northeast-flora-and-fauna

Here's a Common Snapping Turtle I met last September. This fella was swimming with its head out of the water so that even the underwater parts of the turtle photographed pretty well. It was at the Raritan Power Canal part of Duke Island Park, a habitat popular with many species of turtle [1]. While you may not think they're cute and cuddly, other snapping turtles disagree with that assessment . I talked a little about their relatives in this earlier post . And I talked about why they might be easier to spot at Duke Island Park here (hint: it involves food). September 16, 2022 at Duke Island Park Photo 248764345, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC) [1] In my area, perhaps the best places to observe turtles are our 2 canals, the Delaware Raritan Canal and the (much shorter) Raritan Power Canal. Turtles seem to like the relatively calm water and plentiful basking opportunities there -and- the trails are close enough to the water that you can frequently get good looks

I don't often photograph ants. As fairly small insects, it's frequently difficult for me to get a good enough picture of them to post/identify, but after plenty of iNaturalist IDs I feel fairly good about claiming this as a Ferruginous Carpenter Ant (aka Red Carpenter Ant) [1]. Though I couldn't find a lot of information on the Ferruginous Carpenter Ant, Wikipedia has a pretty good article on carpenter ants in general. They get the "carpenter" part of their name from their ability to bore into wood to build their nests. Unlike termites though, they chew holes in wood only to build a home; they can't eat the wood. There's some question about how bad carpenter ants are for trees. Though they do chew into the tree, they may either eat other insects that feed on the trees, or they may just attack the other insects because they don't want them in the tree-neighborhood. But there is an exception to this: aphids or caterpillars that poop out honeydew may b

While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping, As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my apartment door. Okay, I have to confess that my hearing is not good enough to have heard this guy "tapping, gently rapping" on my door. It wasn't until I went outside that I noticed my visitor.  Probably because of the light in the doorway, my apartment door is a fairly popular spot for moths, mayflies, and various other nocturnal insects. This is bound to attract predators like the (relatively) large mantises down to small jumping spiders. I suspect this fella had staked out the area in hopes of making a meal of my smaller arthropod visitors. When trying to get an ID, I initially went with iNaturalist's 1st suggestion, a Carolina Mantis . But then I read that the wings of the Carolina Mantis only go about 2/3 of the way down its abdomen, which is obviously not the case with this individual. That leaves the 3 usual suspects: European Mantis - Generally bigger t

I get a lot of pictures of Great Blue Herons . They're not only fairly common (at least near water) but they're also fairly large birds that stand out around lakeshores and riverbanks. So here's another one, slowly striding through shallow water looking for unwary prey. September 1, 2022 at Duke Island Park Photo 238906839, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

Here's an American Snout I met a few years back. A few days ago I talked about a lepidopteran with a similar name ( Baltimore Snout ) so I figured the American Snout for Throwback Thursday. Unlike the Baltimore Snout, the American Snout is a butterfly . Thus every single butterfly species is more closely related to the American Snout than the Baltimore Snout is. Still, butterflies and moths (aka lepidopterans) are pretty similar (and related) types of insects, and both these lepidopterans can have labial palps that look to us like a big, long nose. Whether the American Snout is also a moth is kind of a philosophical taxonomic question. Some people knowledgeable about insects consider butterflies to be a type of moth, very similar to the way mathematicians consider a square to be a type of rectangle. These people presumably consider the terms "moth" and "lepidopteran" to be synonymous. Others basically look at butterflies and moths as separate groups, where bu

This is probably an Common Eastern Bumblebee , 1 of our most commonly seen bumblebees, but other bumblebees in the area can look similar, especially the Brown-belted Bumblebee and the Two-spotted Bumblebee . (Presumably the bumblebees have no difficulty distinguishing their species from the others, but IDing them can be tricky for us humans.) I have to admit that the 1st time I saw a bee with those orange blobs [1] on the legs, I wondered whether it was due to disease or some sort of parasite, but it turns out that they are pollen baskets . While "basket" may make you think of a container, bee pollen baskets are basically all pollen shaped into an oval that the bee can carry home. Quite a few bees will use pollen baskets, including honeybees , bumblebees , stingless bees , and orchid bees . My guess is that the presence of pollen baskets suggests that this particular bee had a successful day of pollen foraging. September 7, 2020 at the John Clyde Native Grassland Preserve Ph

Here's another American Goldfinch on Purple Coneflowers that've gone to seed. That "gone to seed" part is key. While Purple Coneflowers may be a cool place to sit and rest, they're also a great food source for the seed-loving American Goldfinches. Though you might not like having one of your chairs made out of chocolate or bacon, American Goldfinches don't seem to mind sitting where they eat. And Purple Coneflower seeds must be pretty appealing to them since these flowers were in a pretty busy area, a flowerbed in front of the Duke Farms Orientation Center. They were willing to tolerate some large, loud primates milling around them to get their beaks on those tasty seed morsels. And this wasn't a one-off either; I got pictures of them in basically the same spot in prior years. Given this was still breeding season, I suspect the lack of plumage vibrancy means this was a female. September 9, 2022 at Duke Farms Photo 248761189, (c) jpviolette, some rights

About once a year Duke Farms will have a summer mothing program where a naturalist sets up a sheet and bright lighting to attract moths while talking to us about them. Today I got a confirmation ID on one of the moths, a Baltimore Snout . Though I'm pretty confident of this ID, I have to admit that they do look pretty darned similar to a relative, the Dimorphic Snout  [1] [2]. The main differences are related to the large dark patches on their forewings: The patches are straighter in the Baltimore Snout. The patches extend closer to the end of the wings on the Baltimore Snout. There's sometimes a small point (described as a "tooth") at the end of the patch of a Dimorphic Snout. August 13, 2022 at Duke Farms Photo 228563476, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC) Note their "snout" is more accurately called a labial palp . They may help lepidopterans taste food before drinking it. [1] Technically only the female Dimorphic Snouts look like male/femal

Here's a Dekay's Brownsnake I met back in September (though not for the first time ). My impression is that these snakes are pretty common but are small enough they can be easily overlooked. Although the biggest on record was around 19 inches in length, most of the ones I see are smaller than that.  Their place in the food chain is that they mostly eat soft invertebrates like earthworms, slugs, and snails, and they're preyed upon by lots of small predators like some frogs/toads, bigger snakes, many birds, and small mammals like weasels. So if you invite a Dekay's Brownsnake over for dinner, you could serve escargot but don't invite your ferret friends. September 14, 2022 at Duke Farms Photo 248762526, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

Here's a fairly common wasp that's fairly happy building nests on the ceilings of outdoor structures: Guinea Paper Wasps . I believe this particular nest was under the green-roof pavilion near Duke Farms' Orientation Center. I had trouble getting a good picture because I had to shoot through some wire mesh; I have some sharper pictures here . Guinea Paper Wasps and all their wasp, bee, and ant relatives are haplodiploid insects. This is when sex determination is determined by egg fertilization; no X or Y chromosomes are involved. Unfertilized eggs develop into males/drones while fertilized eggs develop into females. This has some interesting characteristics: If a female mates with only one male, her daughters will (on average) share 75% of their genes since they inherit 50% of their mother's genes but 100% of their father's genes. Because males come from a female's unfertilized eggs, they inherit all their genes from their mothers. Males have no fathers but can

Here's a bird that's commonly found in the warmer months (like this one ) but that's supposed to be around here all winter: the Gray Catbird . Although I spotted one in December, I rarely spot them this time of year. My guess is that this is because they're quieter this time of the year. The best reason for them to be squawking loudly is because that's the way males tell other males that this is their territory, and in the middle of winter there's just no need to be establishing a territory.  This suggests that the loud squawking we associate with this species is almost all being done by the males, though females will make a softer-sounding version of this call. Given the foliage around it, I suspect this was one of those loud males. September 9, 2022 at Duke Farms Photo 248761176, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

A couple weeks ago while talking about a Hackberry Emperor butterfly, I wanted to post a link to my previous post about its relative, the Tawny Emperor . Unfortunately I didn't have one [1], so I'm going to remedy that on Throwback Thursday with a picture from 2.5 years ago. You probably shouldn't feel all that deprived of seeing the Tawny Emperor; it's quite similar to its Hackberry Emperor cousin. In contrast to the Hackberry Emperors I've seen, the Tawny Emperor's coloring is more of a brownish-orange (aka tawny) compared to the brownish-gray of many Hackberry Emperors. But this isn't the best way to ID them since apparently some Hackberry Emperors have the brighter coloring of the Tawnies; a better way is that if the top of the front wing contains 1-2 eyespots (something I talked about here ) then you've got a Hackberry Emperor. As wee little lads and lasses (aka caterpillars) both these emperors like to eat (surpringly): Hackberry Trees  [2]. As a

Looking at my next batch of pictures, nothing immediately struck me as something I had something to talk about, but this Red-spotted Purple picture came out pretty good so I'm going to go with that. This is a subspecies I've talked about before .  The sibling subspecies to the Red-spotted Purple is the White Admiral . It's felt that the Red-spotted Purple no longer looks a lot like the White Admiral because they're evolving to look more like a poisonous species instead, the Pipevine Swallowtail ; they're basically pulling the old "I'm a poisonous Pipevine Swallowtail, so you don't want to eat me" trick. Why aren't the White Admirals also evolving to look like the Pipevine Swallowtail? Well, the Pipevine Swallowtail gets pretty uncommon as you go further north, northern predators aren't afraid of eating a butterfly they rarely/never encounter, and so there's not much of a survival advantage in looking like one. Oh, one final thought. S

Here's an Appalacian Brown I met in the waning days of summer.  I've shown an open-winged one before , though this view makes it a little easier to ID them. They're very similar to the Eyed Brown , but notice the dark lines on the underside of the wing. In an Eyed Brown, those lines should be much more zig-zaggy. I don't think we have many Eyed Browns around here, but it's probably a good idea to ID these carefully. (From a view of the top of the wing it would be awfully difficult to distinguish these guys.) Another butterfly that has a similar wing pattern that you can definitely find around here is the Northern Pearly-eye . You're supposed to tell them apart because the Northern Pearly-eye has light, nearly-white fringe around its eyespots. All 3 of these species are, as you might suspect, related .  September 8, 2022 at Fairview Farm Photo 248397096, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

Over the course of the summer I'll usually spot quite a few Monarch butterflies. I'm sure this is due to a few factors: The bright orange coloring and decent size makes them more conspicuous than most other insects. Though their populations are trending in a bad direction, they remain one of the more common butterflies around. They spend a lot of time around wildflowers, exactly where you'd expect to see them [1]. Monarchs are considered to be a fairly classic example of aposematism , which is attention-getting signal that an organism is dangerous to eat. In the Monarch, the bright orange coloring alerts (many) predators that they're poisonous. (This probably prevents them from getting eaten by most birds, though I've seen mantises eating them.) September 8, 2022 at Fairview Farm Photo 248393626, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC) [1] Some butterflies aren't big fans of nectar and are rarely found among them. (I'm looking at you, commas . And y

I've got another Tenodera picture for you. As a reminder, Tenodera is the genus that contains 2 related and similar species of praying mantis, the Chinese Mantis and the Narrow-winged (aka Japanese) Mantis . I'll use the Tenodera name just because I can't tell what the species is. Although I showed you another Tenodera just over a week ago, I wanted to show another today because: They're big, photogenic insects. This one is eating lunch. So what's for lunch? It's hard to say. My first thought, which could be accurate, that this is a bumble bee . The only reason I'm waffling on that is that usually bumble bees have fairly prominent antennae, and I don't see that in this picture. Of course they could have been broken off or even eaten by the mantis, but some of the hover flies are bee mimics so I wouldn't rule them out either. Note that the mantis has actually torn its meal in 2; presumably this is the best way to eat these insects. (Certainly the

On the same trip to Fairview Farm when I met the Ruby-throated Hummingbird and the Snowberry Clearwing Moth , I also met more common fauna. One interesting encounter was either 1 or 2 pairs of mating Pearl Crescent butterflies. (By my standards, this was a fairly successful outing.) When butterflies/moths (and some other insects) mate, they face away from each other with the ends of their abdomens (temporarily) attached. The attachment is fairly robust; they can fly off without disengaging [1]. Though we have smaller butterflies than the Pearl Crescents (e.g. Eastern Tailed-blues , Spring/Summer Azures, American Coppers ), Pearl Crescents are small enough that it's not easy to tell them apart. When I saw mating pairs a few minutes apart, I was suspicious they might have been the same mating pair. I don't think they look identical, but I also wasn't able to get the same views of them. Of course, the Pearl Crescent is a very common butterfly, so the idea that I encountered

Here's something I'll usually see a couple times during a summer, a Snowberry Clearwing Moth . I've shown this moth before , but they're always a welcome sight. Like hummingbird, butterflies, and moths like their Hummingbird Clearwing Moth cousins, they're helpful pollinators, colorful, and dynamic fliers.  They're also a good example of Batesian mimicry , where an essentially harmless animal has evolved to look like a more dangerous one. In the case of the Snowberry Clearwing Moth, they want you to think they're bumblebees . If you see one, you might want the scream "Ack! A bee!" and look frightened; the Snowberry Clearwing will experience the joy you get when a plan is working perfectly. September 8, 2022 at Fairview Farm Photo 248397240, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

For Throwback Thursday, I'm going to talk about my only known [1] encounter with a bear. Somewhat oddly, it occurred at work. At the time - the summer of 2015 - I was working up in New Providence at the Murray Hill location of Alcatel-Lucent.  I liked to go for a walk after lunch, and my walk would go through a small, wooded area. One day I was walking along, and I heard something stirring off to the side of the path. It sounded like something biggish, but I wasn't worried (initially) since there were a crapload of deer to be found in the area. So when I looked over and saw a Black Bear staring at me, I suddenly became alarmed. Here's my recollection of the event: The bear and I were both very aware of each other. I was trying to remember what to do in this situation [2]. I knew enough not to run. Bears can run 35 mph, and running can trigger a chase reflex in bears. I think I heard that you shouldn't look them straight in the eyes since that could be construed as a ch

I got a pretty good picture of this Common Buckeye last September. Depending on the year, I see these butterflies somewhere between "wow I haven't seen a Common Buckeye in a while" and "huh there's another Common Buckeye". I think I see them the most on sunny, grassy trails. Because they seem to like this habitat, I sometimes find myself inadvertently herding them up the trail; as I get closer, they fly further up the trail to get away from me. (This can happen with other butterflies and birds too.) These butterflies have very prominent eyespots, including 1 very large pair on the top of their wings. It's not completely understood why they have eyespots. Generally they make a butterfly more conspicuous, which potentially makes it easier for predators to find them. Some theories: The classic explanation is that a predator sees the eyespots and mistakenly believes they're seeing the face of a much larger animal, causing the predator to break off its

From the ground (and maybe a little distance) it sort of looked like there were bananas growing near the top of this tree. Since this was taken at Duke Farms, where the Duke family liked to introduce exotic plants, you could be forgiven for wondering if it's possible that bananas are growing wild at Duke Farms. Appearances are definitely deceiving. I'm not sure you couldn't grow bananas in NJ, but they're certainly better suited for tropical climates, and the only states producing them in any amount are Florida and Hawaii. Instead this is our old friend the Kentucky Coffeetree again, it's just that when their pods are young they look like a pale yellow instead of the dark color they'll have later in the season. (In truth, the pods are probably smaller than the classic banana, but it's a little hard to judge size from a distance.) September 2, 2022 at Duke Farms Photo 238963832, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC) September 2, 2022 at Duke Farm

Here are a couple Pearl Crescents , fairly small and common butterflies here in New Jersey. At least they're supposed to be Pearl Crescents. There theoretically could be Northern Crescents around here too, though that species is generally considered to be only in northern NJ. The Northern Crescent wasn't even considered to be a species until the 1980s [1]; before that they were just considered to be Pearl Crescents. When research showed that the butterflies we now consider to be Northern Crescents could hybridize with Pearl Crescents but their offspring had lower survivability they were spun off into a separate species. This is another example of where the line between species is subtle, and even debatable. Or it could also be a Tawny Crescent . Tawny Crescents are also considered to be a very similar and more northern species, considered extirpated in NJ, so theoretically I can discount them entirely when doing identifications. I'm not certain they can hybridize with th

Most of the time when I'm around flowers I'm expecting to get lepidopteran (butterflies and moths) or hymenopteran (i.e. bees and wasps) pictures, but sometimes you get a special guest star. In this case a Ruby-throated Hummingbird was on the scene. I don't get a lot of pictures of these birds, probably because they're small and fast, and I'm neither of these. As with the 1 I photographed the previous year , this looks like a female. Though the throat of the males aren't always ruby colored, the alternative is black rather than the white you see here. Though they can appear legless, they do have tiny little legs; check out last year's picture if you want to verify that. While almost all birds walk or hop, hummingbird legs are so small that they're relegated to slowly shuffling on them. September 8, 2022 at Fairview Farm Photo 248393418, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC) Though they're known to prefer red/orange flowers, they're not

Here's someone for whom I haven't gotten an ID. I'm suspicious that it's a Pennsylvania Funnel-web Spider , and have gotten iNaturalist IDs suggesting I've got the right genus: Agelenopsis . I'm a little surprised I can't get a species ID since my field guide [1] suggests that the similar-looking funnel web spiders don't live in New Jersey. The webs of these spiders aren't sticky. It sounds like the idea is that if an insect lands there, vibrations alert the spider that a meal is a real possibility; the spider sprints out, gauges the risks/rewards, and potentially attacks. This seems to be a compromise between web-catching spiders and spiders that stalk prey; these spiders stay at home but use speed to catch dinner. September 7, 2022 at Washington Valley Park Photo 248393232, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC) [1] Common Spiders of North America, Bradley

This is probably a Chinese Mantis , although my understanding is that a Narrow-winged Mantis (aka Japanese Mantis) is an awfully similar mantis that's also in the area. I don't normally handle the bugs I photograph, so I can't look for an orange spot field mark between the front legs. I've read that the Chinese Mantis has a yellow spot instead; I don't know what you do if the spot is yellowish orange. With views like this one, I've been IDing them at the genus level ( Tenodera ) on iNaturalist since both (related) species are in that genus. (There are around 16 species in the genus, though I think the Chinese and Narrow-winged Mantises are probably the only 2 that are a good candidate for this mantis.) Here's another article to help ID these guys. September 5, 2022 in Bridgewater Photo 238965050, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

For Throwback Thursday let's take a look at a tree that's not native to NJ but is native to the US. The Kentucky Coffeetree  originally comes from the midwest; despite having Kentucky in its name, it looks like they're much more widespread in Missouri/Illinois/Indiana. Kentucky Coffeetrees are trees in the legume family . This means that a Kentucky Coffeetree is more closely related to a string bean plant than it is to oaks, hickories, or maples. But they do have tree relatives; just in this area, Honey Locust , Black Locust , and Eastern Redbuds are fellow legume trees. I also talked about legumes in this American Senna post . Of the legume trees around here, the Kentucky Coffeetree is the one that produces the most robust pods with the largest seeds. They're supposed to be poisonous, though in theory you can roast them and then make a non-caffeinated beverage from them. March 5, 2022 at Duke Farms Photo 6535361, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC) March 5

Late last summer, I met this Green Heron in that intersection of Turtle Lake and (appropriately) Heron Lake at Duke Farms. Of course I've talked about them before , but they're so photogenic that they're always a welcome photography opportunity. Did you know that these birds use bait to help them catch/eat fish, making them one of the few (but growing) list of tool-using birds. September 3, 2022 at Duke Farms Photo 238964661, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

I met this American Goldfinch late last summer. Many people think that these birds migrate away in the winter, and while they do migrate NJ is within the large range where they can be found throughout the year. You won't though see the vibrantly plumaged males in the winter, since their winter plumage is much more subdued, closer to the plumage of breeding females [1]. My guess is that this is a mature male who is starting to transition into his less colorful non-breeding plumage. The males are known for their vibrant yellow-and-black plumage. You might be wondering how they acquired said plumage; here's a Native American explanation brought to you by ChatGPT: One interesting story about the American Goldfinch involves its role in the folklore of the Native American Ojibwe tribe. According to Ojibwe legend, the Goldfinch was once a pure white bird, but it acquired its distinctive yellow and black plumage after helping to rescue the Sun during a great fire. As a reward, the Sun

Here's a cool-looking butterfly that does it with earth tones, a Hackberry Emperor . It's pretty easy for a butterfly to look good with bright orange or yellow wings, or deep blue ones. The Hackberry Emperor manages it with discreet browns, tans, and a few white spots. (While it's tempting to think they're being tasteful, I suspect they're this color to provide camouflage from predators.) These emperors don't exert absolute power over enormous land areas like some Roman, Chinese, and British empires have. In fact, it's unclear that any other animal recognizes imperial power in these lepidopterans.  September 2, 2022 at Duke Farms Photo 238963661, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

Here's a White-breasted Nuthatch I met last summer. It and a few companions were in oak trees near the Duke Farms Haybarn. They are one of the few birds that will traverse down a tree headfirst. Their Red-breasted Nuthatch cousins will also do this, but their Brown Creeper cousins tend to face upwards when climbing trees. While their Red-breasted Nuthatch cousins are one of the few non-woodpeckers that'll peck a hole into a tree to create a nest, the White-breasted Nuthatch isn't as hardcore and will only expand a tree cavity that already exists. The name "nuthatch" comes from the birds wedging acorns and softer nuts into a tree, and then using their beaks to break (or "hatch") the nut.  September 2, 2022 at Duke Farms Photo 238962465, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)