From yesterday: all species I've really only found on/immediately near those tall pine trees with red bark. The pretty yellow/gold/silver jumping spider _Eris floridana_; a tiny _Admestina_ jumping spider with a flattened, speckled body; and a mite from the family Erythracaridae (I'm calling it, I feel pretty sure).

I have found these even in rather bare, shabby, pissed-in areas that get a lot of human foot traffic, normally not a great place to find bugs!

Another kind of arachnid that seems to like the pine trees are opilionids, in the fall when they get big and mate.

#DailySpiderPic #DailyMitePic #Mitestodon #spiders #JumpingSpiders #mites #Araneae #Salticidae #Acari #Acariformes #Erythracaridae

Went down to the lake today and found several zebra jumping spiders (_Salticus scenicus_) feasting on the midges (_Chironomus_ sp.) that are beginning to emerge!

⚠️ WARNING: first pic in particular is alarmingly cute, prepare yourself

#JumpingSpiders #spiders #bugstodon #SpidersOfMastodon #Araneae #Salticidae #Chironomidae #ArthroBeauty

Slides from my talk last night to the Field #Naturalists Association of #Canberra:

"Lessons from #Malaise trapping in Aranda"

https://codeberg.org/dhobern/presentation/src/branch/main/Lessons_from_Malaise_trapping_in_Aranda.pdf

As with most of my talks, there are few notes, but the gallery of amazing #insects may mean something to some of you.

#entomology #taxonomy #DNAbarcoding #biodiversity #OnceAndFutureKing #Hymenoptera #Lepidoptera #Strepsiptera #Hemiptera #Collembola #Araneae #wasps #moths #springtails #spiders