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.

April 7

2016 April 7

 

   Jeremy Tatum writes:  Thanks to Rob Bennett for identifying the spider which I photographed at my Saanich apartment this morning, April 7.

 

 Scotophaeus blackwalli (Ara.: Gnaphosidae)  Jeremy Tatum

Scotophaeus blackwalli (Ara.: Gnaphosidae)  Jeremy Tatum

   Jeremy continues:  There were also a couple of moths on the walls of my apartment building.  The immature stages of these moths are of some interest – Hypena decorata because the caterpillar has only three pairs of mid-abdominal prolegs;  Cyclophora dataria because the pupa is very similar to that of the Cabbage White butterfly – one of my favorite examples of convergent evolution of two unrelated insects.

I had originally labelled the Hypena moth as Hypena californica.  I am greatly indebted to Jeremy Gatten for pointing out that the two white dots near the apex shows that the moth is, in fact, H. decorata.

 

 Hypena decorata (Lep.: Erebidae – Hypeninae) Jeremy Tatum

Cyclophora dataria (Lep.: Geometridae)  Jeremy Tatum

 

Devon Parker reports two blue butterflies, presumably Western Spring Azures, on April 6.  One at Flanagan Place, and one at the intersection of Glanford Street and Mackenzie Avenue.