life, art, biology, repeat: quick East Coast flash, bug question & a question answered

During our trip back east,

I pigged out at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC.

So yum.

What follows: a biological subset of the delicious repast.

Images Caveat

I looked for but didn't find "can't share these" on nga.gov,

I only took photos of those we were allowed to (w/o flash, of course),

& given that many can be downloaded for free here,

& many are >100 y.o., I'm thinking it's ok to share them here. =)

End Caveat

Gorgeous data bank

Painting style that makes the nature noodle in me drool...

Still Life with Flowers and Fruit

Jan Van Huysum, oil on panel, circa 1715, Dutch

Stunning, excruciatingly detailed work that seems like a

great way to preserve data re: living things (if accurate).

Can't imagine any pressed botanical specimen

having color like after 200 years

(tho' obviously natural history museum collections

can be staggeringly valuable to science).

Seems like you could ID many of these species,

if you knew where they were collected. Maybe. =)

And the bugs are the kicker.

Detail of Still Life with Flowers and Fruit

I bet $$ that's a (300 yr old) tiger beetle. =)

Can any bug people confirm or deny my tiger beetle guess?

Pretty please do, in comments, below. I'd be MOST grateful. =)

Fly, ants & butterfly (or moth?), same painting:

I think it'd be fun to review the flora and fauna

of paintings like these to see if they were accurately depicted.

Not your "Great British Bake Off"...

Still Life with Peacock Pie

Pieter Claesz

oil on panel, 1627, Dutch

This made me think of the amazing creations

that Great British Bake Off contestants try to emulate.

But, the first thing I thought of

when I saw the above was the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. =)

I'm pretty sure peacocks aren't covered by it (not native to US, etc.),

but part of my job is to look for such violations, so my brain sent up a RED FLAG. =)

Also, by now the bird's been dead for close to 400 years...

Among NGA's amazing display of lush American-made furniture,

this table leg caught my eye, for obvious reasons. =) 

RAWR! =)

I'll post more images & thoughts later,

but for now, I'll address what many have asked:

Why don't you spend more time at the Natural History Museum?

Because that stuff is what I've been studying

my WHOLE LIFE (or there abouts).

I want to look at different things,

unfamiliar things,

things I may not understand.

I want to explore other worlds when I'm on vacay.

And, apparently, art makes me happy.

Really happy.

=)

Plus, there's LOADS of overlap between nature and art

which I'll continue to explore in further posts.

And I believe nature can explain much of why that overlap exists.

We're just another mammal, after all.

=) 

xoxoxobb

Mumday photo parade

xoxobb

You're so judge-y: county fair photos are RATED.

At the end of this post, I also share a few of my favorite photos other folks took.


The Me Wall

SPOILER ALERT: I got zero 1st place ribbons. Bupkis.

However, I did get a few other-place ribbons, much to my delight. =)

In the novice/intermediate enlargement category for insects and lizards:

MOSTLY I'm just psyched I did this.

It was 100% new for me

& I was nervous

& had no clue what I was doing

& I did it anyhow.

WOOT! =)

In the novice/intermediate enlargement category for plant life/natural environment:

I have no idea how many entries they got,

and I'm dying to know.

They say if it's crowded, they reserve the right to

just display placing photos.

Novice/intermediate snapshots, insects and lizards
 (plus other categories to l & rt.):

The 3 Best In Shows I saw were:

photo of an old man's face

photo of a child's face

photo of corn.

None of the above are photos I'm likely to take or enter.

I'm native species and non-human animal biased. =)

I do love a Good Underdog.
Which, incidentally, was my FAVORITE cartoon when I was TINY.
Probably not a coincidence.

ARF!


The Them Wall

This might be my very favorite of other folks' photos:

Isn't it LOVELY? I think it's YUMMY.


This one is also great. WAY better in person.

So simple, and so good.

This one's also nice and abstract, w/lovely shapes & colors.

The professional group stands out, even from a distance. =)

So much great color and simple, strong composition.

DELIGHTFUL.

There you go.
I got six ribbons in all,
and got to see a lot of other photos I really enjoyed.


Same Time, Next Year

Next year I'm making LARGER prints,
and I've got ONE category that
I'm for SURE breaking into, so...

GAME ON, PEOPLE!

=)

Wishing you all good health, good times, and good photos.
xoxobb

Show off

 Photos I may have submitted to the county fair.

DH suggested you might wanna see. =)

Warning: these may look familiar...

Probably my favorite bee shot. Was TOTALLY watching me. =)

It may have been a strategic error to have SO many of my photos in the insect category

but I'm apparently obsessed w/bugs.

Nevertheless a few non-bug shots got in, too.

 This one I EXPRESSLY submitted 'cause YOU people had said you really like it.

So, THANK YOU!!! =)

Another benefit to this process:

I learned to cut & mount photos which is

exacting, precise and a wee bit stressful.

However, it's 100% absorbing,

and for ONCE I have some of my photos enlarged & mounted.

HOORAY!! =)

xoxobb

Bugs on my house, inaugural edition

If you've not noticed, I added a new page to this blog

(see BB Pages, right column)

explaining #BugsOnMyHouse, a campaign to

document & learn about bugs wherever you are.

EASY-style.

EVERYONE is welcome to participate. =)

Bloggy, tweety, instagram-y, tumblr-y, however you wish.

#BugsOnMyHouse will unite them.

Feel free to "comment" links to your work if you like. =)

*********

Here's First Batch, from Saturday, 31 May.

Beautiful bug: guessing it is a hemipteran,

that is, a member of the Hemiptera order, true bugs.

 As with the rest of these, will look them up as I have time.
I've already updated this post once to improve the IDs.

Here's another hemiptera candidate, 2 views:

 My SUPER unscientific 1st guess was stink bug,

'cause I tend to think they're cute. And this guy was cute.

Update: looking at Laws Fieldguide to the Sierra Nevada and bugguide.net,
I now think it's a shield bug, in the genus Eurygaster.

Side view of same.

This one was SO dark, I had to lighten it a LOT to see anything.

Some kinda beetle?

Guessing it's a treehopper or a planthopper... 

 Those beautiful wings are almost iridescent.

Ladybird beetles are having a banner year. 

Maybe because it didn't freeze forever so there are 10 million aphids.

Update: best guess is convergent lady beetle, Hippodamia convergens.

Mayfly. Pretty intricate, when you look closely.

 the Ephemeroptera order.

Update: it may be a female Callibaetis ferrugineus hageni,
one of the small minnow mayfly species
(btw, the photo at that link is AMAZING).

I remember from water quality monitoring (looking at benthic macro-invertebrates),
finding this species indicated good water quality. =)

DONE.

See?!? EASY.

That's the point:

photograph, post, guess & go.

=) Happy Summer Bug Time!

xoxobb

I'm not dead... I think I'll go for a walk!

 

Pretty much over the flu,
back from weekend travels & recovery,
now back to editing.

In the meantime, this guy was on our screen, outside.
He looks armored, like the knights in Monty Python and the Holy Grail*.

Blends in pretty spectacularly well with the grey metal screen.

But has much more personality....

Super wild guess is a hemipteran,
tho' I've not stared at it very closely, yet.

bb

*Post title is lines from Monty Python and the Holy Grail, wherein a thin, old man is being offered prematurely to the man who gathers dead bodies off of the street. And the subject line are a few of the things he interjects into the conversation between the man who wants to get rid of him, and the dead body collector ("It's against regulations.")

P.S. have a reservation in Lee Vining for this Saturday, so apparently biobabbler WILL get some nature this weekend, & bring Nikon. YAY!!!

teeny, TINY little red guys in the garden--what are they?

 
Found these under a brick in the garden. Literally RAN back to the house, grabbed camera, then RAN back to garden (as they seemed to be scattering quickly) to get a few shots.

This is not a quiz; it is a question.

(obviously wanna click on this and zoom in but this gives you size)

Anyone know what these pups are? I realize the shots are not the best. They had bright red, very round abdomens, like shiny balloons.

Did I mention they were TINY? They made pine needles look like giant logs.

Here's a detail of a photo for the best shot of their shape.

Not lookin' like mites, which is what I normally think when I see tiny tiny scarlet bugs.

Any wild guesses?

=)

bb

ooh, shiny! amazing living gold & silver art posing as bugs

 
Learned about this article, which explains how these bugs are so CRAZY shiny, on Twitter (@bug_girl, a.k.a. bug girl blogger). And I realize my blog is about biology, science, nature, etc., so I should probably talk about the discovery...

But I just wanna stare at this picture, credit the photographer, Eduardo M. Libby, and stare some more.

(sigh)

bb

Innovative animation: (VW) beetle blowing by buggy world

 
This is just FUN. If you watched the Superbowl this year, it may be familiar...

bb

ps Thanks, Bug Girl's Blog! =)

Ooops, HAVE to add this "making of" video (also from Queen Bug Girl). Notice throughout the interviews of the makers, there's nary a wrinkle to be seen. Looks like a young, hip dude endeavor. I cannot believe how they made the set (and brought it to London?!?). WOAH! Apparently it's tough work replicating nature ('cause it's so boss!).

What's That Bug? E.O. Wilson turns everyone into a kid again

E.O. Wilson brakes for bugs.*

So, during the leg of the tour that headed toward Yosemite Falls,

the train of folks halted completely for:

 A spider.

errrt! (brakes squeaking)

What's that bug?

Out came the field guide.

(afraid I missed the answer...)

And, while the book was out,

they looked up a beetle they'd seen earlier.

Next, en route to Yosemite Falls, they found ants on a cedar tree.

errrrt! Train stops again.

What's that bug?

Next, after the Yosemite Falls stop, there's a lunch break.

Someone noticed a bug on a woman's pant leg.

Down goes the sandwich, up goes the pant leg.

What's that bug?

(notice all the delighted smiles around him)

Gently holding the creature, chatting, folks getting a peek....

Apparently, it was a recently emerged adult stonefly.

Then, visit winding down,

we're sitting in an NPS meeting room at headquarters.

And, of course...

What's that bug?

An ant.

I think it was a house ant.

Peering at the ant, now crawling on the table.

So delightful.

Curiosity about the world around him,

delight in nature,

sharing with other people,

all contribute to E.O.-Wilson-as-Pied-Piper,

leading the adults around,

who in very short order

turn into little kids,

looking at the bugs on the ground.

Epitomizing a budding naturalist.

Kind of like when E.O. Wilson was a kid,

searching through the fields,

dropping to his knees,

looking at the bugs on the ground,

and wondering

What's that bug?

Who knows what can become of such small moments.

=)

bb

*fyi using the term "bug" super loosely. Not referring to actual bugs, members of the order hemiptera. Can I just say that looking that up, to get the link and confirm that hemiptera is the name for bugs, it MADE my DAY that I remembered that right? =) Doesn't take much.