t been to LaBarque Creek for quite a while, so it was good to see it again, especially without encountering a single other person (the benefit of being able to hike during the week compared to a Sunday). It’s still much warmer than I prefer for a fall hike, but it was beautiful out and I did see one insect—an unusually pinkish-brown—colored bush katydid (Scudderia sp.). Scudderia sp. (bush katydid—family Tettigoniidae) in dry-mesic upland oak/hickory forest. This is, in my opinion, the most interesting of the three conservation/natural areas in the LaBarque Creek watershed—by far the m ..read more

Last month I made the fifth and final trip to extreme northwestern Oklahoma as part of a trapping study conducted at several locations throughout the area. Recall the main part of the study involved “jug traps” baited with pure ethanol (EtOH), sweet red wine (SRW), or a 50:50 blend of both (SRW/EtOH) to evaluate their efficacy in capturing longhorned beetles (family Cerambycidae). The traps were set in mid-May with the help of my good friend and longtime collecting buddy Rich Thoma (see First insect collecting trip of the season) and checked at ~5-week intervals throughout the season—first in ..read more

For the first time in many months I was able to join the WGNSS (Webster Groves Nature Study Society) Botany Group on their regular Monday field trip (my frenetic bug collecting schedule and travel w/ Madam during this past summer had made this all but impossible). I wish I could have joined the group this summer, as that is when all the good stuff to see is out, but off-season botany is still fun, and the chance to test my ID skills with other experts only adds to the fun (not to mention just socializing as a group). St. Joe State Park is one of my favorites, and the Farmington Trailhead is a ..read more

In late August, I made another trip out to northwestern Oklahoma to service “jug traps” and other insect traps placed at several locations throughout the area. The traps were set in mid-May (see “First insect collecting trip of the season”), checked for the first time in mid-June at the beginning of a 3-week long collecting trip to the southwestern U.S. (see “2023 Southwestern U.S. Collecting Trip iReport”), and checked again in late July (see “July “jug trap” run”). This post describes the third trip to service the traps—less about what the traps themselves had caught and more about other ins ..read more

As a writer of an entomology blog, I don’t normally get hate mail—at most a critical comment about the way my specimens are curated or labeled, or perhaps an opposing thought regarding application of the subspecies concept. But recently, I got a doozy! I was going to respond privately but didn’t want to reveal to them my private e-mail address. Then I was going to respond in a public post (and there is much to respond to), but I decided their position is so hardened that any response is pointless. Ultimately, I decided just to share the hate (sender’s name redacted to protect their privacy) as ..read more

You may recall in May I set out “jug traps” at several sites in northwestern Oklahoma stretching from Gloss Mountain State Park (just east of the panhandle) to near Kenton (extreme northwestern corner of the panhandle). I call them “jug traps” because they are made out of 1-G milk jugs. “Windows” cut into the upper part of the jug allow entry of beetles attracted to volatiles emanating from a wicked bait bottle suspended inside the upper part of the trap, and propylene glycol in the bottom part of the jug acts as a killing agent and preservative. (See this post for details about the traps and ..read more

Welcome to the 13th “Collecting Trip iReport” covering a 20-day insect collecting trip to the southwestern U.S. from June 20 to July 9, 2023. Joining me for the entire trip was Mike Arduser, a hymenopterist specializing in native bees with whom I’ve collected on and off for nearly 40 years! (For those who don’t know, Mike discovered what became the holotype of Acmaeodera chuckbellamyi, a species I described to honor my friend and mentor, the late Chuck Bellamy. That holotype remains the only known representative of the species.) The trip started with three days in the Oklahoma panhandle, where ..read more

April 1—Better late than never. The serviceberries (Amelanchier arborea) in my neighborhood have finally started blooming, marking the beginning of a month-long period where three charismatic native trees bloom in rapid succession (redbuds will follow shortly, followed by dogwood—the king of native flowering trees in Missouri). I normally see serviceberries begin blooming in mid- to late March, but the weather of late has been mostly coldish and cloudy. First bloom on April Fools Day is about as late as I’ve ever seen for this species. Amelanchier arborea (serviceberry) in dry-mesic upland dec ..read more

It’s not often that I see an insect that completely stumps me, especially on my regular morning walk in my own neighborhood. However, this morning I noticed a large(ish) brown insect lumbering across the road, and my first reaction was “What the heck is that?! Initially I thought it was some kind of beetle, but when I bent down and got a closer look at it, I saw that it was actually some kind of fly. But what kind – I’d never seen anything like it before. Coenomyia ferruginea (stink fly, family Xylophagidae) It took a little sleuthing, but eventually I determined its identity as Coenomyia ferr ..read more