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Post by rayrard on Jul 16, 2021 13:04:28 GMT -8
I am planning a big southeastern road trip with a couple friends from Sunday to Sunday (18-25th July). We are heading from CT to N. Florida and back up north through the Appalachians. We have a lot of interests for general naturalizing and insect collecting, and we will have MC/UV lights.
I am posting here to see if anyone has any good collecting spots on the east coast. I am a Catocala fan and would love to get to a good spot for tapping, but if it's too cool a spot for light and bait. I am planning on hitting a few spots already, like coastal SC and the mtns of North Carolina and the Blacksburg area of VA, but we have an open itinerary and a good amount of time to spend. I assume most state forests and WMA's are safe to light in on the east coast? National forests and state parks tend to be a no-no.
My friends tend to be into larger sphinx and saturnids, including rearing eggs and caterpillars, but I am a Lep guy with a side interest in some beetles and dragonflies.
I'd appreciate if anyone has good sites, and you can PM me if you would not want to share publically.
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Post by rayrard on Jul 16, 2021 12:54:53 GMT -8
Appy Tigers aren't done for the year already?
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Post by rayrard on Jul 16, 2021 12:08:50 GMT -8
Catocala species continue to come in:
C. antinympha - 1 C. amica - light C. palaeogama - 1 at light C. lineella - many tapping today C. innubens - 1 or 2 tapping
along with the usual ilia and epione
On a different note I am doing a collecting road trip to the east coast and up into the Appalachians (W. NC and VA). If anyone has any good Catocala spots in the east I could be interested. I want to find some cool southern species.
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Post by rayrard on Jul 13, 2021 21:48:31 GMT -8
Catocala got started early with some flying in late June in CT. My prior earliest was around the 4th of July. We tapped 6 species in 2 tapping trips. So far the species seen have been:
C. ilia - very common tapping and light C. epione - a couple tapping and several at light C. ultronia - several C. connubialis - dozens tapping but none at light C. blandula - 2 C. coccinata - 1 C. crataegi - 1 C. micronympha - 2 C. sordida - 1 at light C. similis - 1 at light
I reared out some muliercula from caterpillars but no wild adults yet.
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Post by rayrard on Dec 7, 2020 21:14:27 GMT -8
I agree the small one is C. mira but I have to say the upper one is C. junctura as it looks to have brown on the FW and it's a bit faded.
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Post by rayrard on Nov 6, 2020 20:33:50 GMT -8
You have the large jet-black Mallophora robber. You are lucky as I've caught lots of the big black and white ones but have never captured the black one.
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Post by rayrard on Oct 22, 2020 22:55:25 GMT -8
I think the worst field disasters are relegated to the past where guys would collect a ton of specimens and have their ship sink or get wrecked and lose everything. I wonder if such a thing has happened in the modern era. I guess they got to actually collect them so at least they enjoyed that, but I couldn't get over losing all my specimens especially if I knew I collected new species.
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Post by rayrard on Oct 22, 2020 17:34:02 GMT -8
I pull ticks off me all the time that just bit as my body reacts immediately with itching. The tick usually has to be attached for hours, embed, and begin to feed to get Lyme. If you got Lyme instantly from a tick bite, no one would go outside in Connecticut ever.
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Post by rayrard on Oct 20, 2020 20:02:56 GMT -8
I ran into a particularly rude "ranger" (or should I say rent a cop ranger) in a State Park in PA where I had paid the fee and was staying in the camp with my friends. I walked a 1/4 mile down the road to an isolated area away from the campers and put up my light. I was just going to photograph bugs for iNaturalist given the no collecting rules at parks. The ranger comes by and tells me I'm not allowed to be there and I need to pack up in an hour, and he didn't care what I was looking for or why. The most surprising thing is when I asked if he wanted to see what was coming in, he said "I don't care about what's on there... it's just a light on a sheet!". These are the people they are hiring for jobs in PA State Parks these days where they don't give a crap about nature and don't allow people to study it. I bet he just wanted authority to yell at kids for drinking beer on the site.
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Post by rayrard on Oct 20, 2020 11:19:11 GMT -8
People worry me more than any wild animal encounter, but again I'm not in Africa or Alaska where the animals are worrisome. Humans, although most are nice and can be interested in what you are doing, it only takes one bad one to ruin a collecting day.
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Post by rayrard on Oct 20, 2020 11:15:30 GMT -8
I like IDing things but yeah label making is a chore. It is nice to place the specimens from the season in with everyone else at the end though. Too bad a did my databasing and museum donations last winter as this Corona winter is gonna suck.
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Post by rayrard on Oct 20, 2020 11:10:16 GMT -8
I've had my share of rednecks in the woods but they would always just yell out and we'd get out of the area so no guns or gunshots.
The closest to danger besides fire ant nests was when we were colelcting in the pine woods of SC and we were jumping in and out of big patches of Black-eyed Susans grabbing Yehl Skippers, Byssus Skippers, and Texan Crescents. Then my friend calls me over a little up the path and points out an Eastern Diamondback Rattlesnake extended and crawling down in the same flowers right alongside the road. We stopped jumping in the flowers after that, or made sure to look and lead with the net handle before entering.
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Post by rayrard on Oct 20, 2020 11:01:11 GMT -8
Has anyone noticed hilltopping tendencies in moths? We had some good Catocala action on the summit of a local ridge, but average to poor action lower. The risks of hills is always the damn wind, which is the worst thing to have when collecting. Moon and temperature aren't as bad as a 10+ mph wind to kill a collecting night. The sheet just whips and knocks everyone off
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Post by rayrard on Oct 1, 2020 20:48:15 GMT -8
Had an 11th hour piatrix on a bait trail just flying about. No other Catocala, but the usual Platypolia and Sunira on bait. The piatrix is #41 for the year and it was still nice looking!
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Post by rayrard on Sept 29, 2020 10:20:15 GMT -8
Had 1 cerogama upstate and 1 cara last night. The cold spell must have had a toll.
Papaipema season has been OK. The usual species but only cerussata has been new for me.
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