This blog provides an informal forum for terrestrial invertebrate watchers to post recent sightings of interesting observations in the southern Vancouver Island region. Please send your sightings by email to Jeremy Tatum (tatumjb352@gmail.com). Be sure to include your name, phone number, the species name (common or scientific) of the invertebrate you saw, location, date, and number of individuals. If you have a photograph you are willing to share, please send it along. Click on the title above for an index of past sightings.The index is updated most days.

October 3 morning

2020 October 3 morning

 

   Here’s a spider photographed by Ian Cooper.  Dr Robb Bennett says it’s a philodromid crab spider in the Philodromus/Rhysodromus species group.

 

Running crab spider (Ara.: Philodromidae)  Ian Cooper

   A few more photographs by Ian Cooper from the Galloping Goose Trail:

Banana Slug Ariolimax columbianus (Pul.: Arionidae)  Ian Cooper

Snail-eating beetle Scaphinotus angusticollis (Col.: Carabidae) with earthworm.  Ian Cooper

Unknown bug (Hemiptera)  Ian Cooper

Unknown slug. Possibly Arion rufus (Pul.: Arionidae) Ian Cooper

Probably Oniscus asellus (Isopoda: Oniscidae) with several Collembola.  Ian Cooper

   There are still a few bees around.  Here are two from the Kemp Lake area, photographed by Rosemary Jorna.

 


Bombus vosnesenskii (Hym.: Apidae)  Rosemary Jorna

Unkown bumble bee Bombus sp. (Hym.: Apidae) Rosemary Jorna

Unkown bumble bee Bombus sp. (Hym.: Apidae) Rosemary Jorna

   Rosemary also sends photographs of a spider and of a tortricid moth:

 


Araneus diadematus (Ara.: Araneidae)  Rosemary Jorna

We originally labelled the moth below as Acleris gloverana.  We are most grateful to Dr Jason Dombrowskie for pointing out that it is in fact A. variegana.


Acleris variegana (Lep.: Tortricidae)  Rosemary Jorna


Acleris variegana (Lep.: Tortricidae)  Rosemary Jorna

   Gordon Hart writes: We visited East Sooke Park on Thursday, October 1. It was a bit late in the day, and we did not see many birds, but at Aylard Farm we saw one Variegated Meadowhawk, Sympetrum corruptum, which is apparently one of 16 species of dragonflies in North America that migrate to some degree. ( See http://www.migratorydragonflypartnership.org/index/identificationGuides ) .

 

Variegated Meadowhawk, Sympetrum corruptum (Odo.: Libellulidae)  Gordon Hart