The Nature Thread

Hi David - Reiner (the butterfly and moth buff) says, "an 'Underwing', genus catocala"

I like how you were able to get it's little eyeballs to light up...

Thanks, Maggie, that makes good sense since we have had many Underwing Moths during the summer. Wish I could have seen the underwing patch usually scarlet in our neck of the woods. This was my first sighting of this moth from inside the house.

Underwing? Looks more like Mothra... ::o
David - bring the children inside and avoid faerie twins singing songs in strange languages....

That's nothing Fred. Last night we had the Giant (European) Hornet and this large Katydid come to see us. The large Hornet gives me the skeeves so I did not photograph it but this lady Katydid was very nice and treated us to her ear shattering song.

Yesterday while rock-hunting, I noticed this varmit. I relentlessly followed him a kilometer along Trout Creek trying to get a picture. This annoyed him, and every few meters he would turn around and glare at me. Finally he attempted to escape amongst these rocks, but instead got cornered for this portrait.
-Dean Allum

Dean, spectacular!

Nice shot, glad he wasn't too annoyed. Not a good idea to completely cut off an escape route.
[www.timesonline.co.uk]

I have some to share... I also am an avid mountaineer and alipinist, which lends its self well to reaching very remote locale's.
Here are some location shots...
These are all in Colorado
Golden Bear Peak

Mt.Sherman

Dyer Mt. & Gemini Point

Some Colorado Wildflowers

More Colorado Wildflowers

Colorado Wildlife

I was collecting tiny garnets in river sand in northeastern Minnesota when I heard something skitter through the brush beside me. Picking up my camera, I found this little guy looking at me from a branch about 5 feet up in a cedar. Common garter snake.




Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/03/2011 08:14PM by Dan R. Lynch.

Sunset taken from Gates Pass west of Tucson 2011

Danny Jones

First pictures I've posted to Mindat. I got all excited thinking I had found some really nice micro minerals that weren't listed for the site that I was collecting at this weekend. These were photographed perched inside a calcite lined tree root cavity in rock hard volcanic ash soils. I assume they must be some sort of wild plant seed pods that are extremely tiny as these are between 80 and 100x magnification. The location was at Pawnee National Grasslands in Weld County, Colorado. These are a lovely golden red color in sunlight.

Anyone know what sort of plant made these?

Not eggs?

Again, I am going to post pictures which are marginally related to this thread. This is in the dreaded scree field at St. Peters Dome.

Hello James, great photos ! Can't wait to see what these turn out to be. Thanks for sharing. Really though, what are those ?

The most interesting bit of biology that I've encountered while mineral collecting is an insect related to the grasshopper.

It is the gyrlloblattid. This insect is wingless and was once thought to inhabit only high mountain snowfields and glaciers, predating upon hapless insects that became moribund on the snow. They are found in the high peaks from Alaska to New Zealand. They can't fly. How could their range be so large ? They must have crawled across the ice in the Pleistocene. That explains the Andes, but how the heck did they get to New Zealand ?

Unlike the mosquito, these things will not bite you. In fact, if you find one and pick it up, it will die in your palm since the heat of your palm will put its metabolic system into overdrive.

Decades ago, while collecting at a quartz breccia deposit in King County Washington known as "Devil's Canyon", I came across these critters while opening up large quartz and scheelite bearing pockets.

My entomology professor at the University of Washington was from New Zealand and all of his students had to learn about grylloblattids, so when I was removing the plates of quartz at Devil's Canyon, and saw these weird little insects scurrying about, I knew what they were and took some back to campus. This species was more heat tolerant than the known grylloblattids and got its own name.

Not Grylloblattiadae gryollobtatid cannononesis, but rather named for the entomology PhD student Dan Mann who paid me $25 to take him to the locality. I bear no grudge, but that is a cool animal just as interesting as zektzerite. A mineral whose naming I do bear a little grudge about.

I think I'm going on too long, but I switched my curriculum from economic geology to an interdisciplinary course where I studied the manner in which geologic history controls biological distribution.

This relates to zektzerite. In the North Cascades there is a large agpaitic granite batholith known as the Golden Horn. It is the source of zekzerite, okanoganite, and a host of other rare minerals. This rock weathers into a harsh, well drained sand because of the abundance of orthoclase which turns only slowly to clay. Right next door is the Black Peak granodiorite with a preponderance of easy weathering plagioclase feldspar which makes a lovely soil. Both are in contact with each other in the montane and alpine zones. One can walk across the contact between the two granitic rocks, and with two steps travel from the scrubby heather meadows of the Golden Horn to the lush herbaceous meadows of the Black Peak granodiorite. This became the subject of my post graduate work. No more economic geology for ten years or so.

There is one more interesting Golden Horn botanical. Pinquicula vulgaris. It roots in the tiny miarolitic cavities of the Golden Horn granite wherever there are moist seeps across outcrops. It is a little purple flowered insectivore. Probably a protected species now.

The members of the mineral kingdom and the animal kingdom all seek out compatible condominiums.

Hi Sam,

I could never find out exactly what they were but they washed out when I ran water through the calcite lined root cavity. (so certainly not some kind of micro mineral) I did some searches on insect eggs as Alfredo mentioned as a possibility but nothing seems even remotely close so I'm still thinking of some kind of seed as some look like empty seed husks. Sort of like when you have stray popcorn seed husks that clump together when you wash the popcorn bowl to clean it out. I also thought perhaps some kind of pollen but that seems even more unlikely as it would be huge for pollen.

Here's a photo of a marmot that was taken last year near the highest parking area on Mount Antero, He/she showed up again in the same general area this year as well.