Favoritos de janabuggs

También llamada Catarina mexicana combate plagas como pulgones, cochinillas y otros insectos que representan amenaza a algunos cultivos, por eso en algunas culturas son asociadas a la buena suerte, ya que eso representaba cosechas saludables y por tanto prosperidad económica en sociedades agrícolas. Actualmente se investiga si pueden estar siendo amenazadas en el país por la Catarina Arlequín proveniente de Asia; además se han exportado a Israel para combatir la plaga en cultivos de nopales de ese territorio con buenos resultados. Fuentes: enlacejudío.com, NTR Periodismo Crítico y Wikipedia.

On Oct 2nd I was sweep netting at Overton Ridge Park and captured this caterpillar:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/17427773

When I got home, I realized from the photos that it was parasitized, so I googled it and came up with an ID. Here's that observation:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/17427771

TODAY I was out hunting mushrooms and came across this same caterpillar species with pupae of the same parasitoid! What are the chances this is the SAME CATERPILLAR 12 days later???

BG photos comparing wasp pupae: https://bugguide.net/node/view/995992/bgimage

This one crawled out of its salp and then swam around trying to get into another (occupied) salp.
see: http://naturewatch.org.nz/observations/3184503

See here for video clips:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XmztHDCnW_Q
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7UK_kxvesYs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ToxhH9166cM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fdvCDe6ltHI

Clung to the beak of a Whimbrel that was foraging in the seaweed, the bird could not dislodge it, after a couple of minutes the isopod dropped off. The Whimbrel continued to feed with the isopod on board.

Flinders Island cave-slater Echinodillo cavaticus. The world has only two known species of the very distinctive Echinodillo cave-slaters. One is found on the Marquesas Islands in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. This other species is known only from a small cave in southern Flinders Island, where its entire global range is measurable in square metres. We found this one during our Bush Blitz on Flinders Island in March 2014.

The prettiest one of the day! Freshly molted, it will turn greyish later on.
NOTE: A permit is required to enter the water or sweep it with a net. Fortunately we were deputized by none other than the author of a field guide to the area (has a permit and was our supervisor). She was coaching a team from US Fish & Wildlife Service. All my IDs for the water creatures are from her. Everyone was super kind, and I greatly appreciate their including and educating us for the morning.