Monday: 28 May 2007
Or maybe, rather, a relatively easy beetle that isn’t a ladybug. Or at least I’m pretty sure it’s a beetle!
Yesterday we got our most visible small taste of what a lot of others have been experiencing in the last month or more - smoke from fires 300 miles south of us. It’s worthwhile looking at some of the satellite photos at NASA’s Earth Observatory (it’s actually worthwhile spending a few hours perusing that site in general!). That particular day (May 17) brought us a faint haze but yesterday’s was considerably more than just a haze. The prevailing winds blew the smoke more to our west in the direction of Atlanta and (Birmingham!) by noon, but it was still an event.
The photos linked by date on the above link are pretty amazing, especially in the changes in direction of the long plumes of smoke. I can’t help but wonder if as aerosols they’re responsible for a degree or two of cooler difference. Not that that makes up for the presence of smoke, of course - yesterday they were alerting elderly and respiratorally infirm in the Atlanta area to stay indoors.
The beetles, and because of all the pollen it almost wasn’t clear that they were beetles, were scouring the Witherod or Possumhaw (Viburnum nudum), which was putting out a generous abundance of umbelliferous inflorescences.
I finally found it buried deep in Bugguide, a Flower Longhorn Beetle, Judolia spp, probably J. cordifera though there are several other possibilities.
These were clearly sipping nectar, perhaps because the sun was past the yardarm, but several sites suggest that they may also eat pollen. However these were clearly plunging their head deep within each floret for a second or two before moving onto the next one, ignoring the anthers.
However, as you can see, they were being liberally coated with pollen, and were therefore doing a fine job of pollination. It may be significant that most of the photos I’ve seen show the beetles on the large flat-topped clusters of umbel-bearing plants, like queen anne’s lace or viburnums. As large as the beetles are (approaching an inch long) it probably isn’t worth the effort of flying from one solitary flower to another.
Another thing that was interesting was that I could get as close as I wanted with the camera, and neither the looming presence nor the flash disturbed them in their labors. But if I touched the stem of the inflorescence or bent it slightly, off they flew into the woods.
And that’s all the adults do. Other than mate and lay eggs in rotting wood, which their kids eat as larvae. They are then the first disorganizers of dead wood on its way to becoming mulch and litter and finally a part of the soil.
They’re in the subfamily Lepturinae, the Flower Longhorns, with about 250 fellow species in North America. They’re part of a much larger family, Cerambycidae, the Longhorned Beetles, which include a great many destructive wood borers such as the Pine Sawyer.
A few thumbnails to alternative views:
Yesterday we got our most visible small taste of what a lot of others have been experiencing in the last month or more - smoke from fires 300 miles south of us. It’s worthwhile looking at some of the satellite photos at NASA’s Earth Observatory (it’s actually worthwhile spending a few hours perusing that site in general!). That particular day (May 17) brought us a faint haze but yesterday’s was considerably more than just a haze. The prevailing winds blew the smoke more to our west in the direction of Atlanta and (Birmingham!) by noon, but it was still an event.
The photos linked by date on the above link are pretty amazing, especially in the changes in direction of the long plumes of smoke. I can’t help but wonder if as aerosols they’re responsible for a degree or two of cooler difference. Not that that makes up for the presence of smoke, of course - yesterday they were alerting elderly and respiratorally infirm in the Atlanta area to stay indoors.
The beetles, and because of all the pollen it almost wasn’t clear that they were beetles, were scouring the Witherod or Possumhaw (Viburnum nudum), which was putting out a generous abundance of umbelliferous inflorescences.
I finally found it buried deep in Bugguide, a Flower Longhorn Beetle, Judolia spp, probably J. cordifera though there are several other possibilities.
These were clearly sipping nectar, perhaps because the sun was past the yardarm, but several sites suggest that they may also eat pollen. However these were clearly plunging their head deep within each floret for a second or two before moving onto the next one, ignoring the anthers.
However, as you can see, they were being liberally coated with pollen, and were therefore doing a fine job of pollination. It may be significant that most of the photos I’ve seen show the beetles on the large flat-topped clusters of umbel-bearing plants, like queen anne’s lace or viburnums. As large as the beetles are (approaching an inch long) it probably isn’t worth the effort of flying from one solitary flower to another.
Another thing that was interesting was that I could get as close as I wanted with the camera, and neither the looming presence nor the flash disturbed them in their labors. But if I touched the stem of the inflorescence or bent it slightly, off they flew into the woods.
And that’s all the adults do. Other than mate and lay eggs in rotting wood, which their kids eat as larvae. They are then the first disorganizers of dead wood on its way to becoming mulch and litter and finally a part of the soil.
They’re in the subfamily Lepturinae, the Flower Longhorns, with about 250 fellow species in North America. They’re part of a much larger family, Cerambycidae, the Longhorned Beetles, which include a great many destructive wood borers such as the Pine Sawyer.
A few thumbnails to alternative views:
