Tag: Eric Neubauer

A Fly Mystery

Sue Ann (Suna) KendallLeave a comment

by Eric Neubauer, elaborated upon by Sue Ann Kendall

A long while back I observed about a half dozen flies of an unknown species, which baffled everyone on iNaturalist. The genus has finally been identified.

Visit the observation on iNaturalist if you want to learn how experts go about narrowing down what genus and species an observation might be. The users aispinsects (Arturo Santos) and tpape (Dr. Thomas Pape of the Natural History Museum of Denmark) worked together through the ID process under that observation, though most was done by Santos. Thank goodness the photos were so good, as details like veining are very helpful in identifying flies. It’s gratifying to see two true experts helping out with the identification of this unusual fly with very small eyes and an atypical head shape.

One thing we do know about these flies is that the fly maggots are parasitic on lizards. You can see an infected anole lizard on the iNat page for Lepidodexia if your stomach is strong (that’s from Sue Ann).

As often happens with the oddities I get fixated on, I’m immediately top observer. There are only ten observations of the Lepidodexia on iNat at present (one new one happened recently). No doubt there are others as yet unidentified.

I need to look at flies some more.

Here’s a quote from Dr. Pape’s comments. He thinks he knows the species for the fly, but is not sure:

“The large flesh fly genus Lepidodexia is mainly Neotropical and has several very tachinid-like species. There are a few Nearctic species, and the present certainly fits the genus and may very well be Lepidodexia hirculus, see: http://diptera.dk/sarco/Detail_s.php?RecordNumber=11734
Very little is known on the biology of species of Lepidodexia, but they include as varied breeding records as live frogs, lizards, snails and earthworms.”

Santos is a wonderful contributor to iNat and has helped identify many flies around the world. He’s a citizen scientist at its best!

Johnson Grass Postscript

Sue Ann (Suna) KendallLeave a comment

by Eric Neubauer

Johnsongrass round postscript: This morning there was a flock of LBBs (little brown birds) on top of it. I couldn’t entice a single bird to come to my feeder in a year. Go figure.

Little brown birds par excellence, the English sparrow Passer domesticus. Photo by Sue Ann Kendall


Late yesterday there was a shrike and a kestrel sitting on the wire above the round.

Loggerhead shrike Lanius ludovicianus. Photo by Sue Ann Kendall.

Also, the pulled-up Johnsongrass is a commodity. The trashman stopped by and asked if I wanted to throw the grass I had just pulled in the truck, but I said, “No, it goes down there,” pointing at the round.

Reconnecting with the Forgotten Spiders of Texas

Sue Ann (Suna) Kendall2 Comments

by Eric Neubauer

Or: The most exciting part of the conference (for me) was getting there!

I’ve been chasing Pardosa wolf spiders from one corner of Texas to another all year. One species I hadn’t encountered was Pardosa littoralis, which I eventually learned was only found in brackish
marshland. I had wanted to check out the Texas coast for wolf spiders for sometime, and the TMN convention gave me an excellent excuse.

So, I drove to Houston via Surfside and Galveston. No one on iNat had encountered Pardosa littoralis south of New York, let alone Texas. They’d been observed in New Hampshire and Nova Scotia at the opposite end of their range. I happily found some in small areas at several locations without a muddy mishap.

I wonder when the last human paid them any attention? Someone must have once, because they were known to be in Texas. Bonus: I’m now comfortable identifying these in Texas, something I couldn’t do before, since I never saw one in person or even in a photo, only those in observations made 2,000 miles away.

Male (left) and female (right) images attached. Body length about 2/10ths of an inch, male (black) slightly smaller than female.

Farewell to the Garden Spiders

Sue Ann (Suna) Kendall2 Comments

by Eric Neubauer

Fall is a sad time of year for some. I had garden spiders arrayed around my house again this year. One picked a low spot between the porch and skirting. It was a good spot at first and she grew quickly. There were lots of suitors while she was the only show in town, including some from the other species.

Argiope aurantia

About that time, she wasn’t catching anything and looked like she might be starving to death, so I started throwing differential grasshoppers into her web. After a while she was doing OK on her own, so I stopped. In all she produced six egg sacs. No other spider came close and most never produced a single sac. After the last sac, she caught no more grasshoppers and died about a week after the photo was taken.

Egg sacs ad what appears to be a former suitor

Prairie Restoration Progress: Johnsongrass Removal

Sue Ann (Suna) Kendall2 Comments

by Eric Neubauer

Many people in the chapter have probably heard about my continuing war on Johnsongrass. Here’s a shot from out in the yard of an area that was once overrun. You can see bunches of native grass which grow to about 4′, drifts of goldenrod, and a poverty weed. It’s about 30′ from the bunchgrass to the house. Although the initial Johnsongrass pulling was taxing, maintaining the area got easier with time. After several years it has dwindled to pulling scatted seedlings once or twice a year. The native plants were already there and just needed sunlight to thrive.

What do I do with all the pulled Johnsongrass? I decided to build haystacks to provide shelter for various animals. This one is conveniently located near the powerline that various raptors were hunting from last winter. The canes are arranged with the roots on the outside so they dry out and die, and the seed heads are on the inside where they won’t spread and germinate. The stack is about 12′ in diameter and 4′ tall now.

Johnson grass haystack