Inverbrates of February

The images in this post will come - mainly at least - from our home in Carwoola.  As well as the Googong post linked below I have also posted about butterflies in the Australian National Botanic Gardens.

To some extent I have already kicked off this topic with the spiders of Googong.  I will continue that theme with a shot of a Huntsman spider found on a screen door at home.

My estimate was that this beast was about 12cm across the legs.  Not quite as evil looking as the black Tarantula we found in Peru but still not one to fill the hearts of arachnophobes with love!

On the pretty end of the scale some daisies growing around one of trees were being visited by some moths of a species I had not previously noted. 

Here is a profile shot:

The next two images are close ups of one feeding.  The first shot gives a good feel for the animal but takes a bit of work to see the proboscis.  The second shot is a bit fuzzy on detail (note that  I am only using a Panasonic Lumix DMC FZ8 not a fancy macrolens) but does give a good impression of the proboscis.

The process of identifying this moth was interesting.  I started by looking through the thumbnails in  Donald Hobern's excellent site but found there were too many images to search on a more or less random basis.  So I Googled for {Moth Australia red white black}.  This gave a list of links including one to Brisbane insects pointing to the family Arctiinae (Tiger moths). Getting back to Donald Hobern's site I thus far have selected Utetheisa pulchelloides (Heliotrope Moth or Salt and Pepper Moth) as the most likely species.  However I note his comment about two members of the genus being possible. Even after establishing, by BugGuide, that pectinate means toothed like a comb I am not sure about the state of these antennae and certainly can't see a groove on the hind wing!

Continuing with the Salt and Pepper Moths, I spent some time at some Helichrysums we have planted on our "bald hill" .  My first snap was of a moth and a native bee having a face-off.

My next target was a grasshopper.  The two images show the detail of the insect in profile and a head-on shot.  The latter reminds me of the images used in 1950's horror films (just add a screaming 5mm high blonde to complete the flashback)!

A small spider was also busy laying some silk around one of the flowers.

For a complete change (not) from moths here is a butterfly snapped on a window by Frances.  I really like the amount of detail on the antennae and the head!

Now we get to a beetle: I will take a punt on it being Polysastra sp.

A little later in the day I thought I had found a different species of leaf beetle with two orange bands.  Then I looked at the image- a bit blurry I'm afraid - and found it was two beetles "doin' a-what comes naturally."

The next image is, I think, of a Water Strider (in the family Gerridae).  In fact I suspect it is two of them, also auditioning for "Annie get your gun"!!

On the afternoon of 8 February I finally managed to get an image of an Orchard Butterfly (Papilio aegeus): the common 'Swallowtail" in this area.  As Denis Robertson has noted about another species of Swallowtail they do not pose often for photographers.  Even when they land on a lemon tree (citrus are their favourite food trees) the wings usually keep beating.

In this case the wings are at a dodgy angle but gives the 'jizz' of the insect.  I suspect that the curved posture in this image is because the beast is planting eggs.  Certainly a couple of days later there were several of their caterpillars (briefly) on the leaves of the lemon trees.

That is my best shot.  I could not provoke it to stick the scary red bits out the front - obviously my provocation skills need some work! .The Chew family of Brisbane can do images that are much better?