Go out in a field and walk it and start to pay attention to the ground beneath your feet.
Pay attention to basically every plant until you learn to tell the plants apart.
Take pictures. Use #inaturalist. Be systematic. Don't say "that is grass": what kind of grass? Is it different from this other grass two feet away? How would you tell?
Then after you've done that… repeat the process over the same area. Looking again at what you missed.
I love our solitary bees. In the late morning hours when it’s still cold they sit at the opening of their tubes, looking out, warming up, trying to find the inner strength to get up and start doing things and I can relate so much.
My favourite NZ observation on #iNaturalist from the last couple of days is this stable fly photographed at Waihi by helenmacky.
It's a handsome enough fly, and it's a good photo, but what makes it stand out is the gang of at least seven pseudoscorpions all hitching a ride on it.
I've delayed long enough -- let's talk about the City Nature Challenge!
It's a global citizen science competition between cities, vying to observe the most species in one weekend. Observations are made via the #iNaturalist app or website.
It starts this weekend, April 26-29, 2024. You have until May 5th to upload all of your observations and try to get them identified.
If your city or region is participating, that's pretty much all you have to do!
I recommend on just getting outside this weekend and taking as many photos you can of all the wild organisms you can -- plants, birds, lizards, bugs, whatever -- as long as it's truly wild (not captive or cultivated by humans).
Then you've got a week to upload the photos to #iNaturalist, which should give you plenty of time.
The bee parasites are out en force. Blood bees, nomad bees, and worst of all, the bee body snatchers: conopid flies. It’s tough to be a busy bee minding your own business…
Cataglyphis lutea (UAE and parts of India) is a desert dwelling ant, the photos of this ant on iNaturalist caught my eye, since, like Leptomyrmex erythrocephalus (the Spider Ant of Australia), this these little ants fold their gasters over their mesonoma.
Very little is known about Cataglyphis lutea, shockingly little. I can't even find a mention of gaster folding in any of the brief descriptions of this ant.
Agree completely, for most animals, their biology and behaviour is largely undescribed.
Here is an ant acting as a pollinator; its limbs and bristles covered in pollen just like those of bees, wasps, butterflies, beetles and flies. For ants, their role in pollination is a well-described ecosystem service and behaviour in the academic literature, and yet, most people don't know about it.
While walking on the Santa Cruz board walk, I noticed this inquisitive Harbor Seal checking out what the kid was doing on the beach collecting water in their plastic beach bucket. Santa Cruz, California, April 2024
The larvae of these flies are all internal parasites, "most of aculeate (stinging) Hymenoptera. Adult females aggressively intercept their hosts in flight to deposit eggs." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conopidae