video: camoflaged, carnivorous caterpillars... oh, my!

 


1. I THINK these are the killer caterpillars (or relatives thereof) my friend Dan discovered (oops, NO, see post script), but he's out tromping in the field (who knows where), so need to verify when he returns.

2. I need to figure out who made this film so I can credit them--it's great! Anyone know?

bb

P.S. Yes, I got an e-mail back from Dan, and those are NOT his bugs. =)

Thanks to the WONDER that is Katie at NatureID, we now know this is probably the work of Steve Montgomery, whom she considers "the expert on these types of caterpillars found in Hawaii. I found that he and his cohorts recently discovered Eupithecia that eat snails."

THEN Katie said "the video is from BBC Earth's 'Wild Pacific' series."

And for the more official site of the on-line video clip, she shows us this, "BBC Earth's very hip 'Life Is' site."

I've said it before, and I'll say it again, Katie is AWESOME and SO much more disciplined than I. THANK YOU, KATIE! =)

AND thanks to DAN for getting back to me. =) (now I totally want to know what Dan IS up to...)

And the photo theme winner is...

Flowers and bugs!

Going through my pics last night to get them onto my mac was a revelation.

I have a lot of pictures of bugs. A LOT. I had no idea.

For a trip that involved the midwest, I'm pretty sure there are more pictures of bugs than people.

ANYhow, here's the first of several.

This is a tiny caterpillar we saw on a blooming indigo plant in the Anza-Borrego desert. Tiny, adorable creature. And the colors in that plant make me nuts--white stems, super dark, intense purple blossoms, so beautiful.

I'm off to clean the coops. It's going to rain a TON so I want the interior of their coop to be as dry and clean as possible, since they'll be spending a lot of time there over then next week.

Will post more pics later. =)  Enjoy!

biobabbler

P.S. Aw, heck, here's one more...

This flower is a native to the Texas region, HUGE red flowers on a towering plant. The instigator is a neighbor of relatives in Texas who has landscaped in all natives, almost making me swoon. Gave us a tour of everything, and I took lots of photos, catching these dashing creatures amid all the shiny red.