Urban Nature Walk Special Event: Moth Night at the Zoo!

[urbpan]

Instead of our usual type of event (go someplace, walk in one direction for a couple hours) the latest Urban Nature Walk meetup was a moth night. Instead of meeting at 10 a.m. on the last Sunday of the month we met at 10 p.m. and stayed up until 1 a.m.

We met up at Franklin Park Zoo, set up some lights to attract nocturnal insects, and went around photographing what we found. Fortunately several people had great photography set-ups (compared to my little point and shoot) so there will be lots of great photographs to look at. Meanwhile, here's my set:


This is a Macaria moth.




This one is a "master's dart" Feltia herilis, a widespread and abundant species whose caterpillar feeds on dozens of crops and weeds.


A somewhat blurry male mosquito casts a long shadow.


On the hardware of the light stand itself sits a Tortricid moth--their larvae are caterpillars that create shelters by rolling or folding the edges of leaves.


This "little underwing" Catocala micronympha has had a patch of its scales rubbed off, resulting in a shiny bald spot.


Moths weren't the only creatures coming to the lights. There were several of these tiny Syrphid flies (hover flies or flower flies).


Our headquarters was a picnic area under a tent. There were creatures there as well, such as this great big crane fly, family Tipulidae.


A nearby structure (a sign) provided a scaffold for this cobweb spider and her eggs. I think this is Parasteatoda tepidariorum

Comments

[drhoz.livejournal.com]

Duplicate photo there

[urbpan.livejournal.com]

Thanks, fixed it!

[badnoodles.livejournal.com]

If you ever do it again, take a blacklight as well as normal lights. I've only ever been able to catch megaloptera with one, and they are really cool. (except for the dobsonfly that tried to take off my thumb, but that's an isolated incident)

[urbpan.livejournal.com]

We used a black light and a mercury vapor light (two stations). It was unseasonably cool, which led to fewer creatures than we might have. It's also pretty late in the season here. Next year we're planning to do a night in June and one in July.