Capture: Roamin' Holiday
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Thanks Joe for your lovely and much happier stories of the frogmouths - you confirmed my feelings about the emotional lives of birds. Their booming is wonderful, I agree.
And Sofie, thank you. I'm loving wherever it is you live.
As for those spiders... are they wolf spiders? Beautiful but, no, not loveable. Not for me.
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Islander, in reply to
As for those spiders… are they wolf spiders?
Thomas J's photo is of a water-spider - not sure about Sofie's...I find spiders both
beautiful & fascinating. -
Sofie Bribiesca, in reply to
not sure about Sofie’s
Upon amateur investigation, closest I can compare it to is the White Tailed Spider. It was a biggy. Glad it was in the workshop up north where it could be escorted outside
Julie, I live in Auckland but also share a place up north with cows over the back fence. The paddocks with welcome swallows are in Ponsonby, a special spot not well known. My friends place looks out onto the paddocks. It's all good, and so is sharing all the photos. :) -
Hebe,
Today I wish I had been able to photograph a beautiful thing with wings I rescued from the cat. I have never seen anything like it: black with iridescent green body about 2cm long and huge dragonfly-like clear wings. It buzzed and clicked very loudly. Does anyone have a clue what it could be?
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Islander, in reply to
Cicada.
Did it have tiny ruby eyes on the top of it's head as well as major -usual insect -eyes each side of it's head?
ANZ has over 17 species of cicada and they make my heart glad with their stridulation...they're late this year, but quintessence of summer-o, and because, like their nymphs, they are fat rich, LOTS of carnivores, including cats, including us, enjoy eating them...
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Islander, in reply to
NOT a whitetail – they are very much smaller- shorter legs..
incidentally, their main prey is other spiders, and they only live where other spiders are. VERY FEW reports of humans being bitten by OZ whitetails are accurate. -
Hebe, in reply to
Thanks: never seen one, heard them plenty. This one was a chorus cicada. Their Māori name is kihikihi wawā – wawā meaning ‘to roar like the sound of heavy rain’
http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/cicadas/3 -
Islander, in reply to
And when you get several thousand of so, that’s what they sound like…
We get several million round this place in a good summer.
Your ears ring. The very land rings... -
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Ian Dalziel, in reply to
see ya later stridulator...
Chinese Lantern Festival came to Christchurch. Not a kihikihi wawā in sight. Maybe next year.
Maybe not in sight, but we drove past the lantern festival last night at about 6.45pm - 'Cicadian rhythms' filled the air with their cricket-like pitch!
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Jackie Clark, in reply to
I still stamp on them when I find them anywhere near the sandpit at work - they like to live inside our big canopy umbrella.
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Lilith __, in reply to
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Still trying to identify the bird that sings from high in our cedar in the morning and often through the day. . It has awoken me at dawn , with a very loud and persistent call..2 or 3 identical, evely spaced notes, followed by a descending coda of another 3 quicker notes.
Name yourself, bird!
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Islander, in reply to
O Jackie!
They get a very short life in the sun after years as an underground nymph.... -
Julie Cross, in reply to
We get several million round this place in a good summer.
Your ears ring. The very land rings…Two years ago, we had what I dubbed 'the wall of sound' - it was so loud we all wore ear plugs outside but approaching the end of the driveway my collar bones would vibrate. Nature's drum and bass - some can produce close to 120 decibels.
Pretty little things though. This one my son is holding was thankfully silent.
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Joe Wylie, in reply to
This one my son is holding
Looks like a superb specimen of a greengrocer:
Around 220 cicada species have been identified in Australia, many of which go by fanciful common names such as: cherry nose, brown baker, red eye (Psaltoda moerens), green grocer/green Monday, yellow Monday, whisky drinker, double drummer (Thopha saccata), and black prince. The Australian green grocer, Cyclochila australasiae, is among the loudest insects in the world.
Most of these names seem to derive from the schoolkid pursuit of catching cicadas. I'm assured that the black prince is a better find than a greengrocer on account of its relative rarity. There are also pisswackers, supposedly the silent females that pee on you when you pick them up.
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Islander, in reply to
It's interesting that there are very few common names for cicadas here..there's quite a few in Maori, but I've never met one of the tribe who's knowledgable in both te reo & entomology-
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Islander, in reply to
Juvenile karoro (blackbacked gulls) and they - and the adults - indeed are beauties!
There must be some interesting food sources round your place e Sof', to bring in such a range of birds- -
Sofie Bribiesca, in reply to
There must be some interesting food sources round your place e Sof’, to bring in such a range of birds-
We were returning to Westhaven Marina in the afternoon yesterday. Many people were fishing off boats. We passed a group on a nice launch . The lady at the back was reeling in a snapper. These beauties followed us in.
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Jos,
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Ian you might have stopped and joined in the festive spirit.
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