Here are a few non-herps of interest that were found during my latest adventure. I have been doing field work and observation as a hobby for more than thirty years and this was a first for me:
For those of you that don't recognize these, the orange winged wasp is called a Tarantula Hawk, the beginning of their life-cycle is when the female wasp finds a Tarantula, she stings it which paralyzes the spider, puts it into a sort of suspended animation, she then drags the tarantula back to a selected spot, usually a rodent hole or something similar and deposits her eggs inside the live but comatose tarantula. When the eggs hatch, the wasp larva has a huge meal of the tarantula from the inside out! Not the way I want to go but very interesting at least...
) Anyway, I have seen tons of Tarantula Hawks and tons of Tarantulas but never, until last week, had I actually seen one in action. To give you some perspective, the wasp is about 3" long and she carried this spider over rocks, through brush, over a log and about 20 feet from where I took the pictures before disappearing down a gopher hole.
Here's an interesting spider, if anyone has an ID I'd appreciate it, about the size of a silver dollar with a huge web that spanned at least 10 feet, she was about 8 feet off the ground suspended between two large bushes under a trail.
Had to take a picture of these if for no other reason that there were so many of these tiger swallowtails around the thistle bush that it was incredible, there was one large patch of thistle which was about 100 feet wide and 50 feet deep, there were dozens of these butterflies all over the place!
One that got away...
Lastly, this guy just happened along a path that we were walking, he's a Longhorn Beetle, apparently fairly destructive little buggers, they have a huge grub that stays in its larval state for several years, grows to the size of an adult males middle finger and can decimate certain tree species as the larvae eats the roots. He measured nearly 4" long!
TRIP SUMMARY:
4 days, 500+ miles driving, 25+ miles hiking
Southern Pacific Rattlesnake: 4
Colorado Desert Sidewinder: 3
San Diego Gopher Snake: 2
Western Yellow-bellied Racer: 1
Striped Racer: 1
Southwestern Speckled Rattlesnake: 1
San Diego Alligator Lizard: 1
Western Spadefoot Toad: 1
Bullfrog: 1
Pacific Treefrog: 1
Fence Lizards: TMTC
Side-blotched Lizards: TMTC
Granite Spiny Lizards: TMTC
So, as summer time goes here, lots of work to find stuff but if you really want to and you find a few locations there are herps and other interesting things to be seen!
Thanks for looking and good “herping”
Brad
