Now that pollinators are back, pollinator predators are back also.
Yesterday I watched a jumping spider waiting for prey among the flowers. If this one does as others have, it will wait on the same leaf week after week—its food comes to it. There are about three-dozen species of jumping spiders in B.C. Who knows which this one is?
A jumping spider sits on the leaf of a flowering plant and awaits prey.
The jumping spider turns and looks up, possibly assessing the tastiness of the camera.
ear maitenance
We have five local species in the deer family (the cervids): moose, elk, caribou, mule deer, white-tailed deer. A short time ago, I included pictures of moose and white-tailed deer. Added today are mule deer and elk.
The pictures of mule deer were taken on a local mountainside by Doug Thorburn; At about the same time I was watching some elk. So, why not post them together? Mule deer are named for their oversized ears—a feature supposedly reminiscent of a mule. This prompted the theme: the swivelling ears of cervids. All of the pictures show females.
Aware of the photographer, a mule deer has its ears swivelled to the front.
When facing the other way, mule deer continue to monitor the photographer by swivelling their ears to the back.
This elk has is ears swivelled to hear what is behind it.
While this one is both watching and listening to what is in front.
Doug Thorburn’s pictures of mule deer are used with permission.
Clint Saunders showed me some nuthatches nesting in a snag in his yard. So, I pointed my camera.
White-breasted Nuthatches carve out their own nest and then smear pitch around the entrance, probably to keep other creatures out. During the winter, nuthatches eat seeds; when spring comes, they will also eat insects and spiders. During courtship and incubation, the male brings food for the female.
“Is it roomy enough?”
“It’s just fine.”
“Might I offer you a tasty spider, m’dear?”
“Ah, and it’s my favourite species.”
There is evidence of beavers around the lakeshore and its adjacent ponds and streams: gnawed trees, tracks, lodges and dams. Yet, I rarely see the animal itself. The problem may well be that beavers are most active from dusk to dawn, a time that doesn’t fit well with my observing schedule. Yet, now and then we overlap.
When spotted Saturday evening, there were two beavers sitting on a boulder. Alas, one was just leaving.
The remaining beaver was gnawing on (what appeared to be) an alder branch.
At one point, the beaver left and returned with another branch. The branch is being dragged along underwater; it is the lighter region extending from below the left eye diagonally across to the beaver’s right side.
Back at the boulder, the beaver set about gnawing on the new branch.
Well, hello.
This is a mishmash of birds seen around the region in the last week.
Red-tailed Hawk
Brewer’s Blackbird
Red-necked Grebe
Killdeer
Cinnamon Teal
Northern Shovelers
Tree Swallows
Wood Ducks
Eurasian Collared Dove
Regurgitation is not a warm and fuzzy topic. Yet, it is an integral part of being a raptor or an owl.
When a bird of prey eats another animal, it generally consumes everything: meat, bones, fur, feet and bills. The indigestible portions are collected as a pellet in the bird’s gizzard and now and then is cast out. Last Sunday, I watched a kestrel cast a pellet.
The kestrel was sitting on a utility wire.
It began to cough as if choking on something.
The pellet appeared in its mouth and was ejected.
“Good, now that that’s over with and I’m out of here.”
Late each year, I pick three or four of my favourite images from the past twelve months and have prints made for my wall.
Yesterday’s muskrat just might make the cut.
For a week now, I have been seeing butterflies—not just butterflies, but bees and flies. The insects are back. This posting marks a seasonal shift to the inclusion of the delightful world of arthropods. What better way to start than with butterflies.
Winter is difficult for insects—how to make it through the frigid months. The adults of most insects, including butterflies, die in the fall but the species overwinters as eggs, larvae, or pupae. However, one tribe of butterflies (Nymphalini) overwinters as adults. As winter approaches, these adults take shelter under leaves or loose bark. When spring comes, these butterflies are the first to get the new food. Each of the butterflies, below, is a member of this overwintering tribe.
The first butterfly I spotted was one of the anglewings, probably a Oreas Comma. Before landing on the ground, this butterfly had been taking a great interest in another of its species.
The second butterfly spotted was a Mourning Cloak. This one looks a bit worse for wear from its winter hibernation.
However, it is time to get on with the job of finding a mate. The one Mourning Cloak is sipping nectar from the catkin of a willow.
Also sipping nectar from the willow catkin is a Milbert’s Tortoiseshell. The willow was alive with butterflies, bees, flies and wasps. The butterflies, wasps, and flies were after the nectar; the bees were after the pollen. In this picture a mining bee is approaching on the left and a yellow jacket is taking nectar on the right.
Despite appearances, this Milbert’s Tortoiseshell is not competing with the honey bees in the picture. The butterfly is sipping nectar, while the honey bees are collecting pollen. These two honey bees are loaded: each is carrying a ball of yellow pollen on its corbicula or pollen baskets.
Soon we will see other species of butterflies.
This blog often seems to neglect local mammals in favour of birds. It is merely that birds are interesting, plentiful, seasonally variable and easily seen. Mammals are not seen with the same frequency. Yet, here are four species seen yesterday.
Now and then I watch a couple of White-tailed Deer grazing alongside my driveway. This doe was chary, but unmoved by my presence. Could such behaviour and observations have led to the term, doe eyes?
Common in areas somewhat protected from predators such a coyotes, is the Columbian Ground Squirrel.
Less common in the West Kootenay, but always fun to see is the moose. It looks as if this one is the mother,
and this one is last year’s calf.
Then there were the Bighorn Sheep. I believe each of these two pictures show females.
Two bees or not to be
A crane lifts the flatcar from down the bank
Yesterday afternoon, I was watching the last of the C.P.R. wreck saga: the lifting of the flatcar that had jumped the tracks and slid down the bank towards the Lake. That story has been told through a number of postings: train wreck, wreck stage one √ , wreck Sunday, drowned excavator, excavator out. The only job remaining was the extraction of the flatcar from the bank. This was done yesterday.
While watching this exciting event (life here is insouciant), I saw a bumble bee fly by and abruptly ignored the C.P.R.’s travails. Heavens, that looked as if it might be a Bombus occidentalis: that is, a rare sighting of the ill-fated Western Bumble Bee. Switching lenses, I set out on a wild-bee chase. Soon I had managed to photograph two different bumble bees, behind each of which lay a fascinating story.
Bombus occidentalis
The Western Bumble Bee was once common across western North America. It was last seen in California a half-dozen years ago, and a survey in the Okanagan a couple of years ago found only two. I saw one around Kootenay Lake in 2009 and another in 2010, but none last year. In former times, hundreds or thousands might be seen during a summer. The backstory of the virtual extirpation of this once-significant local pollinator is involved. The tale combines elements of: bumble bee navigation, commercial greenhouse pollination, breeding techniques, international marketing, and (the lack of) trade regulations. Suffice to say, I was delighted to see one in my yard this afternoon. The Western Bumble Bee is easily identified by its white-tipped abdomen. This female (probably a queen) is collecting nectar from a Pieris japonica.
Bombus melanopygus
As far as I know, this bee is not threatened, so it wasn’t its conservation status that attracted my attention. Rather it was its thorax—I had never seen such a thorax. It is covered with bumps. I suspected the bumps were mites and that the bee was doomed. I sent both pictures to Robbin Thorp of UC Davis. He confirmed that my first picture did indeed show a Bombus occidentalis, and that the second was a Bombus melanopygus carrying mites on its thorax. Then came the surprise. These mites were merely hitchhiking from one colony to another aboard a queen. They are likely to be beneficial because they then feed on harmful fungi found in the nest. The queen is thus bringing her own house-cleaning staff along with her. My Bombus melanopygus and its offspring are probably going to do rather well by those mites.
The bee season is well underway.