Wildlife picspam

[urbpan]

This fly is about 2mm long. I was fortunate that it liked to hang out on this sign long enough for me to get an in focus picture. I'm hoping that one of you will be able to identify it for me! Many thanks to badnoodles who identified this fly as one of a large group of flies called "long legged flies" (family Dolichopodidae) in the genus Condylostylus! Apparently these tiny flies are predatory.


Remember all that discussion about what kind of vetch is pictured in my 365 post? Well this is the other kind. A whole mess of it filling a vacant lot in Waltham.


This little fellow got him or herself caught in the concrete ramp entrance to the Drumlin Underground exhibit (which I sometimes call "the amphibian trap" since we find dozens back there every year). It's a spring peeper Pseudacris crucifer, recognizable by the X on its back. This individual is covered with dust and dirt--my volunteer swept it up while cleaning the ramp--so the X is a little obscured. It's always amazing to me how such a small animal can be so loud. Their ringing call in early spring lights up the wet forests where they live.




This is a garden centipede. Usually they are bright red-orange, but this one has recently molted its exoskeleton, and the new color hasn't "set" yet.


This is an unidentified flat worm (not necessarily a flatworm, but a legless invertebrate compressed in shape). I thought it might be a young landchovy at first, but it doesn't have the hammerhead or distinct dorsal line. Do any of you know what it is? The weird background is a patch of dry rot fungus or a close relative.
This is the larva of a predatory fungus gnat (family Keroplatidae). It's lurking on this mat of dry rot fungus waiting for a fungus-eating creature to stumble into the sticky threads it has lain.


A harvestman perched high on a goldenrod. I don't know why it does this behavior--it seems like it would be vulnerable to bird predation.


This is the fledgling oriole I had to euthanise the other day. You can see that it bled from its mouth quite a bit.


And this is an adult male oriole we found in the Riverway. Its wings were stiffly held up and back, making the carcass into a kind of tripod.

Comments

[drhoz.livejournal.com]

larval fungus-gnat?

[urbpan.livejournal.com]

Good show! After a bit of doubting and poking, I believe it is specifically a larva of a predatory fungus gnat in the family Keroplatidae. Apparently they use that sticky stuff in the photo to catch little critters who come along to eat the fungus! They seem to be more well studied in Australia than in the States.

http://hbs.bishopmuseum.org/aocat/kero.html

The clincher was a nearly identical photo, down to the type of fungus(!), on bugguide:
http://bugguide.net/node/view/14942

[drhoz.livejournal.com]

*nods* the 'glow-worms' in those New Zealand cave are also predatory fungus-gnats.

http://www.glowworm.co.nz/glowworms.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arachnocampa