Two very cool beetles

The world is full of cool beetles. I mean, REALLY full of these hard-shelled little - and sometimes big - charmers. The order Coleoptera is huge; it contains some 400,000 described species and experts think that that many again, if not more, have yet to be described. In many habitats, beetles are the most numerous type of animal. A great many are tiny and nondescript, apt to be passed by without ever being seen.

Not these two.

A trio of pleasing fungus beetles, Megalodacne heros, are undoubtedly quite pleased to be enjoying a fine repast of budding shelf fungi. Last year, I had the great fortune of having one of the other species of pleasing fungus beetle visit the sphere of my front porch's light - SEE HERE - but this species far outdoes Megalodacne fasciata in sheer grandiosity. These three were part of a small herd that I encountered back in June in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

Up close and personal with the business end of a pleasing fungus beetle at the chow line. This animal displays classic aposematic - warning - coloration. The carapace is boldly ornamented in brilliant orange, forming a striking and very obvious contrast with the gloss black base coloration. The jarringly conspicuous coloration pattern, coupled with its diurnal - daytime - habits and fearlessness, strongly suggest that this is a beetle that you do not wish to eat. As many species of fungus are toxic, I assume that these beetles are too.

The pleasing fungus beetles were certainly cool, but they may be trumped by these golden tortoise beetles, Charidotella sexpunctata. They aren't big - it'd take a few dozen to make one of the aforementioned pleasing fungus beetles - but they sure are neat. In this photo, a pair works diligently to ensure that more tortoise beetles grace our landscapes. This species noshes on plants in the morning-glory family, and if you've got morning-glories in your garden, you may have your life enriched by these wee beetles.

In 1979, entomologist Edward Barrows published a wonderful paper on this species, and another similar tortoise beetle. You see, tortoise beetles are chameleonlike and can change color, which adds greatly to their allure. Barrows documented that a tortoise beetle can shift its colors in as little as 12 seconds. When all is well and they're having fun, such as in this photo, a bronzy-gold metallic cast is normal. As light plays over the beetle, glancing off its shell at different angles, a rainbow of blues, greens, and even purplish tints are reflected back.

In the course of making these photos, I felt it necessary to horn in and reposition the beetles for better photo ops. They didn't like it, and when I disturbed the pair, this male went from the rainbow display of the former photo to this dull blood-red coloration in seconds. Apparently these color shifts are accomplished by forcing fluids into tiny cells, or chambers, in the carapace which in turn changes the way that light refracts off the shell. How cool is that?

Beetles may be small, but they certainly can be sublime.

Purple Martins

NATURE

Sunday, July 17, 2011

The Columbus Dispatch

Jim McCormac

Purple martins eager to become our tenants

One of the most prolific wild "pets" in the eastern United States is the purple martin. East of the Rocky Mountains, these large swallows - the biggest in North America - now live exclusively in nest boxes.

People have long been smitten with these charming birds. Native Americans posted hollowed gourds to entice martins centuries ago, and European colonists picked up martin fever and became avian landlords. Witness this 1831 quote from John James Audubon: "Almost every country tavern has a martin box."

Domestication by humans wasn't always part of the purple martin's world. Before then, martins mostly nested in abandoned woodpecker holes high in dead snags.

The beaver probably played a large role in maintaining martin populations. As the furry engineers flooded new ground, causing trees to die, woodpeckers took advantage and created cavities in deadwood. Later, martins appropriated the holes.

As people increasingly enticed martins to nest boxes, the birds gave up their wild ways. By 1900, the transition to human-provided housing was completed.

It's easy to see why we've become beguiled by martins. They ooze charisma and good looks. Males are steely purple, while females are strongly tinged with browns and grays. Both sexes have shallowly forked tails and proportionately massive wings that make them supreme aerialists. Martins feed solely on flying insects, and it takes skill to snatch dragonflies and other speedy fare.

Most purple martin boxes are of the apartment style, with multiple nest holes, or colonies are created by stringing numerous hollow gourds from a beam. These martin villages are fun to watch. Birds constantly come and go, all the while delivering mellifluous gurgling chortles. The residents peek from holes or line up on wires and struts, seemingly gossiping about the goings-on. They remind me of Brooklynites sitting on the stoops of their brownstones, watching the world go by.

Purple martins see a lot of the world. Highly migratory, most of them journey to Brazil and Bolivia for the winter. Some probably travel 10,000 miles round trip each year. The oldest documented martin lived to be almost 14 years old, and that bird probably flew hundreds of thousands of miles in its life.

In late summer, after nesting, martins often form massive roosts. The Ohio Penitentiary, which was on Spring Street near Downtown for 164 years before its demolition in 1998, hosted a martin roost. In the 1960s and '70s, as many as 30,000 martins gathered there - six martins for every inmate. Unlike the jailbirds, the martins were free to go and probably were the envy of any prisoner savvy to their South American destination.

Prime breeding grounds for the purple martin include open spaces and nearby waterways. Some landlords have erected numerous fancy martin high-rises and host small cities of the birds. In May 2007, The Dispatch profiled one of these uber-martinists: Ken Fecker of Waldo, who at the time provided occupancy for 85 pairs of martins.

To learn more about purple martins, including their nesting requirements, visit the Purple Martin Conservation Association's website at http://www.purplemartin.org/.

Naturalist Jim McCormac writes a column for The Dispatch the first and third Sundays of the month. He also writes about nature at jim.mccormac.blogspot.com.

Midwest Native Plant Conference: A pictorial recap

Last weekend marked the third annual Midwest Native Plant Conference, and it was a hoot. A team of dedicated volunteers came together almost four years ago, hatched plans for this event, and brought it to fruition in 2009. The conference has gotten better every year, and we look forward to Midwest Native Plant Conference 2012, which will be held on the weekend of July 27-29, at the same place it was this year.

A special think you to Nina Harfmann, who agreed to put her vast photography skills to work as official event photographer. Each and every photo used in this post was snapped by Nina.

Bergamo Center, hub of conference activities. It's a one stop shop: rooms for our speakers, dining hall, vendor space, a wonderful inner courtyard for displaying plants for sale, and even 61 inexpensive but topnotch rooms for overnighters.

This conference is all about native plants, and we bring scads of 'em right to you. Or at least our vendors do. Some of the biggest and best sellers of native flora in the region are part of the conference, and bring their prime stuff. A big thanks, once again, to Ohio Prairie Nursery for their major sponsorship.

This is the scene in the inner courtyard at Bergamo Center - scores of botanical goodies, all for sale. Dozens of species were available this year, including some interesting oddities that can be tough to find. It's worth attending just to grab some plants.

Two famous native plant advocates walk out with their hands full: Cheryl Harner, and Jim Davidson.

A prime reason we have this conference at Bergamo Center is for the ambience - it sits in the middle of Mount St. John and its 150 acres of diverse habitats. One need only walk out the doors to be immersed in woodlands and meadows, populated with lots of native plant species. Thanks in large measure to the vision and hard work of Dr. Donald Geiger, the grounds feature extensive prairie plantings that sport species such as these purple coneflowers, Echinacea purpurea. The diversity of flora and fauna that we find on our forays around the grounds is astonishing.

The conference features a number of field excursions; this was one of our 6:30 am birding trips. We are scarcely more than a football field from Bergamo's front doors in this photo, and had already seen or heard a few dozen species.

This year, we were fortunate to have Brian Jorg on hand. Here, he teaches a photography workshop, and later he delivered one of our keynote programs, on native orchids. Brian is not only an amazing photographer, he is also an outstanding biologist and field man who possesses an enormous bank of knowledge about flora and fauna.

This is Ann Geise, an  artist from Cincinnati whose work has been featured far and wide. It was a great stroke of luck for us when she agreed to create our conference logo, which you can see at the Midwest Native Plant Conference website. Scroll to the bottom of the website's home page and view her rendering of rattlesnake-master with a coral hairstreak butterfly. We gave a few of those away this year as awards.

Saturday featured two sessions of breakout lectures, and that's Dr. David Brandenburg teaching one of them. David works at Dawes Arboretum, and is author of the new benchmark in plant field guides, the Field Guide to Wildflowers of North America. CLICK HERE for a review I wrote about this book for the Columbus Dispatch.

In addition to the morning and afternoon breakout sessions, there are also several keynote speakers. This is the main room at Bergamo, and this photo was snapped during my program on hummingbirds. We try to get speakers who can make the linkages between native flora and the animals that use them.

Conference organizers scored a home run by bringing in Guy Denny, who is probably the greatest expert on establishing prairies in this region. Guy has created a 22-acre prairie - and growing! - on his Knox County property, and groups come from all over to tour this prairie and learn about how Guy did it.

Steve McKee delivered Saturday evening's keynote address: Botanical Detectives at Work. It was a pictorial story of Steve's ongoing efforts to track down "missing" plants in his home county of Richland. Some species, most notably the rose pogonia orchid, Pogonia ophioglossoides, were known from historical records but no one had been able to relocate the orchid and some others that Steve included. His talk charted his efforts, some successful, some not, to rediscover these plants.

As in the past two years, the final day of the conference, Sunday, is all about field trips. Here, our scholarship recipient Derek Hennen photodocuments something at Cedar Bog. We feel it is important to have excursions into the wild to actually see and feel native plants in their natural haunts, so our Sunday trips visit the best natural areas in the Dayton region.

Proceeds from this year's conference went to support the following organizations: The Nature Conservancy (specifically their Sunshine Ridge project, an effort to link the Edge of Appalachia Preserve with Shawnee State Forest); Dawes Arboretum; MEEC (Marianist Environmental Education Center); and the Cedar Bog Association.

Thanks to all who came, and please put the Midwest Native Plant Conference on your calendar for next year.

Royal catchfly, a beautifully sticky bit of business

Before we get on with the business at hand - royal catchfly - I want to share two beautiful images of one of our rarer birds, courtesy of Dane Adams. Emil Bacik discovered not one, but two Piping Plovers at Lorain Harbor on Lake Erie yesterday. They are still there as of today, and Dane made the scene.

Photo: Dane Adams

The Great Lakes population of Piping Plover is imperiled, to say the least. Listed as federally endangered, this charismatic species had plummeted to about 12 breeding pairs by 1983. Protection of their beach nesting habitats has allowed for some growth in the population, and current estimates place the number of pairs at less than 70. There may have been as many as 700 breeding pairs along the Great Lakes prior to European settlement. Some of them bred on Ohio's Lake Erie beaches, but the last nesting dates to 1942. We only get the occasional migrant now, such as these birds in Dane's photos.

Photo: Dane Adams

You may have noticed that these birds' legs are heavily ornamented with bands. The colors and combinations indicate where they originated, and when. I suspect that someone is running down this information, and if I learn the back story on these pipers, I'll pass it along.

Anyway, in perhaps the world's first blog post to combine Piping Plovers and royal catchfly, we switch gears and jump into Bigelow Cemetery, a remnant of the once vast Darby Plains tallgrass prairie. Bigelow is a state nature preserve not far west of Columbus, Ohio, and is a must-see for anyone interested in prairies.

I was there recently, and the star of the prairie show, royal catchfly, Silene regia, was nearing peak bloom. This is a big plant; its magnificent spikes can shoot up four feet or more.

If you are interested in planting native species, especially in the context of a prairie garden, royal catchfly is a must-have. Several vendors, most notably the Ohio Prairie Nursery, had them for sale at last weekend's Midwest Native Plant Conference and sold lots. By the way, that conference went smashingly and was a ball, and I'll be sharing some photos from the event later.

The brilliant red flowers are star-shaped and sport a long corolla tube. Not surprisingly, they never fail to attract Ruby-throated Hummingbirds.

Here's why royal catchfly - and many of its brethren in the genus Silene - has the "catch fly" in its name. In this tight shot of the upper stem, we see gnatlike bugs and even a few beetles that became ensnared by the plant's viscous glanduar hairs, got stuck, and perished. Press a calyx - the tubular lower portion of the flower - between your fingers sometime. You'll instantly notice the Elmer's Glue-like quality of the plant.

This sort of thing interests me. It stands to reason that these sticky hairs that arm the upper portions of the plant are a defense against insects making their way up the plant from the ground. The plant is, in essence, trying to select for airborn pollinators such as the aforementioned hummingbirds, as those pollinators are probably a more efficient way to disperse pollen. But, when hairs such as these on the catchfly evolve to such a stickiness that they kill insects, is this a step towards evolving carnivory? In fact, I wonder if anyone has looked at royal catchfly to see if the plant already is capable of assimilating proteins and other useful goodies from the bugs that die on its stems.

Not all small insects perish on the gluey catchfly stems. I noticed that many of the plants had small colonies of of tiny blackish lentil-shaped aphids, which seemed to be able to move around with ease and are presumably completely specialized to feed on royal catchfly. All of these aphid colonies were tended by ants -two of them can be seen in this photo - and they also had no problem negotiating the sticky stems. Ants often associate with aphids, feeding on nutritious "honeydew" secreted by the tiny insects. In return, the brutish and warlike ants guard the helpless aphids against predators.

Mississippi Kite and kitelet

Quick update on the Hocking County Hide-A-Way Hills Mississippi Kite nest. Melissa Krygier, who has a place in HAWH, has been monitoring these beautiful raptors, and sent along three photos showing their progress. These were taken last Saturday, July 9, and they show a very young, quite fuzzy young kite high in its nest. Normally there'd be two hatchlings - there were two last year - but it appears only one youngster has emerged.

Photo: Melissa Krygier

Our very juvenile kite, a bit of white fuzziness high in its flimsy heronlike nest.

The sharp-eyed baby spots one of the adults and begins to emit its high keening pipes: "hurry, hurry, I'm starving!"

Photo: Melissa Krygier

A hardworking adult flies in and stuffs a morsel into Junior, which will satisfy it for about four or five minutes.

Photo: Jim McCormac

One of last year's kitelets tests its wings. If all goes well, the young kite in Melissa's photos will be conducting test flights in a month or so. The photo above was taken on August 22, 2010 - the date of our first "Kite Day", made possible by HAWH residents Elizabeth vanBalen Delphia and her husband Michael, who have been excellent ambassadors for these rare - in Ohio - raptors.

We hope to have another Kite Day in about a month from now, when Junior Kite is out of the nest and free-flying, yet still being fed by the adults. That's the easiest time to observe the birds, without causing any disruption to them. Stay tuned for details.

Thanks to Melissa for sharing her photos.

Mydas fly

I don't mean to be too heavy on the flies of late, but this one is just too cool not to plug. Besides, I've seen a few of these gnarly jumbos lately, and it may be a good year for them, for whatever reasons. If you see one of these giants, I guarantee you'll notice it.

BIG bug, on the corner of the headstone

I'm on the board of Columbus' Green Lawn Cemetery, which is one of Ohio's oldest (founded 1848) and second largest (360 acres). We manage it as an arboretum and park, which is how I came to be one of the board members. Some of the state's oldest and largest trees can be found, and about 90% of the native trees in Ohio are present. We've planted a three acre prairie, and there is a lush butterfly garden. Quite the urban oasis, a legendary birding locale, and teeming with all manner of wildlife.

I was in Green Lawn today, helping our general manager, Linda Burkey, give a tour to Patty Toneff of Toledo's Woodlawn Cemetery (another famous birding spot). We were slowly cruising along on one of the cemetery's 25 miles of roads when I saw a VERY large insect make a brief flight and come to rest at the base of a headstone. Fortunately, the women were tolerant enough to allow me a moment to leap out, grab the Nikon, and make some images.

Well, out I shot, camera in hand. The insect was not overly intimidated and allowed me to creep ever closer. I knew it was - or at least was fairly certain - some kind of fly, but the others that I had seen in the past week did not cooperate and no photos were made. So, I hadn't yet pinned a name on the beast. It acted rather territorial, flying to a few favored perches and acting as if it were guarding this particular piece of turf. It turns out that it probably was.

It was easy to make the identification once I returned to resources: mydas fly, Mydas clavatus, and it is indeed a robber fly looking thing. These animals are really big, comparable to our largest wasps. And indeed, it is a wasp mimic, trying to look like the big wasps in the Pompilidae family, and it resembles some of those species to an eerie degree. They even dangle their legs in flight, like wasps do.

So, as with the bumblee mimic robber fly that I recently posted about, this mimicry begs the question WHY? It turns out that in this case, the fly probably looks just like one of the large heavyweight stinging toughs so that other predators leave it alone. Tangle with a giant insect that packs a heckuva sting once or twice, and any bug-eating predator may learn to give them a wide berth. Presumably the mydas fly cashes in on this wasp world respect with its charade, and everyone leaves it alone as well. Except, probably, Summer Tanagers which dearly love huge ferocious bees and wasps and probably snap these mimics up as well.

Apparently adults will establish favored territories which they guard from other mydas flies, and that's what the one in these photos seemed to be doing. Interestingly, adult mydas flies are not thought to be predacious as are nearly all of their robber fly lookalikes. Instead, the adults seek nectar at flowers. The larvae are not pacifists though, and snack on beetle grubs in the soil or rotting wood.

White-cheeked Pintail in Ohio

Dan Russo of Westerville sent along some photos of an interesting duck today - a White-cheeked Pintail, Anas bahamensis. The beautiful fowl appeared recently at a suburban pond, and immediately began consorting with the local semi-domestic Mallards and other tame fare.

Lest you become crazed with listing lust and are lunging for the binocs and car keys, trust me - this is not a wild bird. We don't know its origins, but I'd wager three Jabirus and a Torrent Duck that this White-cheeked Pintail didn't fly to Central Ohio from the tropics.

 Photo: Dan Russo

The pintail happily waddles about the lawn with some Mallards, seeking handouts. It's the one in the back, with the white cheeks. White-cheeked Pintail is indigenous to the Caribbean and parts of South America, with a population also found on the Galapagos Islands. Their occurrence as a wild vagrant in the United States is very questionable, and probably only the south Florida records are in the running as potential bonafide vagrants. But even most if not all of those records are questionable.

Photo: Dan Russo

Lots -and I mean LOTS - of individuals and organizations keep waterfowl. And what fancier of feathered things with webbed feet wouldn't want a duck such as this gorgeous pintail? Well, a lot of folks want such animals, and have them. I have seen some amazing species and collections of waterfowl on people's ponds over the years, including rare Ohio vagrants such as Barrow's Goldeneye, Tufted Duck, and Eurasian Wigeon. One time, in rural eastern Ohio, I was shocked to glance over at a farm as I passed by and see a bunch of Hawaiian Geese (formerly Nene)!

Another time, Bernie Master and I were looking over wild fowl at a pond at Killdeer Plains when a gentleman who didn't appear to be a birder drove up and asked what we were seeing. It turned out he knew every duck out there, and well - he had kept nearly all of them in captivity at one time or another! This guy was a wealth of knowledge about the local waterfowl collector trade, and we picked his brain for some time about different species in captivity, their frequency, cost, etc. After that encounter, I wondered all the more about the legitimacy of many of the so-called wild vagrant ducks in Ohio and elsewhere. Some of these wayward fowl are certainly wild - waterfowl are very strong flyers after all - but others are just as certainly escapees and it can sometimes be impossible to know the origin.

Nearly every species of duck, goose, and swan you could name is available for sale and being kept in captivity. The last time I visited the Cincinnati Zoo, they had Harlequin Duck, Smew, and Barrow's Goldeneye swimming about on an outdoors lake. I have heard birders say that these are tough species to keep in captivity, but I'm not so sure that's true.

Here's some sample prices of a few species (by the pair) that I saw in a quick web search, and all are major Ohio rarities:

Cinnamon Teal - $130.00
Tufted Duck - $195.00
Black-bellied Whistling Duck - $135.00
Barnacle Goose (no Ohio records but we've had free-flyers show up and origin of this species is oft-debated on the east coast) - $325.00

And, for kicks, White-cheeked Pintail - a steal at $90.00 a pair.

Even Garganey - remember the recent lingering bird in southwest Ohio - is readily available should you wish to purchase some.

Just remember to keep their wings clipped, lest they fly away like this pintail did.

Thanks to Dan for sharing his photos of this beautiful duck.