Insects and Spiders Archives - Page 3 of 6

Dozens of aphids, all head down, stud the stem of a Jerusalem Artichoke in the prairie garden. A lone black ant patrols the herd.

Miniature Farmers: Ants and Aphids

Updated September 23, 2024

Raising cattle for milk and beef has been an important part of the activities on Owl Acres for over 150 years. Another kind of animal husbandry has been going on here for millions of years. We noticed it recently when we were inspecting a Jerusalem artichoke plant in our prairie garden. Ants were tending a […]

Insects and Spiders

Life and death and life in the garden. Orange, black-spotted ladybird beetle hunts blue-green aphids on a leaf stem

Mice of the Insect World: Aphids

Updated September 16, 2024

Aphids. They’re crawling all over the leaves of my Jerusalem artichokes. They’re tiny, only about a sixteenth to an eighth inch long. They are soft-bodied, and they are shaped rather like a pear. They’re usually green, although specific species may be other colors such as yellow, black or orange. Aphids have their own family, Aphididae […]

Insects and Spiders

Green, angular, grasshopper-like insect looks directly at the camera, allowing us to see the dark spot deep in its clear, compound eye. Fork-tailed Bush Katydid shares the summer space on Owl Acres with one of its cousins, Common Meadow Katydid.

Late Summer Symphony: Fork-Tailed Bush Katydid

Updated September 2, 2024

I love this time of year. The world is thrumming with life. The crickets and grasshoppers, the cicadas and tree crickets all taking their turns to sing. The symphony will go on until that first hard frost when it shuts down all at once. But today is not that day. The weather is beautiful; the […]

Insects and Spiders

Common Housefly at rest against a bright background. Large compound eyes, and the animal’s major distinguishing characteristic: it has only two wings.

Marvel of Engineering: House Fly

Updated July 29, 2024

I really hate flies. More than ants. More even than mosquitoes. A single fly buzzing around my face is enough to drive me crazy. And everything we ever hear about flies is how dirty they are, how they carry diseases, live in manure piles, leave fly specks on the walls, and generally create havoc, disease […]

Insects and Spiders

Aedes vexans as you don’t usually see or care about. A little insect sips nectar at a yellow flower with spiky white petals, moving pollen about and generally being a good citizen. Male Inland Floodwater Mosquito with his feather-like antennae, large compound eyes, crystalline wings and long, delicate legs, goes about his business, mindless of the evil machinations of the females.

Vexation: Mosquitoes

Updated July 1, 2024

For the past two years, mosquitoes have been practically absent from the landscape on Owl Acres. The years were dry, verging on drought. This year, we’ve had a fair amount of rain. It’s caused flooding, as well as filling up ponds and streams and ditches. It’s a perfect year for the dreaded mosquito. Mosquitoes are […]

Insects and Spiders

It’s time for the bark to come off the owl tree sculpture. Thousands of red ants, each no more than 1/16-inch-long, are instantly cast into a desperate effort to save the cream yellow babies. Their home is gone, their society in tatters in the blink of an eye. The giant who destroyed their world pauses a moment to reflect on the enormity of the act he has just committed. He snaps a couple of photos and brushes away a few of the tiny creatures who are biting him.

By the Thousands: Field Ants

Updated December 25, 2023

When I built the house on Owl Acres 20 years ago, a walnut tree stood sentinel at the corner of the driveway. Unfortunately, as time went on, that tree began to lean more and more toward the garage. It had apparently been compromised by all the building activity. We decided to take the tree down, […]

Insects and Spiders

Photo of a sculpture by Wendy Taylor on a masonry base at the London Zoo. One broad, disc-shaped beetle handles a ball of dung 10 times its size, while another perches on top. This public installation follows modern accessibility practice, common in cities in Europe. They’re becoming more so in the US.

Rolling the Sun: Dung Beetles

Updated December 14, 2023

The Ancient Egyptians have given us a lot of symbols to wonder about. I could never understand, for example, why the Israelites worshiped a golden calf until I learned while traveling in Egypt that a particular bull was worshiped by the Egyptians, and the Israelites were just copycats. Another symbol that needs explanation is the […]

Insects and Spiders

Dark green leaf of Virginia Creeper. Also called Five Leaf Ivy, the hand-shaped leaves are made up from 5 smaller, sawtooth-edged leaflets attached to a common petiole.

A Banquet for All: Virginia Creeper

Updated December 7, 2023

There’s a pile of it in the southeast corner of the yard. It’s growing on the fences and climbing the barn. We knock it back, ruthlessly severing it with the weed eater. And it comes back with a vengeance. It could be mistaken for poison ivy—we have plenty of that around here. But a careful […]

Boxelder bug reaches the end of the line, courtesy of a giant, hairy, black-eyed beast. The robber fly scores a tasty, fragrant dinner.

No Harm Done: Boxelder Bugs

Updated November 9, 2023

It’s time for fall colors. The trees are turning red, orange and yellow. And the bugs from the same color palate are looking for a warm place to spend the winter. There’s a gathering of them on the south-facing garage door just now. They’re basking in the sunshine. When it gets cold, though, they’ll head […]

Insects and Spiders

Tiny spider with long orange legs, indicating male. The rock-strewn desert surrounding him is the texturing of an interior house wall, which shows the size of this little guy. American house spider.

Cobwebs at the Door: American House Spider

Updated October 30, 2023

There is a recurring cobweb just outside the front door. I knock it down, and it comes right back. We find them just below the ceiling on the deck, and even under the cupboards in the kitchen. The culprit is most likely an American (or common) house spider (Parasteatoda tepidariorum) or perhaps a pair of […]

Insects and Spiders