Do you have a favorite bug?

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I totally understand why so many people love ants. They are like miniature centurions.

I also like caddisflies.

I like how the larvae breathe through gills and build cases.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caddisfly

I enjoy most of them,watching dragonflies on the pond,seeing a mantis in the garden,butterflies in the flowers,the hum of bees,unusual moths around the porch light,spiders in the web and dewdrops on the webs.
Don’t care about ticks,biting gnats,skeeters or squash bugs.

Giant Weta's are awesome. They look pretty scary but aren't very aggressive, they have pinchers but those are usually pretty weak depending on the type of Giant Weta.

Saw a nice, big June bug the other morning, and we've been having tons of stink bugs in the house.

I've always been told that they stink really bad, but I have never once experienced it for myself.

I love arthropods of all kinds, but if I have to choose just one kind, it would be mantids. I also love holding giant millipedes - watching and feeling the motion of their legs is very soothing to me.

I've had a fascination with beetles. My favorite beetle is a rhinoceros beetle.

I've always found water striders to be incredibly fascinating. Because of the square/cube law, they can travel across the surface of water without breaking the surface tension. They also have hairs on their feet which repel water.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerridae

Although these bugs look graceful, they are predators who will attack any bug who lands on the water. With their legs, they can feel the ripples in the water made by a struggling insect. The water strider kills and devours its prey using a sharp proboscis.

Yes, water striders are cool. I always liked water beetles, we would get a lot of them in the puddles, when the campground flooded (which was pretty often).

One time, I caught some and kept them in a jar with minnows...and the minnows did not live very long, whoops.

Lovely, lovely ladybirds - all green grass, blue skies and daisy chains associations. Hmm, and just as I write that a Gothic castle high up on a cliff pops into view...

Melipona beecheii, stingless bees that make really great honey. Tetragonisca angustula stingless and very tiny make honey and are very fun to observe.

This timid fellow snuck into the house the other night!

At first I thought it was a small bat, or a really big monarch butterfly, but it turns out to be an underwing moth.

It might be a Catocala meskei. You can't really see it in the photo, but I don't recognize the distinct brown banding that Catocala amestris has, so I don't think it's that (which is endangered and legally protected).



We have a lot of bats in the area, so I hope it didn't become a snack after I let it go =( It says they have good hearing organs to help avoid them.

I think tiger beetles, dragonflies, and robber flies are pretty cool. Jumping spiders are also pretty interesting, but my favorites are probably ants. I remember when a local museum had an exhibit dedicated to army ant colonies, and that was pretty intriguing. Now that I think about it, the trap jaw ants of the genus Odontomachus are pretty cool, with their propulsion and expelling of enemies just by closing their mouths being fascinating.

Monarch Butterfly
Luna Moth
Walking Sticks

I accidentally disturbed a praying mantis at work today. It was brown, but it had some green underneath its wings, as if it were trying to match the foliage.

I carried him over to the other side of the parking lot, so it could climb in the trees.

I find phasmids (aka stick-bugs or walking sticks) to be very interesting. I also like cockroaches (specifically the Central American Giant Cave cockroach) because of the absence of hemoglobin in their blood. Ants are cool, too, because of their cooperative behavior, supercolonies, and how consumed aspartame affects their brain function.