Lecture Assignment 03-Observe and Record
13th & 14th September, 2021
Deary, Idaho
~7:00pm
On the 13th and 14th of September I visited a prairie field in Deary, Idaho that had a small aspen covered area. I went out on both days at ~7:00pm when it was just starting to get dark. I wasn't able to find too much insect activity on the 13th, so I decided to go back out the next day. The habitats where I found the insects were full of prairie grasses, trembling aspens, snowberry plants, and small ponderosa pine trees. I also observed some sunburst lichen on one of the larger aspens. Additionally, a few of the trees had fallen and begun to decay, adding more decomposed material to the floor of the little aspen grove.
*A darkling beetle was found and collected from a pile of firewood outside a large ring of aspen trees surrounded by prairie grasses.
*A flatbug insect from the genus aradus was found and collected from under the bark of a fallen/decaying aspen tree.
*I also observed many grass spiders and black ants crawling underneath decaying aspen bark and in prairie grass, but they were too quick for me to catch and photograph.