{"id":1503,"date":"2014-06-02T18:12:01","date_gmt":"2014-06-02T22:12:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sicloot.com\/blog\/?p=1503"},"modified":"2014-06-02T18:12:01","modified_gmt":"2014-06-02T22:12:01","slug":"arboretum-butterflies-and-weevils","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/sicloot.com\/blog\/2014\/06\/arboretum-butterflies-and-weevils\/","title":{"rendered":"Arboretum: Butterflies and Weevils"},"content":{"rendered":"

I saw this pair of Lixus<\/i> weevils yesterday clinging to a plant stalk. They look like anteaters crossed with grasshoppers, only twice as ridiculous. They appear to be black yet covered with an orange or rust-colored powder. They continued to mate as I pointed the camera at them. The lower one, however, would slide around the stalk to hide from me.<\/p>\n

\"Lixus
Lixus weevils mating<\/figcaption><\/figure>
\n<\/p>\n

A few shadows turn these weevils into the clowns of the insect world. The lower one now appears to have a smile that expresses its enjoyment of the mating experience, while the upper one appears embarrased to get caught.<\/p>\n

\"Lixus
Lixus weevils mating<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I found quite a few butterflies near Bussey Brook. My sightings yesterday included the eastern pine elfin (Callophrys niphon<\/i>), black swallowtail (Papilio polyxenes<\/i>), Peck’s skipper (Polites peckius<\/i>), and American copper (Lycaena phlaeas<\/i>).<\/p>\n

\"eastern
eastern pine elfin<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"black
black swallowtail<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Peck's
Peck’s skipper<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"American
American copper<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Earlier in the week, I saw what I believe to be a tawny-edged skipper (Polites themistocles<\/i>) sipping from a star-of-bethlehem<\/a> flower (Ornithogalum umbellatum<\/i>).<\/p>\n

\"Tawny-edged
Tawny-edged skipper<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Thanks to Blaine Mathison<\/a> for help identifying the weevils on BugGuide.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I saw this pair of Lixus weevils yesterday clinging to a plant stalk. They look like anteaters crossed with grasshoppers, only twice as ridiculous. They appear to be black yet covered with an orange or rust-colored powder. They continued to … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[316,7,320,190,234,498,86,493,500,386,499,391],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/sicloot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1503"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/sicloot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/sicloot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sicloot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sicloot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1503"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/sicloot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1503\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1512,"href":"http:\/\/sicloot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1503\/revisions\/1512"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/sicloot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1503"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sicloot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1503"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sicloot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1503"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}