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.

2024 March 11

2024 March 11

   Kirsten Mills sends a picture of a Banded Woolly Bear caterpillar from Swan Lake, March 9.  We are accustomed to seeing many of these in October, after which they hide away somewhere over the winter.  Overwintering caterpillars are not at all easy to rear.  Occasionally Banded Woolly Bears are to be found early in spring, after they have woken up from wherever they have spent the winter.  When they are found in spring, they have usually finished feeding, and are looking for somewhere to spin a cocoon and pupate.  They are then easy to rear to adulthood.  The adult moths are called Isabella Tiger Moths.

 

Banded Woolly Bear  Pyrrharctia isabella  (Lep.: Erebidae – Arctiinae)  Kirsten Mills

 

Kirsten also found at Swan Lake this early European Paper Wasp:

 European Paper Wasp  Polistes dominula  (Hym.: Vespidae)  Kirsten Mills

 

2024 March 5

2024 March 5

   Jeremy Tatum writes:  This bug came into my Saanich apartment this morning.    Some bugs can deliver a painful bite; others can’t.  I don’t know whether this one can or cannot – I don’t care to find out by experiment.

Brochymena affinis (Hem.: Pentatomidae)  Jeremy Tatum

  

2024 March 2

2024 March 2

   More invertebrates photographed by Ian Cooper at Colquitz River Park.   Note that the globose springtail, also shown on February 29, is a new, undescribed species.

Globose springtail Ptenothrix sp. nov.  (Coll.: Dicyrtomenidae) Ian Cooper

Springtail Orchesella cincta (Coll.: Orchesellidae)  Ian Cooper

Araneus diadematus (Ara.: Araneidae)  Ian Cooper

Rugathodes sexpunctatus (Ara.: Theridiidae)  Ian Cooper

Female linyphiid spider, perhaps Neriene sp. (Ara.: Linyphiidae)  Ian Cooper

Male linyphiid spider, perhaps Neriene sp. (Ara.: Linyphiidae)  Ian Cooper

Lauria cylindracea (Pul.: Lauriidae)  Ian Cooper

 

 

 

2024 March 1

2024 March 1

 Ian Cooper sends some pictures of a very tiny spider on the bark of a conifer in Colquitz River Park, identified by Dr Robb Bennett as very likely Rugathodes sexpunctatus, a new one for Invertebrate Alert.

Rugathodes sexpunctatus  (Ara.: Theridiidae)  Ian Cooper

Rugathodes sexpunctatus  (Ara.: Theridiidae)  Ian Cooper

Rugathodes sexpunctatus  (Ara.: Theridiidae)  Ian Cooper

 

 

2024 February 29

2024 February 29

  More miscellaneous invertebrates by Ian Cooper.

Jeremy Tatum writes:  The conspicuous dark-bordered pale dorsal stripe on the caterpillar below is more pronounced than is usual for Noctua pronuba, so it may be something else – nevertheless I am fairly certain that it is indeed N. pronuba.

Probably Noctua pronuba (Lep.: Noctuidae)  Ian Cooper

 

Jeremy writes, of the fly below:  I don’t know what species this is.  In spite of its short antennae, I think it is of the group Nematocera (thread-horns) – a female (the males usually have longer and more ornate antennae).  If anyone knows what it is, please do let us know.

Unidentified fly (Dip.: probably Nematocera)  Ian Cooper

Deroceras reticulatum  (Pul.:  Agriolimacidae)   Ian Cooper

 

Dr Frans Janssen tells us that the springtail below is a new, undescribed, species of Ptenothrix.

Globose springtail,  Ptenothrix  sp. nov. (Coll.: Dicyrtomenidae)   Ian Cooper

Globose springtail, Ptenothrix  sp. nov.  (Coll.: Dicyrtomenidae)   Ian Cooper