After a painfully-slow start to dragonfly season, suddenly things are off and running (or flying, I should say). In the past two weeks almost 30 species of odes have been observed in Lucas County, my home county here in northwest Ohio. June is the month with the highest species diversity each year, so I’m really looking forward to what the next few weeks will bring. We should see more than 80 species by the end of the summer.

My time has been occupied with our big annual native plant sale for most of the past few weeks, but the other day I finally got caught up enough with other obligations that I was able to take an afternoon all to myself to go look for bugs. (Note: dragonflies aren’t “bugs” but I often use that term as a shorthand, and it’s less confusing than “odes.”) I spent three blissful hours at Irwin Prairie State Nature Preserve and photographed close to 30 species of insects. That number surprised me, even for an ecological treasure trove like Irwin Prairie. Only six of those were dragons and damsels, but that was okay with me because I found so many other interesting things. I felt like a kid in a candy store, and more than once found myself standing on the boardwalk grinning from ear to ear. I even told an inquisitive passerby that I was crouched down with my camera beside a bunch of irises because –wait for it– I was anticipating some mating behavior between two iris weevils. (I wasn’t surprised to see the odd look on his face…I’m used to that.) And I did see the mating, but it happened so fast and I wasn’t quick enough to get a sharp photo of it.

I remember the day I discovered these weevils on irises and came home to find out that they were actually called iris weevils. Every year since then, I can’t pass a patch of irises without checking for their presence. I love all kinds of weevils because of that dorky snout that protrudes from their little faces…so cute. Weevils aren’t true bugs (Hemiptera) either, but rather are in the beetle family (Coleoptera). The true bugs are distinguished by having sucking mouth parts, whereas beetles and other insects have chewing mouth parts more similar to our own. (Well, vaguely similar to our own, I guess. There are some crazy insect mouth parts out there!)

I found another, much larger, weevil on the same day. This one is harder to identify, but I was thrilled to find him sitting out in the open on the wooden boardwalk. I got down on my stomach to get a face shot.

In the past couple years I’ve become more interested in beetles, mostly because it seems there are endless kinds of them to find everywhere, and they often have bold color patterns to make identification easier…well, sometimes. Many of them can’t be identified unless you have them under a microscope, so a beetle fan has to be comfortable with some degree of not knowing. And I think that’s okay with me. (Wait, did you see how close I just came to calling myself a Beatles fan? Ha! Different beetles….) In fact, it makes them all the more fascinating when there’s so much mystery about who they are and how they live their lives. It makes the world seem so much bigger and complex and…special, I suppose. (Have I mentioned that a connection to insects has made my life richer? I’m pretty sure I have.)

Did you know that 20% of all living organisms on earth are beetles? And that beetles play very important roles in the ecosystem? It’s true. While some of them can cause serious damage to trees (and homes and crops), others are essential nutrient recyclers as they eat decomposing plant and animal matter. And gardeners are familiar with the service provided by ladybug beetles, who are happy to eat aphids by the mouthful.

I was captivated by eyes and faces on this day, and got some nice photos for a little collage that I’ve titled “Three Flies and a Spider.” And of course it made me think of the famous poem by Mary Howitt that begins, “‘Will you walk into my parlour?’ said the spider to the fly.” In the case of my collage though, the spider is outnumbered and outsized, so these flies are safe from his flattery and manipulations.

This group shows, from the top left and going clockwise:

1. Broad-banded hornet fly (Spilomyia alcimus) – one of the syrphid flies, a hover fly that can’t sting but looks and acts like a hornet to scare predators.
2. Dimorphic jumping spider (Maevia inclemens) – jumping spiders are some of the friendliest spiders you’ll ever meet, and so darn cute!
3. Scorpion fly (Panorpa genus) – This pic doesn’t show it very well, but his abdomen curls up in the back and he must have reminded some scientists of a scorpion. And I just realized that their faces are similar to weevil faces.
4. Horse fly (Hybomitra genus, maybe) – check out those mesmerizing eyes.

It wasn’t my first time to see any of those insects, but every year I feel like I’m meeting old friends after a long winter in northern Ohio. Here’s a closer look at that syrphid fly — isn’t it fabulous?!

And here’s a damselfly, the lovely emerald spreadwing. They’re named spreadwings because of how they tend to hold their wings spread at a 45-degree angle, which is different from the pond damselflies who hold their wings folded flat alongside the abdomen.

You might notice small dark round things beneath his thorax; those are parasitic water mites. A small number of them probably won’t impact the lifespan of a damselfly, but sometimes they occur in large numbers and can be deadly. They attach to the dragon or damselfly while it’s a nymph living in the water, and when it emerges from the water to become a flying insect, the mites quickly transfer from the shed exoskeleton to the adult insect, and thus are able to ride around and feed off of it. I’ve seen much heavier parasite loads on some dragonflies, like this meadowhawk:

Are you still with me? I realize I may have just gone a bit too far into squeamish territory for some of you, so sorry about that! Let’s end this with a pretty picture then. I give you tiger swallowtails feasting on the native buttonbush that grows in wild abundance at Irwin Prairie. Yep, that oughta do it. Thanks for sticking with me for the reward at the end. 🙂