INVERTEBRATE ALERT
This blog provides an informal forum for terrestrial invertebrate watchers to post recent sightings of interesting observations in the southern Vancouver Island region. Please send your sightings by email to Jeremy Tatum (tatumjb352@gmail.com). Be sure to include your name, phone number, the species name (common or scientific) of the invertebrate you saw, location, date, and number of individuals. If you have a photograph you are willing to share, please send it along. Click on the title above for an index of past sightings.The index is updated most days.

2022 July 13 afternoon

2022 July 13 afternoon

    Rosemary Jorna’s Ceanothus Silk Moth caterpillars, reared from eggs found near Kemp Lake, are now spinning their intricate double-walled teardrop-shaped cocoons:

Ceanothus Silk Moth Hyalophora euryalus (Lep.: Saturniidae)

Rosemary Jorna

 

Ceanothus Silk Moth Hyalophora euryalus (Lep.: Saturniidae)

Rosemary Jorna

 

 

Ceanothus Silk Moth Hyalophora euryalus (Lep.: Saturniidae)

Rosemary Jorna

Ceanothus Silk Moth Hyalophora euryalus (Lep.: Saturniidae)

Rosemary Jorna

   Meanwhile Jochen Möhr writes from Metchosin:  We have quite a few Essex Skippers.  They seem to be wandering through in an easterly direction, about one every two to three minutes, once three of them at the same time.  For good measure here are two damselfly pictures, taken while trying to get pictures of Essex Skippers.   Jeremy Tatum responds: It can be difficult to distinguish between Boreal and Northern Bluets from photographs, so let’s leave these as either/or:

Essex Skipper Thymelicus lineola (Lep.: Hesperiidae)  Jochen Möhr

 

Boreal/Northern Bluet Enallagma boreale/annexum (Odo.: Coenagrionidae)  Jochen Möhr

 

Boreal/Northern Bluet Enallagma boreale/annexum (Odo.: Coenagrionidae)  Jochen Möhr