Spring Babies in the Nature Lab

There are only 17 days left until our Nature Gardens and Nature Lab exhibits open! This makes me extremely excited and a little bit nauseous. To cope with the craziness, all I have to do is go and visit  our new Nature Lab babies. Just in case you're feeling stressed out too, here's some baby love for you:

This is our new program opossum, Didelphis virginiana. She is a rescue animal that we were lucky enough to get from a local rehabber. She is blind in one eye (from a dog attack) which makes her unreleasable, and therefore our newest and cutest ambassador for L.A. wildlife.

Look she smiles, even though she's blind in one eye!

 

We also have 14 baby Norway rats, Rattus norvigicus! They are currently in training to move into their new home which will be decked out with lots of toys including ladders, wheels, tubes, and a see-saw or two.

Our baby rats snuggle up for a nap

You've already met our harvester ants, Pogonomyrmex spp., but here is a much better close up of the babies, aka larvae. You'll be able to visit them in the Nature Lab and watch their older sisters caring for them.

Antlings are cute too!

 

Recently one of our crayfish, Procambarus clarkii, had about 100 babies hatch. The fry (that's what you call a baby crayfish...not because they're good eating though) are about the size of a quarter and they zip around tank town like anything. This is mostly because they are looking for food, and trying to escape being eaten by the adults. What can I say, it's a hard life!  

 

Biggy-baby and not-so-biggy-baby hanging out together.

 

Last but not least, here is one of our California Newts, Taricha torosa. Did you know that baby newts are called efts? If you are an avid L.A. Times crossworder, then you already know this, I swear eft is in the puzzle, like every other week!

Who could say no to one of our baby newts?

 

Want to meet our new babies? Come by the Nature Lab after it opens on June 9!

 

Baby Mantis Explosion

Lately, I've been so busy working on our new Nature Lab exhibit (OPENING THIS JUNE PEOPLE) that I rarely make it into my office anymore. Earlier this week, I popped in to check some e-mails (fun I know) and what do you think I found?

An explosion of praying mantids!

They were on my #2 pencils:

#cute

 

They were on my scissors:

#thisisnotanadvertisement

 They hatched out of this ootheca (nerdy word for egg case):

If you ever find yourself in a similar situation, do not fret! All you need to do, is collect them in a jar and release them into the closest garden!

Live long and prosper my tiny predatory friends, eat lots of pests and keep laying those oothecas!

Pond Babies: Dragonflies and Diving Beetles

Two weeks ago I told you I'd fill you in when I found dragonfly nymphs in our pond. I wasn't expecting to be able to give you this update so quickly, but SURPRISE, nature moves fast, people! In the last few weeks, I've found more than 50 dragonfly exuviae (the papery exoskeletons shed between molts) attached to the rocks of the pond. Of course, this prompted me to take out my dip net and look for nymphs in the water.

Here's a picture of one I found:

Variegated Meadowhawk, Sympetrum corruptum, nymph

Found May 5, 2012

While I was dipping for the dragonfly nymphs, I found a lot of other macro-invertebrates. The list isn't very long, yet, but includes immature mosquitoes, chironomid midges, mayflies, and predacious diving beetles!

Mayfly nymph found May 5, 2012

 Predacious diving beetle larva found in pond
May 4, 2012

I also found an adult predacious diving beetle

on

May 5, 2012



Hey People We've Got Baby Opossums

Remember back in December, when I said I'd let you all know if we had baby Virginia opossums, Didelphis virginiana? Well it's spring, and right on cue they're here! Sam Easterson's camera traps have caught the babies (we think there are three) on video over the last week, and although many people don't find opossum babies cute, there are a few of us here at the Museum that do. Check them out and make your own assessment.

Out for ride on Mom's back!

Here are some interesting facts about opossum babies.

• The opossum gestation period is only 11-13 days.
• When they are born, the babies are the size of a lima bean!
• Female opossums can give birth to more than 20 babies in one litter.
• After they are born the babies crawl up into the mother's marsupium (aka pouch—remember opossums are the only North American marsupials) and attach to one of her teats.
• There are only 13 teats in the marsupium, and its first come first serve. 
• Babies are carried in the marsupium for between two and three months
• When they are large enough, the babies venture out of the marsupium and are carried around on the mother's back when they are out of the den.
• The average lifespan for an opossum is only two to three years!

Check out this video Sam's camera trap caught. It puts me in mind of all those fight scenes I've seen where outlaws are fighting on top of moving train that is about to go into a tunnel. Admittedly the mother opossum moves quite a bit slower than a train and the baby is not as nimble as a knife-throwing outlaw, but hey, you get the picture!

Carting all those babies around must be pretty tiring!

First Baby Oaks Sprout Up in the North Campus

The North Campus is the proud parent of some baby oak trees!

Baby coast live oak sheltered by wall

Carol Bornstein, our new Director of the North Campus Gardens, discovered a couple of oak saplings on one of her recent outdoor forays. The babies are coast live oaks, Quercus agrifolia, of which we recently planted several trees. We've also planted another species of oak, the Engelmann oak, Quercus engelmanni (we planted only three of this species). Both species reside in the section of the garden called the urban wilderness which is composed of several kinds of California native trees and shrubs.

This might be the mother oak!

Oak trees provide amazing habitat value, and this is the main reason we planted them. By putting in such a  sizable stand of oaks we're hoping our created wilderness will provide habitat for a whole slough of organisms rarely, if ever, seen before in Exposition Park. In just one oak tree it would be easy to find hundreds of species of associated plants and animals and thousands of individuals (think how many birds, ants, or squirrels you find in an oak tree). One species that has already shown up with our oaks, is a tiny insect called a whitefly.

Crown whitefly nymphs on oak leaf

(each nymph is only 1 millimeter long)

It was once again thanks to Carol, who was out inspecting our lovely oaks, that we discovered these small insects. At first we thought they might be a scale insect, but Brian Brown, the Museum's Curator of Entomology, identified them as crown whiteflies, Aleuroplatus coronata. As adults these small white homopterous insects (group of insects consisting of aphids, cicadas, scales, etc) fly around to find a suitable location to lay their eggs. For the crown whiteflies their plant of choice is oak. What you see in the image above are the nymphs (immature forms) of the whitefly, they have no wings but are covered with white waxy secretions that make them look like little crowns. The nymphs feed on the leaf's juices by piercing and inserting their mouthparts into the leaf. They can cause damage to the plant's health if their numbers are high enough, and they can also transmit disease organisms from one tree to another (not unlike mosquitos transmit malaria).

Go check out your local oaks and see what animals live on them!

Hummingbirds: Born to be Sword Swallowers!

We've got more bird babies at the Page Museum (you know the one at the La Brea Tar Pits)! We were informed about an Allen's Hummingbird, Selasphorus sasin, nest in the atrium about two weeks ago, and jammed over to scope out the scene. When we arrived we found two tiny eggs in a beautifully crafted nest, suspended about ten feet up in one of the plants.

This past weekend Sam Easterson captured the footage below. I really like the way you can see the nest stretch as the nestlings move around. This is because the nest is partially constructed from spider webs! When constructing the nest, the female hummingbird collects materials such as plant fibers, moss, lichen, and small bits of bark or leaves. She also collects the spider silk for its elasticity. As the nestlings hatch and grow the nest can stretch with them! Check out the video to see it and then be wowed with feeding time. The first time I watched this footage, I couldn't help thinking about a sword swallowing circus act. Enjoy!

The Birds, the Bees, and the Fecal Sacs

I know you've seen a lot of still images from the Black Phoebe, Sayornis nigricans, nest, but I just had to share this footage. Honestly, it is too good not to post.

At the beginning of the video you'll see one of the adults (hard to tell if it's the mom or dad, they both help to care for the nestlings) feeding a European Honey Bee, Apis mellifera, to one of the young. This in and of itself is pretty awesome to see, but it gets even better! Remember the Bushtit post? I told you all about how some species of birds produce fecal sacs, to make it easier to keep the nest clean and disease free. Well, Black Phoebes also produce fecal sacs, and this video gives you an insight to this behavior. I'll let you judge for yourself whether you think it's gross, cool, or just plain interesting.

Eggs Hatch in Black Phoebe Nest

Here is a quick nest update for the Black Phoebes, the babies have hatched! Sam was able to catch these images of the action.

 

Mom on the nest

 Clamoring for food

   Done with food, not clamoring anymore...

Bushtits Move In

New Neighbors

A pair of Bushtits, Psaltriparus minimus, just built their nest in the live oak tree behind the Butterfly Pavilion. Kimball Garrett, our resident bird expert, found the nest this Monday and promptly sent me an e-mail detailing the nest's location. As soon as I got into work on Tuesday morning, I headed out to the Butterfly Pavilion to check it out.

Adult Bushtit, Psaltriparus minimus

Nest Hunt

Thankfully Kimball had given clear instructions to find the nest, as it was very well hidden in the oak foliage. The effort was well worth it, as it was one of the coolest nests I've ever seen in the wild. As the picture below shows their nests are woven from dry plant material and hang from branches of the tree. They are small and dainty, this one measures about seven inches from top to bottom. The small opening at the top of the nest, which is only about an inch in diameter, is just big enough for the adults to enter and exit.  

Bushtit entering nest

Bushtit Behavior

After spending a good portion of my morning watching the nest, I realized I had to blog about it. But what is a blog without images, or even better some actual video footage. I ran up to my colleague, Sam Easterson's office to see if he could get some for me. Sam recorded the nest for about an hour, and we captured some interesting behaviors, including removal of fecal sacs! A fecal sac is clean, tough membrane that encloses the excrement of young birds. Not all birds produce fecal sacs, but for those that do sacs are usually produced directly after each feeding and promplty removed by the adult to maintain a clean nest interior. 

Bushtit cleaning nest

Sam Easterson is a video naturalist and also our new Media Producer for the North Campus and Nature Lab exhibits. He's really into implanting cameras into natural environments, and is best known for his animal borne imaging work.

New Bird For North Campus List

165 and Counting...

Earlier this week, Kimball Garrett, NHM Ornithology Collections Manager, spotted a not-so-common sight, a pair of Rufous Hummingbirds, Selasphorus rufus, in the Rose Garden. This hummingbird species is now number 165 on Kimball's Exposition Park Checklist. Over the last 28 years, Kimball has been keeping track of all the birds he sees in Exposition Park, even those that are just doing a fly-over!

Male Rufous Hummingbird

An Annual Migration

Most of the year Rufous Hummingbirds cannot be found in our region, but in March and April they are often seen passing through. Every year this bird makes an over 3,000 mile migration from its overwintering grounds in Mexico to the Pacific Northwest. It is easily confused with one of our local hummingbirds, the Allen's Hummingbird, and so is often missed in species counts (maybe that's why it has only just made it onto Kimball's checklist). Males of both species have red-brown markings on their sides and tails, but only the Rufous Hummingbird also has them on its back. If you have a hummingbird feeder in your yard, keep your eyes open for this hummingbird stopping by to fuel up!