Some Critter Finds

As a regular morning habit when i am at home in the province, i have coffee and a little bread, lug the camera and my eye drops, and go find the butterflies. But in the course of looking for the butterflies i also see lots of unusual little entities. Sometimes i know them, and sometimes don't. Truth is, most of the time i don't! When this happens more time are devoted to scrutinizing and photographing them. In return, sometimes i miss the butterflies. Anyway, these finds are interesting too.

Cotton bug, Dysdercus cingulatus. It might look beautiful, but it devours the pedicels of my hoya buds. In the past i just allow them there, but when i saw the damage on my plants, i drive them away or make things difficult for them. However, i don't use insecticide so they are still around. 

Spiders are also common residents in my garden and surrounding environment. 

This could be a jumping spider, but i don't know its ID yet. 

Hawkmoths are regular pests of my caladium.  Sometimes i go home finding all the leaves gone. When i feel that they have already pupated, i look for the pupa beneath the plant and photograph them. Once, i reared the pupa to eclosion, so i know that the above is Pergesa acteus. 

Picture below is very dark, probably another hawkmoth. I do not have the time to rear it, so i am not sure of the ID. I just guess that it is Theretra oldenlandiae. It also has many hostplants. 

This is an exoskeleton of the pale green awlet, Bibasis gomata syn. Burara gomata. 

Its host plant is the green Schefflera. I have not seen their larvae nor the live pupa, and i have seen the adult only once. I wish to see them earlier next time to document the life cycle. 

a very thorny head of a moth catterpillar, later when i poked on it, i realized it is already dead

nymp of a stink bug

bag moth

  another bag moth

another kind of bag of a third bag moth

I realized this moths have different bags that house them which serve as their camouflage. They also pupate inside and later emerge at the bottom portion during eclosion as adult moth. Actually, i have not seen an adult moth coming from this bags. I just saw them in pictures. If i have enough time, which could be later, i will rear them in nearby vicinity so i can also document the adults emerging from them.

Our Garden Dwellers

I am not good in shooting critters, which One of Onenezz is so good at. I am thrilled with her collages of dragonflies and butterflies in Tropical Nature Photos. There's a lot of critters too in our garden. I have tried many times to take their photos, but am always drawn to chase the butterflies. When butterflies are around, I forget the rest. However, this time I am fascinated by the works of some critters, mainly because they fully consumed many of our plants.

This big larva devoured all the leaves of a big periwinkle plant, which died eventually. I realized this plant is not so resistant to larvae's attacks. Some plants just produce more shoots again after the onslaught of larvae.

 This larva looks almost the same as the above, but it feasted on the chrysanthemum.

This young larva attacked the caladium, which together with another bigger larva finished 5 big leaves overnight.

YAICKS! Grrrr! Another one on the green caladium!

He looks so cute, with those beautiful "eyes" (sorry for the blurr, i dont have a better shot)

I got it from the caladium to pose for me with the help of my niece. I taught her to touch the larva without being scared. However, whenever it moves she made a loud shriek. Eventually, after a lot of caresses, she got so enamored with it that when the chickens came, she shooed them away or else they will easily have a piece of snack.

Some of the devoured caladium leaves courtesy of the cute brownish larva. It camouflaged itself near the petiole when the sun is already up.

The Colocasia above is an accomplishment of another larva, this time a black one (below)

It is so long but beautiful too! Can you see the two "antennae'' at its posterior tip. I don't know its name.

A hairy monster eating the Chrysothemis pulchelia, a few days later 3 plants were bald.

I believe this is the swallowtail larva, mimicking bird droppings when still at this stage. Eventually it will be a big green caterpillar too before it pupates. It might not however hide from the birds frequently seen above them. This plant is a species of citrus with very nice scent, but it doesn't produce fruits like the common citrus we know. It however is medicinal.

These okra plants succumbed to a lot of larvae which after eating the leaves make them as their blankets. Eventually, molds will grow from their excretions and the okra will die. 

This time i don't know if these ants are helpful to the plant. What i know is they make harvesting of the custard apple fruit very difficult. 

Now, i know this praying mantis might be helpful. However, its stance is a reply to my prodding so it will pose nicely for me! I don't know if this is the Chinese species which Randy Emitt beautifully photographed in his blogsite.

And these are the last enemies of our plants. The cats (we have 6), play hide and seek in the garden. In this photo they are in the amaryllis hedge. The dog is a little subtle, but it loves to rest and sleep there near some plants. I did not include here yet some chickens and the young goat kids.

Maybe you are thinking that our plants will not be able to grow well with these creatures plaguing them. But we still have lots of plants, so we still see the flowers and the fruits of those which survived their natural ordeals. Everyone is happy!

Some of our other unwholesome garden guests: http://abagillon.blogspot.com/2008/11/animals-in-our-farm.html

http://www.camera-critters.blogspot.com

An Incredible Backyard Scene

Most of you, my blogger friends, are living in residential suburbs with not much biodiversity around. Those who have wide gardens and neighboring forests might have wildlife around them, yet i wonder if you have already seen what we saw in our backyard. 

We were wondering that morning why the crows have been coming and going so often,  maybe 20 meters south of our house. They have been so noisy, we thought they might be watching my mother's newly hatched chicks again. Our curiosity was well paid off! This is what we saw!

an electrocuted snake!!!  Foul play or suicide ?

Apparently, it climbed up the coffee tree near the upper wire, then it traversed about 2m along that line northwards. When it sensed another plant near the lower wire, it got closed to it to transfer to the tree. The upper half with the head is already at the lower line, while the midsection  and the bottom with the tail still on the upper line.  Snakes might not have been taught by their mothers or their schools that electric lines are arranged like that, with the + and - lines separated.  Electricity just function when the lines touch and any living thing containing water will be a very good conductor of the power passing the 2 lines. Maybe they see birds alighting on them, which are not harmed. Of course birds only alight on one line. This snake did not have the time to learn its mistake, it died immediately, electrocuted! It was already almost dry and toasted when we saw it. Apparently it is already a big mature snake.

Who says this snake could have committed suicide? 

If anybody has seen this scene before please tell me. Maybe there should be a poll to count how many had such experience. Who knows this might be a world record. Hahaha!

I searched on electrocuted snakes and found only one by an electric fence in Africa, another one in Japan which climbed a pole of the train station, and another in Borneo inside a transformer. But the same case on electric lines like in our backyard doesn't have a reported incident yet.

REF:
http://mysteve.com/BelieveItorNot/2005/08/electrocuted-snake
http://www.hemmy.net/2006/02/26/huge-snake-caught-in-electric-fence/ 

Please visit other  Outdoor Wednesday  and Nature Notes posts

  

Unusual Finds in our Backyard

I am trying to look for critters from my files,  as my beloved blogger friend One, likes them. I am not that good in getting small critters photos with handheld camera, and i don't bring a tripod during walks. So here are what i found one weekend.

 raintree (Samanea saman)

This is a big raintree near our property in the province. The small road passes under its canopy. It is home to many birds, butterflies and insects. We also love to stay under it when watching other birds in the vicinity. There is also a mini 2nd growth forest nearby. We noticed that when this crows are there, the other smaller birds go away. And i am sure the little birds cannot make their nest on the tree because the crows will eat their eggs as they do with our chicken eggs and chicks when my mother is not around. These are already nuisance in our area.

 Large billed crow or jungle crow (Corvus macrorhynchos)

 Oriental magpie robin (Copsychus saularis)

This bird comes down to the ground often, and very near our house. It has several kinds of tweets, and my niece can immitate a few of its songs. A pair has been roosting at the eaves of our house for already a few years. They brought a young one along sometime but our male cat did not let it pass unnoticed. We just saw some leftover feathers nearby one morning.  

 Female cow

This cow is normally tithered among the weeds and bushes. Its color caught my attention, as it looks so dirty from afar. Approaching it i realized the prints are actually its normal skin design. I suppose its parents are dark brown and light brown, or black and brown. However, the mixture did not homogenize properly resulting in the dirty look it now has! hahaha



 anole

One morning I immediately approached my 10-yr old nephew calling me frantically for something which the dog has been barking on. It turned out to be this anole. When i finally arrive, the dog thought it was a dangerous creature and immediately killed it. My nephew was so guilty and so sorry for the anole, which he thought died because of his loud calls to me. The dog misinterpreted him to be calling for help. I am so sorry to, but the dog has a mind of its own! His primary purpose is to protect us, he just did his role, oh how sweet! So I told my nephew to just be calm whenever he saw something unusual, or he should just whistle as our signal that i should see something nearby.

Then i found this green spider luminiscing with the light. However, i cannot get a better photo as it is near the ground. I also do not know its name.

If only i have a macro lens for the small creatures, and a telephoto lens for the birds, lovelier photos will manifest from our walks during weekends.