Day Two: Hot and Windy!

Thanks to all you hardy souls who braved the heat and wind today in the name of the Brazos Valley City Nature Challenge. I could only take it until about 3:00 today. I thought the Big Sit was today, but it's tomorrow. I hope they get a break in the weather and are able to iNat the heck out of Brison! Good luck, everyone!

I just checked in on the project, and we're at 3,135 observations of 1,002 species by 135 observers! Am I making this too easy? Should I up the stakes? Seriously, though, you people are UH-MAY-ZING!!! And the first thousand species are the easiest. I noted that we had never had Spanish moss, American coot, or hackberry emperor on the previous three challenges. Tick, tick, and TICK! I spent the day looking for rock doves, a.k.a., stupid pigeons, but, fortunately someone got some. I'm really going to have to look by the end of the challenge to find something obvious that we're now missing.

For the stats, and I'm sure these will change as more people upload their contributions,

Most observations: Me (307, just shy of 100 today)
Most species: Me, again (187, followed very closely by Dwight Bohlmeyer at 184 who maintains his observation-to-species ratio of 1.05)
Most observed species: Salt Marsh Moth (27, all but 2 are caterpillars)

Plants: 458 spp
Fungi and Lichens: 41 spp
Mammals: 5 spp
Birds: 94 spp
Reptiles: 19 spp
Amphibians: 5 spp
Fishes: 24 spp (someone's been busy!)
Insects: 316 spp
Arachnids: 23 spp
"Other": 8 spp (2 terrestrial isopods, 1 freshwater shrimp, 1 crayfish, 2 millipedes, 1 springtail, 1 leech)

Breaking down the insects:

Bristletails and Silverfishes: 0 spp (if we get rained out tomorrow, I may go through some old boxes looking for these)
Mayflies: 2 spp
Odonates: 15 spp
Zorapterans: 0 spp (iNat calls these "Angel Insects")
Earwigs: 0 spp
Stoneflies: 0 spp
Orthopterans: 22 spp
Webspinners: 1 sp
Walkingsticks: 3 spp
Mantids: 1 sp
Cockroaches and Termites: 4 spp (yes, they're closely related; termites are just specialized cockroaches!)
Thrips: 0 spp
True Bugs and Allies: 49 spp
Dobsonflies: 1 sp
Snakeflies: 0 spp
Lacewings and Allies: 3 spp
Strepsipterans: 0 spp
Beetles: 65 spp
Hymenopterans: 37 spp
Caddisflies: 1 sp
Butterflies and Moths: 83 spp
Scorpionflies and Allies: 0 spp
Fleas: 1 sp (I was going to make that tomorrow's challenge, but somebody beat me to it!)
True Flies: 26 spp

Great work, everyone! Good luck tomorrow!
Bruce

Posted on April 28, 2024 02:30 AM by bruceneville