Along the way...just couldn't resist taking some photos

I was on a mission this morning -- to check elevation and mileage at some of the local sites where I've been finding Uenoids.  I hope, in the near future, to sum up my findings on the Uenoids I've found over the winter: which species are found where?   And by the way, the season is pretty well over; pupation is underway.  I saw more cases this morning that were sealed up than those that were open for business.

But while I was out and about, I couldn't resist looking around.  Here are some of the photos I took.

Doyles River at Rt. 674.

1. The beautiful, fully mature, male Heterocloeon amplum small minnow mayfly in the photo above.  More views.

2. At the same site, a Perlodid stonefly, Diploperla duplicata.

3. And also at the same site, a Uenoid caddis, Neophylax oligius (pale stripe down the face).

Microscope view of the face.

Sugar Hollow, small, 1st order stream, elevation 1200 ft.

1. Uenoid caddisfly larva, Neophylax mitchelli.

#1

Close-up of tubercle on the head.

Microscope view of tubercle.

#2

2. Uenoid caddisfly larva, Neophylax aniqua.

#1

Close-up of tubercle on the head.

Microscope view of tubercle

#2

N. aniqua larvae appear to be much smaller than N. mitchelli: 3 mm vs. 5-6 mm.  And I suspect that they're only found at high elevations in 1st order streams.

3. Ameletid mayfly, Ameletus lineatus.

4. And a Rolled-winged stonefly, Leuctridae, genus Leuctra.

Color comes to the Doyles as the Spring insects start to mature

It's an E. invaria spiny crawler.  It's not the first one we've seen, but it's the first one we've seen with the beautiful colors of a nymph that's almost mature.  Here are three more photos of the same insect.

My plan was to venture up to South River this morning, but in the end I headed off to the Doyles.  First stop -- up at the very top of the valley, but this spiny crawler was further downstream at Blufton Road.  So too was this colorful, male, Heterocloeon amplum small minnow mayfly.

One more beautiful insect I found at that location: Perlodid stonefly, Clioperla clio.  Note how the wing pads are starting to spread away from the body.

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At my upstream site on the Doyles, I found a totally different group of insects.   Under the rocks, the flatheaded mayfly, Epeorus pleuralis.

In all of the streams that I visit that are in or close to the mountains, E. pleuralis nymphs own the rocks at the moment.  Turn a rock over and you won't see much of anything else.  They are really prolific at this time of year in this part of Virginia, and where there are trout, they provide mighty good fishing when they hatch as the Quill Gordons.

Also at the upper Doyles site, lots of large winter stoneflies, Strophopteryx fasciata.  Look in the leaf packs.  I can't swear that the Taeniopteryx burksi/maura large winter stonefies are "gone" (= hatched), but it's been awhile since I've seen them.

Look at the length of those antennae!

Three other things.

1. Perlodid stoneflies, Isoperla namata.  They're all over the place at the moment, and we'll be seeing them in large numbers from now well into April.

2. A less mature H. amplum small minnow mayfly, also a male.  Note how at this stage they seem to have four eyes, two on each side.  These eventually merge forming large red eyes that we see when they're mature.

3. And can I make a report at the moment without a few shots of at least one Uenoid?  Upper Doyles -- the rocks were covered with them: just walk through the stream and look down.  I kept three larvae to check for the species ID.  They were all Neophylax consimilis.  Note the pale orange stripe on the head.

Up to South River on Monday.  Until then, it's back to the clouds and the rain and the snow.  Ugh!

Doubling up on Caddisflies: Back to Sugar Hollow

Another "rare" day of sunshine, so this morning I headed off to my favorite small mountain stream in Sugar Hollow.  Lots of insects.  But I seemed to score best with the caddisfly larvae.

In the photos above, a pair of free-living caddisfly larvae, Rhyacophila nigrita.  It's one of the species I commonly find in this stream.  Sometimes the body is white; sometimes -- as here -- it's aquamarine.  R. nigrita is described by Beaty in the following way:

R. nigrita -- head black or brown and parallel sided; pronotum darker anteriorly. Occurs mostly in small Mountain streams.  Third most common Rhyacophila in NC.  ("The Trichoptera of North Carolina," p. 61)

The Appalachian mountains, by the way, are rich in Rhyacophilids, and the R. invaria group -- which includes R. nigrita -- is the subject of a very important study: Aysha Lynn Prather and John Chapman Morse, "Eastern Nearctic Rhyacophila Species, with Revision of the Rhyacophila invaria Group," Transactions of the American Entomological Society 127 (1): 2001, pp. 85-164.  They note that the 14 species of the R. invaria Group are "endemic to the Appalachian Range." (p. 86).
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But another double shows up in my photos -- the common netspinners that we find in these small mountain streams in the spring, Diplectrona modesta.   D. modesta and D. metaqui are both attested in North Carolina.  Both have a "submedial dark U-shaped pattern" on the frontoclypeus, and a "dark pattern posterior to and along the frontoclypeal sutures." (Beaty, "The Trichoptera of North Carolina," p. 74)  But they differ in one respect: there is an asymmetrical notch in the anterior margin of the head on D. metqui, but not on D. modesta.  These are D. modesta.

And a couple more photos.

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I also doubled up on Uenoids today.  I found two different species in the very same part of the stream: Neophylax consimilis and Neophylax mitchelli.  Remember that N. consimilis has a pale area or stripe on the head, while N. mitchelli is distinguished by a long, pointed tubercle on the head.  Both have "well developed clavate ventral gills on abdominal segment 1." (Beaty, "The Trichoptera of North Carolina," pp. 86-87.)

Neophylax consimilis:

Neophylax mitchelli -- pictures of three different larvae.

#1

#2

#3 (very small)

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Other findings and photos.

1. A fairly big Limnephilid caddisfly larva (case about 1 inch long), Pycnopsyche gentilis, the one that makes the three-sided case out of sections of leaves.  (The "cling-ons" are a mature large winter stonefly, T. atlanticum, a tiny E. invaria spiny crawler, and one of the D. modesta netspinners.)

2. Perlodid stonefly, Malirekus hastatus.  I found two -- neither one is mature.  (Their heads are too big for their bodies.)

3. Flatheaded mayfly, Epeorus pleuralis.  Lots of them on the bottoms of rocks.

4. And a Chloroperlid stonefly (green stonefly).  This is the most common taxon I saw today.  Unfortunately, I discovered that the M. hastatus Perlodids like to eat them!

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Sugar Hollow: a small mountain stream in the winter.