Insects

This is a caterpillar that I found crawling on some flowers in Wake Forest.  It is a very young Monarch caterpillar, Danaus plexippus. Check out this series of photos of a monarch caterpillar making a chrysalis, maturing, and hatching into a butterfly.

This is most likely an Eastern Yellowjacket, Vespula Maculifrons, but it might be a Common Aerial Yellowjacket, Dilochovespula arenaria.  It was on the porch this morning eating the remnants of honey left from some bee hives.

A Tiger Bee Fly, Xenox tigrinus, in Wendell, NC.  Its larvae feed on carpenter bees.

This is a Triceratops Beetle, Phileurus truncatus.  I actually found it crawling around inside the house a week or two ago.  They are attracted to lights and it was late at night, so I am guessing it found its way inside somehow.  Because it was so late, I put it in my bug-catching jar with a nibble of cake until the next day when I let it go and took a few pictures.

So if anyone is wondering, Triceratops Beetles can survive on cake and icing for at least a day or two.

This is a male Eastern Carpenter Bee, Xylocopa virginica.  It is easy to tell the difference between males and females, as long as you can see their heads.  Males have a white or light yellow face, whereas females have solid black faces.  There is also a difference in shape of the compound eyes.  Carpenter bees in general are normally docile, but males do not even have a stinger, so there is no worry of them harming you at all.

This one is crawling on my hand, in case you were wondering.

This is an Ailanthus Webworm Moth, Atteva punctella.  They are somewhat common in this area and normally about an inch or so long when fully grown.  The color patterns are very interesting.  One might think that the bright orange color and distinct pattern would make them stand out, but they blend in with their surroundings quite well at a distance, even to a human eye.

These bees are both on their "front porch" (the entrance to the hive) and our front porch (where the hive is).  It looks like the bee in the middle is telling a story or something the way its legs are.

This is a fly I saw yesterday.  It was on the top of the trashcan and it did not move even when I was only a few inches away.

This is a monarch butterfly I saw at the NC State Fair last year.

I have no idea what kind of bug this is, but it looks really cool.  I took this a few weeks ago in Mom's garden.