First I'll talk birds - fifty days of rare competition. Nothing exciting on my end... Seeing some birds that are getting late - various shorebirds, American Bittern, Tree Swallow, Barn Swallow, etc. It seems like my birding plans at the beginning of a week always change and I never get out to as many spots as I had planned, so I'm not surprised I haven't turned up anything remotely exciting. Birding plans for the rest of this week: I think I'll bird Long Point once or twice and try to snag a rarity before it finds it's way out to the tip (to be found by Stu no doubt!).
O.K., insects. While checking Old-Cut bird observatory rather briefly this week I spotted a tiger beetle on a pathway and thought, cool, I think that's a new one for me. I took some photos and have since identified it as the Twelve-spotted Tiger Beetle (
Cicindela duodecimguttata). It's not rare as far as I know, and I probably overlooked it before amongst the masses of the more common
C. repanda.
Twelve-spotted Tiger Beetle (Cicindela duodecimguttata)
The Ontario Odonata message board has been fairly quiet recently with no southern rarities showing up apparently. Black Saddlebags are still making their way south and I couldn't help but take a photo of this one at Old Cut.
Hi,
ReplyDeleteI love reading your blog, and I have been wondering, how do you identify the Tiger Beetles you have been seeing? Is there a field guide you use? Congrats on the lifer by the way!
Thanks,
Nathan G.
Hey Thanks! Glad you like it.
ReplyDeleteThe book that I use for identifying tiger beetles is not really a field guide but more of a scientific reference book. "The Cicindelidae of Canada by J.B. Wallis". Copyright 1961, University of Toronto Press. Not sure where you can pick it up - I received it as a gift. A quick google search for field guides shows there are a couple of new guides for Tiger Beetles. They would likely be more up to date.
Adam Timpf