Centipede man, still figuring out how their jaws work

Friday, November 24.

A snug bug in a rug.

As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect. This, Gregor thought, simply could not be better.

Beautiful Macarostola moth found on the glass window of a Kmart.

24/11/23 - Macarostola sp.

QLD:WET

To clarify, regarding the recent post... house centipedes are my friends

Autism is so strong. Like I used to be afraid of spiders and bugs, but suddenly out of nowhere, I seemed to unlock a repressed special interest in them? And now every time I see one I'm like: "I want it!" Like Autism be damned, this boy can play with bugs now!

I was recently extremely blessed in being able to finally see one of my “bucket list bugs” as I’ve started calling them. (Not a real list, as I’m never one to be organized…)

But a friend alerted me to the presence of this big beauty and J gave me a leg up to take a closer photo with my measly phone camera and subpar photography skills. I found some eggs she had laid on the wall and I scooped them up in hopes I can look after them. She hung around with her admirers for a good half hour before deciding she’d lingered long enough and flew off into the literal sunset.

Cecropia moth, Hyalophora cecropia, largest moth species in North America. Bug haters, don’t interact!

Spectember/Spectober 2023 #11: A Large Spider

An anonymous submission requested a "spider the size of a coconut crab":

Ceratohispidus aspectus is a distant descendant of jumping spiders living on an Aotearoa-like landmass, isolated with no mammalian predators.

This particular lineage is notable for both their extreme gigantism (with their larger size and weight causing them to lose the ability to jump) and for having taken up herbivory in a similar manner to one modern species. Most of these big plant-eating spiders are around the size of wētāpunga, and occupy a similar ecological niche, but Ceratohispidus is the largest of them by far – rivalling the modern coconut crab with a body length of up to 40cm (~1'4") and a legspan of almost 1m (~3'3").

After reaching sexual maturity at 5-10 years old, adults grow very slowly, molting only once every year or two and taking several decades to actually get anywhere close to their maximum size.

Ceratohispidus' thick legs end in hoof-like claws, and it selectively browses on vegetation by snipping off pieces with its pincer-like palps. A gizzard-like structure in its digestive system helps to grind up fibrous plant material with small gastroliths, and its wide abdomen houses both large book lungs and a tracheal system with air sacs that can contract and expand to provide a small amount of active ventilation.

While the "horns" and spikes ornamenting its body may provide some defense from the few avian and reptilian predators in its habitat, they're mainly used as part of highly elaborate visual displays between individuals.

[ID: A mixture of digital and traditional artwork featuring a variety of stylized bugs. The first features the most in one image, with arthropods ranging from flies, weevils, cockroaches, ticks, mantids, and ants to dragonflies, grasshoppers, stinkbugs, big-eyed bugs, silverfish, and earwigs all cluttered around the drawing. The word "BUGS" is spelled out in big bubble letters to the left, going top-down instead of left-right. The next art piece compiles a few assets drawn for a web-design class, including things such as a stag beetle, tortoise beetle, a checkerspot butterfly resting on the word "Endangered", and two ladybugs holding up a banner that reads "Email Updates / Photo Submissions". The next drawing shows the stag beetle up close, with a patterned background using even smaller stag beetles to create a unified image. Artwork 4 showcases a simplified pillbug, styled to resemble a logo and placed within a black box background. The final image shows a comparison image of the tortoise beetle drawing, with the one to the left being from 2021 and the one to the right being from 2023. End ID]

Bug art from the past few months

so i found a baby, and they in my hand and i love them so muxh "it's weeviling time" is what they said when i saw them in the ground

bugs? just lots of bugs please

BUG THEMED STIMBOARD

with themes of lots and lots of bugs!!!!

cw. bugs!

requested by anon :)

lycan fact -> my favorite type of bugs are beetles! what are yours ^_^?

x | x | x x | x | x x | x | x

this nice bee stopped on a signpost and posed for a picture for me! (/j, I know the bee was not thinking of me when it decided to rest upon the signpost)

Seek IDed it as a Tawny Mining Bee, and, while I don't completely trust Seek (I've had some interesting things happen like it IDing my toy shark as a guinea pig very confidently and IDing a peregrine falcon as a tiger) I think in this case it checks out.

10/10 bee, would recommend

Grote's Bertholdia Moth: when bats are detected nearby, these moths emit a rapid series of ultrasonic clicks that act as a "jammer," interfering with the bat's sonar signals so that the moth can avoid detection

The Grote's bertholdia moth (B. trigona) is capable of emitting about 4,500 ultrasonic "clicks" per second. While there are other types of moths that use ultrasonic signals (in various ways) to avoid being preyed upon by bats, none of them have a more rapid-fire pace than this species.

The barrage of signals provides the moth with a way to remain hidden, because it interferes with the echolocation that bats use to navigate and locate prey.

As this article from Smithsonian explains:

... when approached by the bats, the moths produced their own ultrasonic clicking sounds at a rate of 4,500 times per second, blanketing the surrounding environment and cloaking themselves from sonar detection.

This article also expands upon the use of ultrasonic signals among moths:

Like other nocturnal insects, moths need to contend with bats. Unlike grasshoppers or beetles, they have soft bodies without spines or hard cuticles to protect them. Yet bats’ reliance on echolocation has given moths a way to avoid ending up as food: by tapping into their predators’ acoustic signals. Many have evolved ears that can hear the calls of bats. Some moths make ultrasonic squeaks, chirps, or clicks to warn their predators (honestly or not) that they are poisonous. Others generate near-constant, ultrasonic buzzes capable of jamming bat sonar. 

Sources & More Info:

Smithsonian Magazine: How One Moth Species Can Jam Bats' Sonar Systems

The Scientist: Many Moths Speak Up to Ward Off Bats

Science.org: Moths Block Bats' Sonar

PubMed: High Duty Cycle Moth Sounds Jam Bat Echolocation

Journal of Theoretical Biology: Neural Representation of Bat Predation Risk and Evasive Flight in Moths

S. violacea, a very round species of jumping spider.

14/01/24 - Simaethula violacea

QLD:WET

Went through Discord for centipede pics and discovered my own character growth

"family pet"

nicrophorus & poecilochirus