Category Archives: Butterfly house

Meet our bugs- velvet ants!

For this week’s installment of the “meet our bugs” series, we’re profiling a fascinating example of Great Basin biodiversity, our velvet ants. Despite their name, these cuties are actually wasps (Hymenoptera) in the family Mutillidae. Velvet ants are all solitary species, unlike many of the un-friendly wasps you might be more familiar with. Species of these wasps are found all over North America, though they are especially diverse in the arid West, and you can sometimes find them if you are hiking in undisturbed habitat. One feature almost all species share is the presence of aposematic coloration, or bright coloring that is meant to convey danger to potential predators. In the case of velvet ants, females are armed with a powerful sting, one of the most painful in North America! However, they are not aggressive and very rarely sting if unprovoked. As shown in the picture, many species in a given area will mimic each other to increase the protective ability of their coloration, a process known as Mullerian mimicry. So, it can be hard to identify individuals as different species; we do know that our wasps are all in the genus Dasymutilla.

Velvet ant in our display

Velvet ant in our display. Cotton ball is soaked in nectar solution.

Figure of Dasymutilla diversity in North America, along with associated mimicry rings (figure from Wilson et al. 2012).

Figure of Dasymutilla diversity in North America, along with associated mimicry rings (figure from Wilson et al. 2012). You can read more at the website of Joe Wilson at Utah State University Tooele.

Velvet ants have a number of interesting biological features. Males and females are extremely sexually dimorphic, meaning the sexes look very different. Sometimes, males and females of the same species don’t even share the same color pattern, making it hard to tell which species is which. In addition, females are all wingless (thus, all of ours are females), and are also the sex with a stinger; males fly and are harmless. One other characteristic of velvet ants is an extremely tough exoskeleton, which comes in handy for their lifestyle. Velvet ants share an unusual reproductive strategy in that they are ectoparasitoids of other solitary hymenoptera. A female velvet ant will locate the burrow of a solitary ground-nesting bee or wasp that contains a developing larva, invade the nest (often to the dismay of the host), and lay an egg next to the larva. The velvet ant egg will hatch into its own larva and proceed to kill the developing host, devouring it and/or any prey items in the burrow. However, once the velvet ant metamorphoses into an adult, the wasp will be a nectar feeder, visiting flowers during the morning and evening, making these species important pollinators of arid regions. Adult velvet ants can live for one to a few years, relatively long lived for wasps. Below are a couple short videos that demonstrate the nectaring behavior of velvet ants (the white ball is a cotton ball soaked in nectar solution).

Velvet ant drinking

Velvet ant drinking

In addition to the mimicry of velvet ant species to each other, other types of insects that may not be as well defended also mimic velvet ants to try and gain protection via association, a process called Batesian mimicry. These species include spiders, beetles, and antlion larvae. In fact, the spider mimic below was found right at the butterfly house, and we have seen velvet ants on the site as well. The unusual biology and ecology of these organisms, along with their diversity in the Great Basin, make them great species to exhibit at our butterfly house and outreach events.

Jumping spider velvet ant mimic

Spider velvet ant mimic

 

Up close and personal. Big eyes are essential for a hunting lifestyle.

Up close and personal. Big eyes are essential for a hunting lifestyle.

Spider mimic dorsal view

Spider mimic dorsal view

Velvet ant dorsal view

What a great year!

Thanks to all who came and visited!

Thanks to all who came and visited!

Fall’s a’comin: Last weekend for the butterfly house this season!

First off, we’d like to thank the River School Farm for hosting the Urban Farm Fest last Sunday. Put together in partnership with Urban Roots to celebrate the local food/sustainability movement in Reno, we had a great time talking to lots of families, letting kids handle our beetles and caterpillars, and showing off our collection of local moths and butterflies. Special thanks to Nikki Boyce of the River School for organizing; we had a blast!

Hanging out with our darkling beetle Tenny

Hanging out with our darkling beetle Tenny

What a great group of kids at the Urban Farm Fest!

What a great group of kids at the Urban Farm Fest!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Next, if you’ve been in Reno the last week or so, you’ve noticed the changes in the weather: clouds are rolling in, blustery afternoons, and a quick drop in temperatures! We’re officially into fall now, and that signals the end of the season for insects: butterflies either migrate south for the winter, or spend the cold season “overwintering” as eggs, larvae, pupae, or even sometimes as adults. Because of this seasonality, we will close the butterfly house for the winter starting in October. That means this Thursday, Friday and Saturday, Sept. 26-28, will be our last open days for the season. If you haven’t had the chance, we hope you’ll make it out to the butterfly house and say goodbye to the bugs for the winter. The weather looks to be best (warmer and sunnier) on Saturday, so if you can make it then we’d love to see you!

Variable fall weather, but it looks good for Saturday!

Variable fall weather, but it looks good for Saturday!

 

The butterfly house is thriving!

If you haven’t visited the butterfly house yet, we’d love to see you! The harvest season is in full swing in and around the house and the butterflies are loving life! Stop by and see us in the last few weekends of our opening season! We are open Thursday, Friday, and Saturday 10-4 through September 28th. Feel free to call or email us with any questions.

A fritillary in the sun

Our Indiegogo campaign is up!

Hi all-

It’s official now. We’ve launched our fundraising campaign on Indiegogo to build an outdoor butterfly house and science center. It was a solid group effort, and first off we’d like to thank everyone who helped us create such a great summary of our vision for Nevada Bugs and Butterflies. A special shout-out goes to Amy Seaman, who not only narrates, but also edited the footage to create such a wonderful video. We’ve put in some really fun perks for the campaign, including a hug from Cynthia and Kevin (who doesn’t like hugs!), our logo stickers, sticker sheets of Nevada butterflies, a champagne brunch on opening weekend, and a collection of pinned butterflies in a display box. Click here to go to our campaign page. We’d appreciate your donation or just spreading the word about our goal to get kids outside and learning science this summer. If money donations aren’t your thing, please contact Kevin about volunteering for our build dates in April and May.

 

This really is just the beginning. We’ve got some penstemon seeds in the ground for the butterfly house already, and we’re planning a fundraising event in late April, right in Reno, that should be quite a little shindig. The response from people about our project has been amazing, and we are looking forward to a great summer of having kids in the butterfly house and garden, as well as taking live insects to kids in schools and teaching them about the importance of invertebrates in our world.

Butterfly house sketch

Hi all: a shout-out and giant thank you are due to our great friend Sarah Snyder (a fellow Ph.D. student with Kevin), who recently created a beautiful conceptual sketch of the butterfly house! We are excited to use it in our indiegogo campaign video, which will be online in the next week and will go into detail about our plans for the house this summer (also, see our What We Do page). Thanks Sarah!

Butterfly house conceptual drawing by Sarah Snyder

Butterfly house conceptual drawing by Sarah Snyder

Plan view of butterfly house, by Sarah Snyder

Plan view of butterfly house, by Sarah Snyder