Small

Small things are amazing. Megafauna like vultures or bison are charismatic but not enlightening. Creatures in nature are used for careers, industries or distractions, but they can also just be small lessons. Lessons about ourselves. Things round us are not objects that represent other things, yet they are things that represent the essential human condition.

In the rains that began after the official start to the monsoon season in Corrales, the night-time ground erupted on the bajada to the west of the river. Out of holes there came these cute little frogs with large eyes; Couch's spadefoot. The painter Renoir contrasted the impressionist early career style with the classic strict style of his dry period. This frog, showing a calm, warm milieu also models the hidden drives of a desperate struggle to survive and breed both as an individual and a species behind a warm and soft expression of calm.

This leafhopper (Texananus lathrami) is a strange creature that lives on the widely available but nutrient poor diet of plant sap. Renoir showed the world how to represent shadows and texture not as a matt color, but as an impression. These insects have been using impressionistic themes to blend into their background and process plant juice in peace for literal eons. They take the dilute liquid and process though a filter chamber to concentrate the material, essentially using a kidney before the digestion. They pee out the sugary liquid and then use specialized bacteria to predigest and build the essential amino acids from the raw materials in the slurry. There are many species of these amazing insects, the diversity comes because they need to develop niches to reduce competition in a food poor environment were most of their time is taken up with producing food.

Magritte said a pipe is not a pipe. It was a bold statement. This picture also contains something that is not what it seems. This wasp is a velvet ant that is actually a wasp, but not the kind most people know. Genus Odontophotopsis. There are 100,000 species of wasps and many more not known. The vast majority are parasitoids and don't chase children around picnic tables in the summer. These wasps have unique projections on their jaws and chest plates that fit like a lock and key to allow copulation, allowing very specific identification to the few who can read them.

Magritte, the surrealist, was fond of painting leaf birds to explore "elective affinities" the connection between things. This is the greater purple hairstreak butterfly (Atlides halesus). The hairstreak has a neat trick; the butterfly uses to put two fake antennae on the end of the wings. In studies, these appendages fool 100% of jumping spider attacks into attacking the hindquarters. The butterfly even wiggles these after landing to entice a jumping spider to stalk to the rear of the butterfly instead of the vunerable head.

Phoratoxins in the mistletoe help the butterfly inchworms thrive. This plant is the exclusive food for greater hairstreak caterpillars. While the plant is a poor choice over all, the lack of competition means the symbiosis is as locked in as milkweed is for monarchs. During Magritte's "Renoir" period the painted a bouquet of flowers weirdly growing from the ground like a tree. This is a great way to describe the Haustoria that mistletoe uses to grow into the tree's xylem and Phloem transport system.

The geometer moths break all the rules. Most moths have soft and fuzzy fringes and muted colors but these have bright contrasts and lines marking them. Renoir fought against this rigid style in the Parisian art scene his whole life, claiming sharp lines were unnatural, before reversing his opinion in the severe period after a trip to Italy and its examples of Renaissance abstraction.

Magritte wrote his aim was to "make the most everyday objects shriek aloud". And while this Physella acuta is a very common place, ordinary thing. There is an unusual feature. The coiling is left handed. This is odd as almost every other snail species spirals the opposite way. The term is chirality and in some circumstances this gives the species an advantage.

The jumping spiders seem to become much more active once the weather increases. Webs are actually pretty uncommon, but these spiders do make silk as a safety tether for when jumps go wrong. While those two big eyes grab the attention, there are actually another set of smaller eyes to the side like indicator lights. There are then another set behind and another two at the back and to the side.

This looks like a typical bee grubbing around the flowers. But as Magritte always tried to do, an observer should look closer. But this is a Digging wasp (Dielis pilipes). The females hunt beetle grubs to paralyze and lay egg in. The males need flower nectar to buzz over the ground to try to be the first to intercept a virgin female as they dig out in the early summer. 

While this looks like just a fly, there are several features worth remarking on. The most obvious is the size, this fly is huge. The eyes are almost a single visor, showing it is a male (Tabanus atratus). This is good news because the females have scissor like jaws with which they lap blood from mammals. The Malpighian tubules work in tandem with the hindgut to pull this massive rush of water out of the hemolymph (insect blood) and dump it out, leaving the midgut packed purely with a dense, highly concentrated paste of red blood cells and protein.

The adult antlion (Brachynemurus signatus)is often seen in late spring. They are quite poor fliers and look nothing like their juvenile phase, which has huge jaws and ambush tactics in the loose soil.

It can be quite breathtaking to see the size of some of the carpenter ants found in Corrales. The enlarged thorax suggest this is a new queen, looking to establish a colony. The winged drones can be found outside as well but only for a short while. Renoir went through several stage of his life that seemed very different, from the impressionist, to the dry period to the hybrid and eventually his senescent red period. Similarly the ant queen goes from a Pharate, to an Alate, to a Foundress with nanitics, and then a mature queen Claustra. This last stage processes vitellogenin protein that can halt cellular aging, allowing her to live over 25 years.

Asters are a diverse group of plants developed to be adaptable for conditions found near wetlands. Their big open flower faces attract all pollinators, and also human gardeners. This species; Spiny Chloracanthas is monophyletic and unique. It adapts to dry conditions by shedding its leaves quickly, prroducing chlorophyll in the stem to reduce leave water loss. The lateral branches are modified into thorns that allow the stems to grow tall into dense thickets that deter grazing animals. A dicot learning the evolutionary tricks of an opuntia (cactus), truely not a pipe as Magritte could have commented.

This is Idaea gemmata, another geometer moth like the one above. Except this one is much more fuzzy and subdued, blending in perfectly with light stucco. That edges of the wings are fringed, breaking up the body edges but also absorbing and reflecting bat echolocation signals. These moths have a discal spot on their wings in a contrasting orange, red hue that disappears as they age. The older Renoir used vibrant cochineal red pigments in his late paintings. These pigments have also faded out over the years to muted browns and oranges.

Bumblebees come with a lot of myths. They are not anatomically impossible flying marvels but they do use a different form of lift than modern planes. They also pollinate differently than honeybees, using vibrations and static electricity very precisely. In desert willow/Catalpa hybrids they have another trick of biting a hole in the base of the bloom to bypass the throat and pollen collecting stamens. This hole is often then exploited by hoverflies and honeybees.

Nature is wonderful and an amazing restorative to the weary soul. It allows us to observe and take away from the encounter just what we need. The beauty is that nature also never reaches an end, there will forever be more to be seen. The endlessness of it is what many painters such as Renoir and Matisse sought to express in their studies. Renoir sought to express light and shadow in color, while Matisse looked at the nature of reality itself in specific detail. Both sought to express the medium of colors as a sensation or experience. An abstract experience all of us could probably do well to emulate, if we start small.

Monsoon

 

The snowpack no longer exists in a meaningful sense. It used to provide summer water down the Rio Grande where some was impounded behind dams like Heron Lake and Lake Abiqu. The El Vado dam is closed until around 2032. No matter the expert, the truth is we are not really sure what the new normal is going to mean for the future. Likely there will be unexpected outcomes, with winners and losers. Much of which will actually depend on events that seem completely unconnected. But it will help to be informed.

Many people have noticed insects increasing. Some have appeared as a result of the return of a monsoon. Water from the sky is an unusual even in the Southwest lately, but carpenter ants like this one use the moisture as a trigger to create new swarms, using winged drones like this one to spread out across the landscape.

Insects that are far more photogenic include this hairstreak butterfly Strymon melinus. Those tail streaks confuse predators into thinking the rear is the head, misdirecting the travel and maybe buying the insect more time to escape. These butterflies use many host plants, allowing them to adapt to human altered ecosystems.

While it can be very difficult to identify freshwater microscopic organisms, this one is likely a rotifer. The outer case is a protein shield called a lorica. They are part of a quite complex ecosystem that breaks down organic matter in treated wastewater. These creatures are eaten in turn by animals such as mosquito fish

I'm still not 100% sure this is a mosquito larva, most likely it is a midge larva. These macroinvertebrates are surprisingly complex, with  internal swim bladders and fine filters

Not often seen, these planarians are a type of flatworm that feed on small creatures in treated wastewater that flows into the Rio Grande. These specialize on snails, digesting them using specialized enzymes and a muscular sucker, a lot like a starfish

The wastewater pipe at the Harvey Jones BioSwale contains a whole beach of Physella snail species to support the flatworm populations that hunt them. Flatworm in turn are eaten by small freshwater leeches. These snail gorge on the algae and diatoms films that use the high phosphate and dissolved total solids of treated wastewater to grow lushly in shallow water and on volcanic rock used as substate.

Tadpoles are amazing survivors and the amphibian life cycle is quite complex and amazing. These juvenile woodhouse toads breed in the Rio Grande in spite of the large number of predatory hazards, by staying in the fish free zone of backwaters, where the depth is often only a few millimeters. They use those flagellant tails to excavate a depression to stay in a pool for as long as they can. They only need a survival rate of  .008% to keep a stable population, so can often persist in spite of incredible odds

Many flowers are beginning to bloom now. Plants have to invest quite a bit of energy into flowers, so wait for favorable conditions such as warm temperatures, moisture  and bright sunlight.. Different plants use different strategies to divide up the niches. Asters like this one use general styles and often use ants in a mutualistic system, encouraging them to deter caterpillars and other tissue destroying insects. The interaction is complex, however, and ants also contain a strong defoliant like formic acid, while also using aphids to milk the natural sugars of the plant

The silver leaf nighshade is a beautiful bloom that is very attractive to bumble bees in the late summer. These plants are insanely tough, with deep roots, spines that also keep out the cold, and berries containing solanine to deter browsing. This same chemical is also found in the humble potato, albeit at much lower levels

Bindweed is a pretty remarkable plant with many little tricks. The petals can close up, protecting the valuable reproductive organs from wind and rain as well as wasteful generalist insects. Solitary bees have widely spaced hairs that are best for capturing coarse pollen grains. Metallic sweat bees also visit and can find the flowers in the most marginal of environments.

Solitary bees can be found in mallows, but chimney bees are often found sleeping in the blooms. These bees (Diadasia) are oligolegy and only use the Globemallow flowers for their young. Actually, only the males are found in the blooms, and they are not there so much for the nectar as to be the first to intercept a receptive female arriving on a flower.

There are three invasive crayfish species in New Mexico, but there is also three endemic species. This one might be a Conchas crayfish (Faxonius deanae), but is about 190 miles away from where its supposed to be. The pincers, when closed, are more shaped like needle nosed pliers than the more typical shovel shape of the other species

The warm temperatures seem to bring out the bold jumping spiders. These arachnids are very photogenic, not just because of their large pair of forward facing eyes, giving them anthropogenic features, but they also have green, glittery fangs and an engaging alert, personality.

Many lizards in the wild have behaviors related to their environmental needs. This skink has the smooth surface of a mostly fossorial life, but they come out on cool morning to warm up in the sun quicker.

The lack of water in the drainage ditches show the snapping turtles more easily. These large Chelonia are also looking for sunny, sandy banks to excavate a nest. Most of these will be sniffed out and raided by some mammal, but enough survive to continue their ancient lineage that formed (as Chelydridae) as they have since before the great extinction event 60 million years ago

This juvenile wheelbug is showing off its rostrum which is used both as a dagger and a straw to feed on other insects. They control insects to some extent, but their ambush tactics are too slow to make much of a dent

Last year there was a large number of Cottonwood leaf beetles present. This year there are also many, but noticeably fewer. This is likely partly due to their predators increasing in numbers as a response

This is an adult Arizona beetle. A newcomer to the bosque for me. They occupy the same niche as the other leaf beetles but mature sooner and can also handle the slightly older leaves higher up the tree. 

The bosque attracts many birds that do not want to stay in just one place. This turkey vulture has migrated from further south. It is quite cool blooded for a bird and uses it's large black wings to absorb heat from the sun on cold mornings. This "horaltic pose" actually has quite a few different functions. I noticed the brittle old branches of the tops of cottonwoods actually broke off quite a few times under their weight.

This is a Putnam's cicada, an adult molt. They are stimulated by the humidity and temperatures to leave their life of sipping root juices underground and climb up into the foliage. They leave behind a shell called an exuviae as they become a winged form. Those wings are actually a sound device that they slap against the branches to call for mates in the forest

The number of moths is slowly increasing, but it doesn't seem like an explosive breeding year. This is maybe due to a good growth of mold in the moist warm leaf litter which are attracted to the moth larva and grow prolifically

Coyotes will always be loathed or loved by people, for the simple reason that they are now almost ubiquitous across the country. Their range has expanded as the natural checks on their numbers have been removed. Couple of little known facts: they have a weakness for fruits like mulberry and apples, and they stay near humans when predators such as mountain lions are nearby. In spite of all the experience, most people know much less about canid habits than they think.

The drastic changes in water in the middle Rio Grande valley; from floods to droughts actually benefit many native species. When water is pooled, damned or channeled the invasive, feral or parasitic species benefit most. Native or migratory species often adapt with behaviors such as increased mobility. Here a small flock of white faced ibis taking advantage of an acequia flooded field.

Flooded fields often bring more than just extra water. This owlet moth caterpillar was flushed out of hiding by the unexpected water and is an easy snack for just about any bird in the area.

Lizards are usually very difficult to catch, except when the cold water slows them down and reduces the number of hiding places for them. This is a NM whiptail, they are specializes for a highly active and inquisitive lifestyle. This leaves little time for reproduction and this lizard species is all female.

Another common species is the Southwestern fence lizard. These lizards are better at ambushing insects and are more relaxed and observant. They have a lower body temperature than whiptails and are more generalist in behavior overall

Freshwater snails use reproductive strategies to explode in numbers when conditions are best for plant growth. Snails in warm water lay many more egg batches and these incubate for only 3-4 days. The snails formed this way are much smaller, more likely to die and reach sexual maturity twice as fast but will quickly dominate a local area if there is room and food resources.

Garter snakes require warm sun to bask in or they are unable to digest food properly. Garter snakes use polyphagism, meaning they can adapt their diets. They can occasionally use a clumsy type of constriction, and often hunt in water for small creatures such as tadpoles or leeches. They can hunt the numerous small lizards in the area, especially the incautious small ones.

This western poplar sphinx moth has caterpillars that feed on cottonwood. These large moths are not often seen up close and many people mistake them for a hummingbird. But the adults have no mouthparts and die after a few days surviving only on the fat reserves collected as a caterpillar. They are the embodiment of the very hungry caterpillar.

There are two or three species of hummingbirds that take over the bosque environment. They will harass and divebomb large birds, especially raptors like hawks and owls. Their arrive can completely change the birds found in the riparian habitat by the river. They use nectar and sugar for energy, but also feed on small soft bodied insects like gnats or small spiders. Spider silk is also used to produce their thimble sized nests. Apparently they are very partial to water misting to clean residue from their feathers.

Fruit is found in abundant around Corrales, but supply is often erratic. The apricot trees produce early, but often they are too soon and the whole crop is damaged by a late frost. Most fruit trees use a "chill hours" internal counter. These are a range of mechanisms from callose plugs, abscisic acid, and chromatin remodeling of genes. None of this helped the fruit when NM late a late cold snap around April 17-18 after an unusual early warming that prompted the trees to begin fruiting too soon.

Bagworm moths can form intense and local swarms of insects. Most people only notice them once they are about the length of a fingernail, but they start off the size of a comma. They build a portable tent of chewed leaves as camouflage and protection from desiccation and predation. 

While many insects simply lay eggs and die (like the bagworm), allowing the next generation to continue, there is a lot of different strategies out there. These yellow eggs are likely ladybug eggs that are laid and hatch quickly from adults that overwinter is a torpor called diapause. As the water cycle changes, many different insects will be affected and develop in unpredictable ways. The natural world is going to have some surprises for us. What we do with those surprises will depend on the knowledge we have stored and how we spend it.

Spring

 Spring in Corrales seems insanely earlier and it is but the planet has its own ideas about how change should happen, and often all we can do it watch.