a short winter concludes!

Earlier this week, the entirety of Tucson got hammered with winter’s last hurrah. On our side of town, heavy snow fell for most of the day, accumulating to around four inches. The local newspaper’s front page proclaimed, “MIGHT AS WELL BE MICHIGAN” – and although the storm here was out of the ordinary for Tucson, it’s a far cry from the 200+ inches of snow that Marquette, Michigan has received so far this winter.

It also helps that it melted within two days. Though the mountain peaks to the north and the east remain blanketed in snow, warmer temperatures and sunshine have returned to the lower elevations, and winter, it seems, has ended. Birds are singing and searching for nesting materials, and the bugs are back!

Today the temperature reached nearly 70°F. With a light breeze and a mostly cloudless sky, it was the warmest it’s been in several weeks – and a perfect afternoon to go looking for insects and spiders at the Broadway Trailhead at SNP. The first bug I saw was a medium-sized wasp, pictured above. I’m assuming it’s a type of spider wasp, as it was certainly behaving like one, searching the nooks and crannies of the cholla for unsuspecting prey. Sure enough, a couple of chollas over, was this cutie:

I’m tentatively IDing this jumping spider as Phidippus californicus. It wasn’t being very cooperative for photographs, and I was dangerously close to the spines of the cholla in which it was hiding!

The other spider I saw today was small and very fast, and I spotted it scurrying full-tilt across the trail. It finally took a break, and I was able to get a picture:

I believe it’s in the family Gnaphosidae, perhaps of the Zelotes genus.

Also out and about today were the true bugs! I was able to photograph three different species, the first of which was a lovely stinkbug.

The other true bugs were on a barrel cactus and cholla, respectively.

The last insect of note observed today was this bright-yellow and slightly goofy-looking sawfly or wasp. I wish I’d been able to take a better photograph, but it was in a hurry and didn’t stick around. Any ideas for its identification are welcome.

Now that the warm weather has returned – bring on the bugs!