J.C. Abbott Nature Photography

Mexican Free-tailed Bats

2011-04-20T22:42:00.000-07:00

The other night we took a friend to see the Mexican Free-tailed Bats at the Congress Street Bridge here in Austin, Texas. This is the largest urban bat colony in the world. It had been a while since I had seen it and reminded me of the great photo opportunities I've had with this species.

The Mexican Free-tailed or sometimes called Brazillian Free-tailed Bat (Tadarida brasiliensis) is a wide-ranging bat found throughout North, Central and South America. They get their name because of their long, prominent tail.

They can roost in a number of different places from buildings to trees, but they are probably best known for the large colonies they form in caves. The photo above was taken at the Eckert James River Bat cave owned by the Nature Conservancy. It is one of the largest bat nursuries in North America and his home to around 4 million bats throughout the summer. The emergences from this cave are quite impressive.

The two photos above were taken at Bracken Cave owned by Bat Conservation International. It is home to the largest bat colony in the world and is home to some 20 million Mexican Free-tailed bats that emerge every night throughout the summer. It is truly a spectacular phenomenon and I encourage anyone who has the opportunity to watch an emergence. They are so numerous when coming out of the cave that as they fly in a cyclone like pattern up and out of the entrance, some bats get pushed to the outside and are actually impaled on prickly pear cactus spines!

Spring has Sprung

2011-04-11T20:44:00.000-07:00

This has been a very dry spring in Texas, but the insect activity is picking up quickly. Here are some of the neat things now flying in the Austin area, specifically at Wild Basin Wilderness Preserve.

This is a snakefly (Agulla sp.); so named because of its cobra like head and appearance. A neat group of insects generally placed in their own order (Raphidioptera), but sometimes placed in the Neuroptera (lacewings, ant lions and owlflies). They are predators and found only in the west within the U.S. Austin, Texas is at the very eastern edge of their range. This is a female with a its long ovipositor that she uses to lay eggs in the crevices of bark and rotting wood.

This is a robber fly in the genus Efferia, most likely E. snowi. Like the snakefly above, this is a predator and a female with a stout ovipositor. Efferia species can be commonly seen perching on rocks and vegetation while waiting for potential prey items to pounce on.

This is a small long horn beetle (Typocerus sinuatus). These can be seen commonly on flowers at Wild Basin right now. They will readily fly from one flower to another looking for mates and taking in nectar.

The Dark of Night

2011-04-05T19:33:00.000-07:00

Blacklighting, or the use of an ultraviolet light to attract insects at night is a favorite past time of almost every entomologist. This technique can bring in amazing numbers of insects. The most productive time to blacklight is usually on a calm, balmy night with a new moon and no competing artificial light sources. It is fun to take the time to photograph insects coming into these lights. Because they are nocturnal, many of these are seldom seen.

This is a composite of many moths, beetles, true bugs, caddisflies, and true flies that came to a light I had setup throughout the night.

This Armyworm moth visited the light frequently one night. The larvae can be very destructive on a variety of crops and considered serious pests.

This is not a mosquito, but rather a non-biting midge in the family Chironomidae. They are really neat when seen up close. Like mosquitoes, their larvae are aquatic, but as their name implies, they cannot bite and are harmless.

This is the adult of a net-spinning caddisfly in the family Hydropsychidae. This group of insects have aquatic larvae. The adults look like moths, but they have hairs on their wings rather than scales and they lack the coiled proboscis found in moths and butterflies.

This caddisfly belongs in the family Leptoceridae. They are called Long-horned caddisflies because they have very long antennae.

This is one of my favorite insects, the dobsonfly. The larvae are aquatic, called helgramites, and are often used for fish bait. The adults are short-lived, secretive and thus rarely seen by the casual observer. Males (left) in this group have very long sickle-shaped mandibles that they use to grab a hold of the female (right) with during mating. They are large and really cool looking!

Dragons Underwater

2011-04-03T08:16:00.000-07:00

Most people are familiar with dragonflies and damselflies as adults, but few are familiar with the much longer-lived and equally (if not more so) interesting larval stage. They live in the water in a variety of habitats and take on a tremendous variety of shapes and forms. Below are representatives of four different dragonfly families and one damselfly family.

Common Sanddragon (Progomphus obscurus)

Gray Petaltail (Tachopteryx thoreyi)

Yellow-sided Skimmer (Libellula flavida)

Undescribed Spiketail (Cordulegaster sp.)

Ebony Jewelwing (Calopteryx maculata)

Blueberries in the Sky

2011-03-30T13:43:00.000-07:00

Early every spring, a group of leaf-cutter or mason bees in the family Megachilidae are actively flying about much of North America. They belong in the genus Osmia and go by a number of names. The species O. ribifloris is called the blueberry bee which is appropriate given its size and color! Females in this genus like to nest in narrow holes or tubes. Most commonly this means hollow twigs, but they will use a variety of things with the appropriate sized hole, including empty snail shells and old dirt dauber nests like you can see below. They don't excavate their own nest, but rather find pre-existing nesting holes. A female might inspect several potential nests before settling in.

Blueberry females then visit flowers like redbuds to gather pollen and nectar. They make many trips to complete a pollen/nectar provision mass for their larva.

Once a provision mass is complete, she will back into the hole and lays an egg on top of the pollen. She then creates a partition of "mud", which also serves as the back of the next cell.

This process continues until she has filled the cavity. Female-destined eggs are laid in the back of the nest, and male eggs towards the front.

Once she finishes with the nest, she plugs the entrance to the tube.

They may end up with several completed nest holes before they are done.

A group of wasps in the family Sapygidae (no official common name, but sometimes referred to as Club-horned Wasps) are also actively flying at this time looking to parasitize the blueberry bees.

By the summer, the blueberry bee larva (if unparasitized) has consumed all of its provisions and pupates. The adult matures in the fall inside its cocoon and doesn't emerge until the following spring when the whole process starts over.

Urban Coyote

2011-03-29T21:28:00.000-07:00

There is a small pack of coyotes running around at the field station where I work in downtown Austin, Texas. They are occasionally taking down a lone deer and move around the entire 82 acre facility. I setup some cameras in areas where I could tell they were actively moving about and have been successful in getting a few images. They are beautiful animals who have really adapted to live among humans. In addition to coyotes, I've gotten numerous raccoons, armadillos, opossums, red fox, white-tailed deer and even a porcupine!

BugShot 2011: Improve your insect photography with John Abbott, Thomas Shahan, and Alex Wild

2011-03-28T11:50:00.000-07:00

I am pleased to announce BugShot, a first-of-a-kind weekend workshop for arthropod photography. The event is a photography course and weekend retreat scheduled for Labor Day Weekend 2011 (September 2-5) at the Shaw Nature Reserve outside of St. Louis, Missouri. We have chosen a long weekend and a central location to make the event as accessible as possible and have limited enrollment to 35 to keep the participant/instructor ratio manageable.

Depending on how the event unfolds, we may make BugShot an annual event similar to the famous Ant & Bee Courses, with rotating instructors and locations.

[download announcement] | [register online]

Who should attend?

Entomologists who aspire to improve their photographic skills for work or pleasure
Photographers who wish to learn arthropod- specific techniques
Naturalists & gardeners who enjoy the little things outdoors
Bug bloggers & bugguide.netters who’d like to spice up their online imagery
Anyone looking for an excuse to hang out at the beautiful Shaw Nature Reserve for a long weekend

Attendees are assumed to have an understanding of simple camera functions, including shutter speed & aperture, and should be able to operate the basic functions of their equipment. The course is geared towards SLR equipment, but most topics will also be applicable to digicams that offer manual control of important functions.

We are offering up to three registration fee waivers to current students, please email (alwild [at] myrmecos.net) for details.

Who are the instructors?

We have arranged an instructor list that spans a diversity of photographic styles.

John Abbott, of Texas, loves to photograph insects, especially in action
Thomas Shahan, of Oklahoma, is a master of close-up arthropod portraiture
Alex Wild, of Illinois, is an ant photographer extraordinaire

What will you learn at BugShot?

Macro-& microphotography equipment
Digital asset management & workflow
Composition
Lighting & flash
Working with live insects
Special techniques: focus-stacking, time-lapse & video
Field sessions in prairie, woodland & aquatic habitats
Evening photo-sharing presentations
and more!

click to register for BugShot 2011

New Texas Spiketail Dragonfly

2011-03-27T12:08:00.000-07:00

I just described a new species of dragonfly in the genus Cordulegaster. The common name for this family of dragonflies is Spiketails because the females typically have long ovipositors making it look like they have a spiked tail. The formal description of the species should be in print in a couple of months, but here are some pictures. It seems to have a strong association with Pitcher Plant bogs and is now known in five counties in Texas and just over the border in western Louisiana. I will be describing the larva soon. This species probably remained undiscovered because of its very early flight season (March-April) and restricted habitat of pitcher plant bogs. I'm hoping to learn more about its natural history this spring.

Male perched on a dead pitcher plant.

Male.

Female

Larva.

Exuviae or shed skin.

Bugs in the House

2011-03-26T20:41:00.000-07:00

I had the opportunity today to visit an apartment complex here in Austin that is infested with bed bugs. These are very difficult to get rid of and this is a very heavy infestation. Your mom really meant it when she said, "Don't let the bed bugs bite!"

There were many simply crawling on the walls.

Others were of course hiding out in the folds of the mattress.

The dark stains in the two images above are dried blood and fecal material from the bugs. You can seem some in the fold of this mattress (same ones photographed above).

They like to get in tight spaces. Above you can see where they get between the slats of this bed. Below are closeups of the activity. Notice the dried fecal pellets and all the eggs (elongated white structures).

Scorpionflies Everywhere

2010-11-30T22:15:00.000-08:00

I look forward to seeing scorpionflies every fall, but this year they were particularly abundant here in Austin. I was able to escape the lab and photograph both males and females in flight and perching. It was interesting to watch as males defended and fought over a dead grasshopper. They would release pheromones that in turn attracted females.

Lowland Tapir

2010-07-24T17:18:00.000-07:00

While visiting friends in Florida, Kendra and I had the opportunity to go to Lion Country Safari. They have a pair of Lowland (South American) Tapirs there. They really enjoy playing in the water to keep cool on a hot day!

Bats, Bats and more Bats

2009-07-27T15:08:00.000-07:00

Kendra and I had the opportunity to join Liz Braun de Torrez from Boston University this last Saturday night. Liz is working on her Ph.D. and focussing on bats that are feeding on insects in Pecan groves. We had fun photographing four different species, Red Bat, Cave Myotis, Evening Bat, and Eastern Pipistrelle. Here is an example of each bat.

Phorid (Scuttle) Flies

2009-03-28T09:13:00.001-07:00

These flies belong to a large family called Phoridae or Scuttle Flies. They are parasites on many different invertebrates. These photos are of two species (Pseudacteon obtusus and P. tricupsis) attacks the Red Imported Fire Ant (Solenopsis invicta). They quickly lay an egg in the thorax of the ant, then the larva hatches and migrates to the head of the ant where it eats out the head capsule, which eventually falls off!

Cats at Sirena

2009-03-06T19:30:00.005-08:00

Margay, originally uploaded by Abbott Nature Photography.

Ocelot, originally uploaded by Abbott Nature Photography.

Mountain Lion or Puma, originally uploaded by Abbott Nature Photography.

In February of 2007, I spent some time at Sirena Biological Station on the Osa Peninsula in Costa Rica. This is a magical place with lots of wildlife. I setup my trap camera and had amazing success capturing tapirs, white-lipped peccary, many small animals and the three cats above. Capturing all of these animals in a single month is a testimony to not only the diversity of this special place, but also the density of the wildlife.

Diving Beetle

2009-03-03T22:02:00.000-08:00

These are aggressive predators, both as larvae and adults. They feed on other insects as well as small fish and tadpoles. The full series of shots can be viewed in the galleries at my website.

New Website

2009-03-03T20:48:00.000-08:00

I have moved my old www.aeshna.com photographic site to www.abbottnaturephotography.com and enhanced it in many respects. I'll be adding lots of photos in many galleries over the coming months.