September 23, 2004 – up close and personal with a macro lens

Although it's called a Red-Haired Velvet Ant (Dasymutilla coccineohirta), this insect is actually a Mutillid wasp. This male has wings and does fly. The females are wingless and thus are mistaken for ants as they scurry around looking for the lairs of ground-nesting bees and wasps, where they lay their eggs; their larvae then become parasites on the cocoons in the nests.


The larva at right is that of a Cynipid, or gall wasp. This species lays its eggs in oak trees, as do 85% of all gall wasps. The complete gall at left is about a half-inch in diameter.

A partly translucent spider tends to its web on the South Marsh Loop Trail.

Finally, a Familiar Bluet damselfly (Enallagma sp.) resting on a female Coyote brush flower. Like dragonflies, damselflies hunt flying insects, catching them mid-air in their elaborate mouth parts, visible above.