📜 EwA Week Highlights: Tiger Beetles & a Changing of the Flower Guard

[Mike McGlathery]

EwA Highlights August 3, 2024 Hello everyone!  Thanks for reading the August 3rd EwA Highlights. I hope you get to watch a nice thunderstorm today. As summer swelters on, you can sense the slowly turning seasons in the phenology of flowers. Many common milkweeds (Asclepias syriaca) have finished flowering and gone to seed. Goldenrod (genus Solidago) season is approaching but isn't close to its peak yet. One hub of current pollinator activity is the joe-pye weeds (genus Eutrochium), such as this one that Sara observed on Monday. EwA iNaturalist Record (© gsarajg · Cambridge, MA · July 29, 2024)  Bill observed this Hentz’s tiger beetle (Cicindela rufiventris ssp. hentzii) this week. Tiger beetles, are fierce, very fast predators that hunt in fits and starts. It’s theorized that their hunting pattern of sprinting and pausing is due to the fact that they sprint so fast that they cannot properly process their visual surroundings. This specific subspecies is quite rare, with its entire geographic range in Massachusetts, mostly restricted to the rocky hilltops of the Boston Basin. EwA iNaturalist Record (© Bill MacIndewar · Massachusetts, USA · August 2024)  Once again, EwA’s most-observed species this week was the common Eastern bumble bee (Bombus impatiens). The social organization of a Bombus impatiens hive is highly structured; each worker has a specific distance from the center of the nest that it works within, in order to decrease travel times. Individual bees tend to keep these distance “assignments” throughout their lives. EwA iNaturalist Record (© Christine Tuccelli · North Andover, MA · Aug. 1, 2024)  📊 Thanks to everyone for your great biodiversity records this past week, totaling 865 observations of 435 distinct species. If you’re curious about the records from this week that have been validated by the iNat community so far, you can find them » here. 🏆 Running tally: To date, we have recorded 201,859 observations of 11,448 distinct species! Check out our EwA umbrella project, see the details per site/observer, and more » here. 📅 EwA Upcoming Public Events Ewa Field Events » Check the EwA Summer [ Event details and registration » ] Don’t miss some great opportunities to follow the rhythm of the season in our local habitats and in the local wildlife! Space is limited for all our field events. Wildlife ethics is important to us and we seek to avoid putting the pressure on natural habitats which large gatherings unavoidably do. We are asking our audience to register-and-commit (or cancel when you know you can’t come) to avoid no-shows. EwA Fieldwork (and Resources) It’s a great time to join our monitoring programs. Check EwA’s Volunteer Program Calendar 📅  to know when things happen. And if a session is of interest to you, don’t hesitate to reach out to get the rendezvous location. 📅 EwA Sites Map | 🌱 Site Protocols and Guides · Field Rosters · Field Notes » All here! | ℹ️ More about EwA’s Citizen Science Program » Here ❓ Do you have any questions? Don’t be shy. Just email me or reply to this thread.  That’s all for this week—hope you have a good one! -Mike

[Martin Fraser]

Mike,

Thanks for another fascinating post. I always learn from you, like a Clair walk! ;)

Thanks

Martin

--
For more information, visit: https://www.earthwiseaware.org/
Like us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/EarthwiseAware/
Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/EarthwiseAware
Follow us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/earthwise_aware/
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Earthwise Aware Discussion Group" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to earthwise-awa...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/earthwise-aware/CAD5Qu82nX%2BXPxbqRuk3OH%3Dx4f7XT_eB4-D%2BwgNMHdL%2Bpm3hKzg%40mail.gmail.com.