It's true! TCR will be at Paradise Canyon. Sent cellularly. -Don
On Apr 2, 2012, at 2:43 PM, [email protected] wrote: > And home to the next TCR? > > One can only hope! > > > > Mark > > > > -----Original Message----- > From: Kurt L. Menking [mailto:[email protected]] > Sent: Monday, April 02, 2012 2:40 PM > To: Mixon Bill; Cavers Texas > Subject: RE: [Texascavers] leafcutter bees > > Paradise Canyon, the home to several TCR events has several large colonies of > leaf cutter ants. They're all in the newer developed areas. They seem to > have declined in the past few years, probably due to the drought. It will be > interesting to see if they rebound with the decent rains in the past few > months. > > Kurt > > -----Original Message----- > From: Mixon Bill [mailto:[email protected]] > Sent: Monday, April 02, 2012 2:33 PM > To: Cavers Texas > Subject: [Texascavers] leafcutter bees > > Many of us have enjoyed watching parades of leafcutter ants, such as can be > seen in Bustamante Canyon in northern Mexico. Don't think they get very far > into Texas. Here's a curious things from Jim Conrad's Naturalist Newsletter > about leafcutter bees, which I'd never heard of before. > > You can sign up to get his e-mail weekly newsletter at > www.backyardnature.net/news/natnat.php > > Very rarely anything about caves, but lots of interesting nature stuff, > especially about plants and birds. -- Mixon > > JIM CONRAD'S NATURALIST NEWSLETTER > Issued from the woods not far from Natchez, in southwestern Mississippi, USA > > April 1, 2012 > > ***** > > LEAFCUTTER BEES > On my last day in the Yucatán I untied the rope that for so long had been > suspending my backpack from the hut's ceiling, hopefully out of mind for > nest-seeking rats and mice, and took my old backpack in hand. Ashes from > daily campfires had settled all over it so I stepped outside and gave it a > good whack. The resulting cloud was half ash and half green tatters of dried, > coiled-up leaf-parts stuck together into tube- like affairs. The leaf tatters > surprised me. > > But, I knew what they were, for back in 2006 during my stay at Genesis > Retreat in Ek Balam, Yucatán, the Maya staff there had showed me the same > thing. You can read about that encounter and see the leafy, tube-like item at > http://www.backyardnature.net/yucatan/jo_olon.htm > > A young Maya woman had told me that the green leaf- tube was a collection of > nests stuck end-to-end, and that the tube construction itself was known by a > special Maya name, which was pa'ak. The creature inside the cocoon was > Jo'olon. I was told that a bee made the nest, but I hardly believed it. > > But, now I believe her, for once I had disturbed all those nests in my > roof-suspended backpack, hoards of bees came complaining, thumping against me > and entangling themselves in my hair but never stinging. > And they were surely the most unusual bees I've ever seen, for instead of > carrying clumps of pollen on their back-leg "baskets," they transported it on > hairs covering the entire bottoms of their abdomens. With their golden-yellow > abdomen bottoms they look like dimly lit fireflies. You can the pollen-dusted > lower abdomen on a bee entering its pa'ak cocoon, one stuffed into one of my > backpack's looped belt-tips, in the hut's dim light, so it's a grainy > picture, at http://www.backyardnature.net/n/12/120401be.jpg > > A rear view of the same bee showing golden pollen stuffed inside a green > pa'ak tube is shown at http://www.backyardnature.net/n/12/120401bf.jpg > > So, this was my last Yucatán identification challenge for volunteer IDer Bea > in Ontario. Here's what she came up with: It's a Leafcutter Bee. Many times > we've spoken of leafcutter ants, but this was something new. > > Leafcutter Bees, I find, are members of the genus MEGACHILE, and despite my > ignorance of its existence that genus is one of the largest among bees, home > to well over 500 species and over 50 subgenera. A list of insects of Río > Lagartos, Yucatán includes eight species of Megachile leafcutter bees, but I > can't say which species is shown here. > > Of leafcutter bees I read that, exactly as we see with our pa'ak tubes, > Megachile nests typically are composed of single long columns of cells > constructed from cut-out leaf sections. Females place pollen or a > pollen/nectar mix in each cell as food for the egg laid there, then the cell > is capped so that a wall separates that cell from the next one. The larva > hatching from the egg eats the food supply and after a few molts and maybe a > period of hibernation spins a cocoon and pupates, emerging from the nest as > an adult bee. Males are typically smaller than females and emerge before > them. Males die shortly after mating but females survive for several weeks, > building new nests. > > What a fine last discovery to end my Yucatán days! > ---------------------------------------- > The winner of the rat race is still a rat. > ---------------------------------------- > You may "reply" to the address this message came from, but for long-term use, > save: > Personal: [email protected] > AMCS: [email protected] or [email protected] > > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- > Visit our website: http://texascavers.com To unsubscribe, e-mail: > [email protected] > For additional commands, e-mail: [email protected] > > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- > Visit our website: http://texascavers.com > To unsubscribe, e-mail: [email protected] > For additional commands, e-mail: [email protected] > > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- > Visit our website: http://texascavers.com > To unsubscribe, e-mail: [email protected] > For additional commands, e-mail: [email protected] > --------------------------------------------------------------------- Visit our website: http://texascavers.com To unsubscribe, e-mail: [email protected] For additional commands, e-mail: [email protected]
