I Like Pigeons Because Nobody Else Does

Geoff the British bee dude and comb

Geoff, the bee guy, came and took our colony today. It really pains me to have evicted them, but I think it was in their best interest in the long run. He’ll take them to a friend who has an orchard where they can pollinate avocado blooms.

Coincidentally, my uncle recently inquired if I’d be interested in helping him set up some hives next summer when we return to Pennsylvania so all this recent honeybee enthusiasm will have an outlet after all.

Look closely near the center and you can see honey

Look what I found today!!

Thrilling! A colony of honeybees has taken up residence underneath the lid of a trash can in our yard. I haven’t decided what to do about it yet. If it were up to me, I’d get them a proper hive and allow them to live in our yard…but I am not sure what our landlords would think of that! I contacted a guy who will relocate them. My main concern is that they go to a suitable area with plenty of food and can continue honeybeeing.

This picture sucks, but I am going to try and get better shots. Gene isn’t here, so I am forced to do all this one-handed.

Here’s what Phil sent out to our supporters and other interested parties after our trip last week (text only, I added the photos):

Dear San Jacinto friends and colleagues,

We found a junkyard

Last week Melody McFarland, Jim Berrian, and I spent from Monday to Wednesday, 8 to 10 September at Valle Vista (just east of Hemet at the west base of the San Jacinto Mountains ), resurveying the site Harry Swarth covered from 30 August to 5 September 1908.  Actually, the site we covered, along the wash of the San Jacinto River at the east end of Valle Vista, is about 2 miles northeast of the 1908 site, which is now covered by orange orchards and the concrete-lined channel of Bautista Creek.  We selected it as a surrogate, as it supports the only remaining alluvial scrub at the same elevation in the general area. It has been designated for conservation as open space and wildlife habitat.  It is under the jurisdiction of the Eastern Municipal Water District, and we thank Joe Lewis, Director of Engineering Services, for authorization and access to cover this site.

This visit was focused on birds and invertebrates; intensive surveys of mammals and reptiles will come on a subsequent visit when more of our team is able to participate.  But we wanted one survey to correspond in time as closely as possible to the time of Harry Swarth’s visit in 1908.  Like Harry Swarth, we experienced the “blistering heat” of which he complained (what do you expect in Hemet in late summer?!), but at least we did not endure the dust storms that afflicted him in 1908. 

Mockingbird

Ken Weaver also covered the site on the morning of 9 August 2008, and his results are tabulated with last week’s in the attached spreadsheet.

The Valle Vista site is interesting because it originally hosted a subset of what I am calling the “Aguanga fauna.”  That is, species of characteristically desert

green lynx spider

distribution that have an isolated population on the west side of the mountains, centered at Aguanga just north of Temecula Creek in south-central Riverside County.  Of birds these include (among others not reported from Valle Vista) the Ladder-backed Woodpecker and Black-throated Sparrow, of mammals the White-tailed Antelope Squirrel, and of reptiles the Zebra-tailed Lizard and Long-nosed Leopard Lizard.  Because the 1908 expedition did not extend south to Aguanga this biogeographically interesting region has gone underappreciated over the last century, and it has been questioned whether the birds were resident in the area or just postbreeding dispersers.  Ken Weaver has been studying the Aguanga region and is finalizing a paper on the area’s birds.

Our striking finding at Valle Vista for 2008 is that none of the “Aguanga fauna” may still survive at Valle Vista.  We hope to find some on future visits, but the Ladder-backed Woodpecker, Black-throated Sparrow, Zebra-tailed Lizard, and

Western toad

White-tailed Antelope Squirrel, at least, should have been seen easily in 4 days if present.  In 1908 Harry Swarth commented on the importance of cactus fruit, noting that the four antelope squirrels he collected were stained inside and out with juice of the fruit.  In 2008, prickly pear cacti were sparse, low, and not looking very healthy; I saw only one fruit, already nearly dried up.  So an important component of the ecosystem may no longer be functioning.  The decline of cactus undoubtedly contributed to the disappearance of the Cactus Wren too.  Similarly, Harry Swarth commented on yucca pods as a food source in 1908; in 2008 yuccas too (both schidigera and whipplei) were few and unimpressive, lacking fruit.

Bewick's wren

A couple of other characteristically arid-country species were barely present in 2008. In 1908, the California Gnatcatcher “was one of the most abundant species” at Valle Vista; in 2008, Ken Weaver found just one on 9 August and we found none from 8 to 10 September. In 1908 Brewer’s Sparrow was “fairly common,” with 3 specimens collected; in 2008 I saw just a single individual each on 9 and 10 September.  It’s not clear in what role Brewer’s Sparrow occurs at this site; most likely it is just a migrant, but a few years ago Bob McKernan found it nesting not far away at Winchester.

cucumber beetle

The message seems to be that when enough species are extirpated from a site interesting biogeographic patterns can be threatened with extirpation as well.  And in spite of the desertification of the climate, it is the seemingly desert-adapted species that have suffered the most in this case. Ken Weaver reports that all the species of the “Aguanga fauna” now missing at Valle Vista still survive at Aguanga, highlighting the conservation importance of that area.

On the plus side, we saw 35 species of birds Harry Swarth missed in 1908, more than doubling the list for Valle Vista.  Among these are many of the usual suspects, the Red-shouldered Hawk, Anna’s Hummingbird, Nuttall’s Woodpecker, Black Phoebe, Cassin’s Kingbird, American Crow, and Common Raven, not to mention the introduced House Sparrow, European Starling, Domestic Pigeon, and Eurasian Collared Dove.  In some cases local conditions at the site clearly contributed: the proliferation of the tree tobacco is providing nectar for 3 species of hummingbirds in 2008; Harry Swarth noted no hummingbirds at Valle Vista in 1908.  The percolation basins in the floodplain, dry in late summer, are grown up now with thickets of sunflowers, providing a bonanza of seeds for the American and Lesser Goldfinches; Harry Swarth noted no goldfinches at Valle Vista in 1908.

To me the most interesting addition among birds was the Rufous-crowned Sparrow.  Along with Snow Creek and Banning, Valle Vista makes the third site at which we have found this sedentary species missed completely in 1908.  Yet Harry Swarth found and collected them less than two weeks after leaving Valle Vista, in the Santa Ana Mountains on the opposite side of the San Jacinto Plain.  I suspect that the species has spread, aided at least by fires in the San Gorgonio Pass.

We were disappointed by the low diversity of reptiles, especially as Jim Berrian is an experienced herpetologist.  But I hope you enjoy Melody McFarland’s photo of the Red Diamond Rattlesnake, a species missed at Valle Vista in 1908.  The site is riddled by abundant rodent burrows, so it is likely to be interesting when our mammalogists are able to work here.  The seasonal flow of the San Jacinto River leaves dried mud, especially in the percolation basins, that is great for prints, so a tracker better than I should be able to identify from them species beyond the raccoon that I could confirm.  In any case, we look forward to future visits to this site, important as the only 1908 site at a low elevation at the west base of the San Jacinto Mountains.

honeybee

Thanks very much again to Joe Lewis for authorizing us, to Karin Cleary-Rose for her advice in this area and suggesting the site we covered as a logical surrogate site, to Ken Weaver for his help and knowledge of this area, and to Melody and Jim for their help in the field.

The Valle Vista trip was our last of the summer; the next will be to Little Paradise in Palm Canyon in the third week of November, beginning our winter surveys.

Thanks for your interest in our study.

I’m having a hell of an annoying time trying to find a decent set-up for this blog that will accommodate tables and photos. If you don’t have your browser window maximized, the photos will be all bunched up. I bought textbooks for the Pattern Making and French classes that I’m taking next week. Imagine the look on my face upon discovering that the French textbook cost $182. Unbelievable. Enough bitching…

In addition to being camp cook, I handled invertebrate collection by means of pitfall trap. Pitfall trap equates to nothing more than plastic cup sunk in a hole in the ground. It’s a cheap and convenient way to sample an area for neat creepy crawlies and other ground-dwelling creatures. A pitfall trap can be any size including five-gallon buckets that yield some really impressive animals like larger lizards and mammals. In this case we used plastic cups that someone scored from a convenience store.

Upon arrival on Monday we dug twenty holes in four different sites and inserted cups for a total of 80 traps. Each trap was checked every morning and representative animals assessed. The 1908 expedition didn’t bother with invertebrates so we don’t have any comparison data. I am hoping that on the next trip I’ll be able to do a little more with collection methods.

In addition to insects, we trapped scorpions, spiders and lizards. We were hoping for a shrew in one of the sites, but there are either no shrews or they’re too smart to blunder into our traps.

A ubiquitous beetle that we found in great numbers is this:

Eleodes in defensive posture

a darkling beetle of the family Tenebrionidae, species Eleodes. These beetles are found in desert settings throughout the western part of the US and are active most often at dusk and dawn. One would think that this crepuscular habit of foraging would be to their great disadvantage – a jet black beetle against a light-colored sandy background is quite conspicuous to the keen eyes of nocturnal predators.

When this beetle is disturbed, it assumes the defensive rear-up posture that you see pictured above and readies itself to unleash a rank cocktail of offensive chemicals. It’s foul-smelling and irritating defensive fluid is highly effective against most attackers, especially ants, and is composed of 1,4-benzoquinones, several hydrocarbons and caprylic acid. What is all this stuff, you ask. It doesn’t matter, but trust me when I say you don’t want to know. It positively reeks.

This species is capable of only a mild sting

Meet Fulgora laternaria, aka, the peanut headed bug:

bee from museum

I successfully updated the blogging software. Not surprisingly, I made a much bigger deal out of it that was truly warranted. I guess I could learn more about how all this works, but the last thing I need is another hobby. I just want to know enough to be able to design my own theme, so if anyone has a good reference or book or something of that nature, please let me know. 

Here are a couple of beautiful animals from the museum. I never go without my camera. There’s no telling what’s going to be on the lab table when I walk in.

A buprestid beetle:

lined june beetle:

scorpion:

The photo on the left is a shot of some beautiful green bees, I am not sure of the species. But check out the photo below. This is an interesting animal. It’s called a Solfugid, by bug people, wind scorpion, sun spider or camel spider by others, even though it is neither a spider nor a scorpion. This one was found in Balboa Park:

It is an arachnid, however, but in its own classification.  They’re non-venomous, but the larger species can inflict a painful bite. This specimen was small, maybe an inch long. Solfugids vary in size and you might have seen photos of a very large species from Iraq that was flying around in an email a couple of years ago:

I spent the day at the museum taking photos of bees:

Last week we received a dwarf cassowary from the zoo that had died. A bird like that is just too large to stuff and keep as a whole specimen, so Phil decided that we prepare the skeleton only.

There are three species of cassowaries which are large, flightless birds native to New Guinea and Australia. The dwarf cassowary is the smallest of the three and lives in the mountains of New Guinea. The largest, the Southern or double-wattled cassowary, is native to northern Australia, New Guinea and some smaller islands in the vicinity. Gene and I had the experience of a lifetime when we saw a live wild cassowary in Queensland last year. It was absolutely thrilling. These birds are over 6ft tall and weigh up to 180 pounds. We were advised to not walk through the forests without a stick and were briefed on how to behave if we should run across one of these birds. They’re infamous for their ability to eviscerate humans with one kick. In the photo on the left you can clearly see the modified inner talon that’s used for defense. Looks just like a sword and I wouldn’t want to get one of those in the gut. Even on the dwarf cassowary, the power in the legs is staggering. It’s upper legbones were almost the diameter of my forearm bones. That’s some serious kicking power in a bird that’s only 3.5 feet tall. Imagine what one of the big ones could do to your guts!

These birds are important to forest health because they’re frugivores (fruit eaters) and are integral in seed dispersal. Unfortunately, like virtually every other animal on the planet, they are endangered because humans just can’t control their greed and population levels.

I began volunteering in the Entomology Department at the museum which increases my time in the museum to three days a week. The bug department has about 1,000,000 specimens, largely lepidopterans (butterflies and moths), none of which are cataloged. “Not cataloged” means that they are not in any kind of database, anywhere, with identifiers for easy location. I began the monumental task of getting these things organized last week, starting with the type specimens. Each insect will be assigned a museum identifier number and its accompanying information (collector, date, species name, location, etc) will be entered into a computerized database. The best part about this whole project is access to one of the marvels of modern photography, the Canon 65mm MP-E macro lens. A bitch to wield, but take a look at the results:

and that’s not even as good as it gets. This lens can do 5 times life-size, that photo is only 1 or 2. If you’re not camera-geek enough to understand what that means, trust me when I say it’s enough to give me goosebumps.  I would love to have this lens, but I can’t justify the purchase of it just yet without having a wide-angle lens first, something that has a much greater utility and that would nicely round out my basic lens set-up. Its use is very specialized and limited to tiny subjects. It’s extremely difficult to use in the field and its purchase also necessitates the additional purchase of a good tripod and ring flash attachment, bringing the total investment for this lens to roughly $2800. The insect pictured above is probably 1/4 of an inch long.  But the detail! Wow! Take a look at these:

All of the insects pictured here were collected in the early part of the last century, maybe around 1910 to 1930. They remain in remarkably good condition when properly maintained.

We made it back on Saturday evening, after having made the 2800 mile trip from Pennsylvania to California. We had a fantastic trip and I’d do it again in a minute. I’ll fill you in on the details later, but here are some photos from late summer in rural Pennsylvania.

Things are moving along in our process of extricating ourselves from this base. We’ve got 3 sayonara parties to attend in the coming weeks and I am going on one last birdwatching trip next Sunday…the day after the sayonara party. That might be rough.

Volvo contacted us and the car is being constructed at this very moment. We even have a VIN number. Unfortunately, the most important thing has yet to materialize: our actual departure date. Not surprisingly, that lies in the hands of the government, so no wonder it’s delayed.

It’s been hot, but we’ve had relatively low humidity which is rare for these parts in the summer. This is the time of year when the kabutomushi or rhinoceros beetles are active and it is with that enormous insect in mind that I set out this morning. I saw one last year when I was walking home from Japanese class at about 10pm. Of course, I see the most spectacular beetle in the country outside of a pet store and I don’t have my camera. That always happens – like when we went to Australia. We saw a cassowary and I didn’t have my camera.  Kabutomushi are native to Japan and are much much larger than their US counterpart, the eastern Hercules beetle. Kids keep them as pets and their images are on t-shirts, lunchboxes, notebooks, toys and anything else you can think of.

Here’s a video of them at night:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hO3IduOlDSM]
I found an aodougane (アオドウガネ, Anomala albopilosa albopilosa) which is a type of scarab beetle. Many scarab beetles are brilliantly colored. This is due to the beetle’s ability to reflect polarized light. And for the real science nerds out there, they don’t simply reflect polarized light, but reflect it in a circular manner with chirality. Most species of Scarabidae show left rotation of reflected light. These two unedited photos illustrate the difference.

The photo on the left was taken in bright, but not direct light. The next is the same beetle in direct sunlight:

 Coloration in insects and other animals is usually a tradeoff between camouflage and sending a message either to potential predators or a mate, so it is still a mystery as to why these beetles have evolved such complex color spectrum manipulation.

This is a species of longhorned beetle, but I am not sure what since my insect books are in a shipping crate somewhere on a boat in the Pacific:

You really need to click on that photo and expand it to get the full effect of those eyes. Unfortunately, this poor creature was only a shell of his former self. Literally.

 This is what was left of his carcass after it had been consumed by something else. I’ve seen huge hornets here chewing away on large beetles so this is possibly the work of one of the giant Godzilla hornets.

Think of the next two photos as symbolic of the closing of summer rather than allowing the gross-out factor to overpower the poetic signifigance this might otherwise have. A cicada succumbing to the inevitable end-of-summer death and a carrion beetle and its larvae feeding on an earthworm:

 And lastly, an unidentified beetle that Gene and I saved from slow death by ants:

It stopped raining today for a couple of hours so I took advantage of it and walked up the hill in back of our tower to my usual insect hunting area. The last time I did any insect photography was about 5 weeks ago. The rain and my attitude has permitted me from engaging in any outdoor activities since then.

Since my last visit, some ants had colonized the underside of a stray piece of concrete and deposited a motherlode of pupae. I felt really bad about disturbing them:

Wouldn’t you be pissed if someone flipped over your rock that protected your entire next generation? I soon found myself under assault from the colony and moved on, but not until I’d replaced their shelter. Then I found the biggest horsefly I’ve ever seen Tabanus trigonus, ウシアブ:

Of all the bloodsuckers, these might be my least favorite. I shudder every time I see one.

Thistle with a beat-up butterfly and a trio of weevils, one of whom is making a mistake

This moth was huge. The next time you think you see a dead leaf, check again, because it might not be a leaf.

This moth was in an awkward spot for taking its picture, but I have a policy of inflicting the least amount of stress on my subjects, so I didn’t prod it to move and dealt with the situation as it presented itself.

I have no idea what species this is. Some kind of sphinx moth, I guess. My insect book sucks in their treatment of moths.

By this time the mosquitoes and ants had done some major damage to my legs and arms, so I started to head home and as frequently happens, I find the best things when I’m not even looking.  I am not sure, but I suspect this a pellet from a small owl:

you can clearly see pieces of meat and insect shell and it’s crawling with ants which may be a little hard to see since the majority of them ran for the hills when they saw me. I took this photo around 3pm and it looked relatively fresh, but the humidity and rain presumably prevented it from drying out.

After examining the pellet I stood up, turned around, and saw this mamushi tail under the edge of the asphalt.  I got goosebumps just being near the thing.  I’m one of those sick people that enjoys seeing dangerous animals…much to Gene’s extreme displeasure.

Lastly, some neat mushrooms or kinoko in Japanese. Literally, that means tree’s child.

We’re going to my favorite Indian restaurant tonight that we’ve named Poppy’s. If you’re a Seinfeld fan you’ll understand. I don’t care, he serves the best Indian food around. Like I said before, I like living dangerously.