Unknown beetles mating on wooley sunflower
Mon, Apr 20, 2009 at 5:19 PM
Dear Bugman,
I found these beetles mating? on Wooley Sunflower Eriophyllum lanatum 4/20/09 on my hike of the Stevens Trail in Colfax, CA. Can you help me out with id?
Thanks, Cyndi
Sierra Nevada Foothills in Colfax, California

Blister Beetles Mating

Hi Cyndi,
These are Blister Beetles. We believe we found a match on BugGuide to Nemognatha scutellaris which does not have a common name. The three photos posted on BugGuide were taken in early May 2006 in Carrizo Plains National Monument and the beetles were feeding on the pollen of Chaenactis flowers, which like Woolly Sunflower, are in the aster family Asteraceae. According to BugGuide: “Females lay eggs on flowers, larva attach themsleves to bees when they visit flowers and are then carried to bee nests where they eat bee eggs and stored food. “

Update: How annoying is this???
Our time is precious and we never seem to have enough. We cannot answer even a fraction of the email we receive, so we are quite sensitive to SPAM ourselves, however, we would never ever ever think of installing a SPAM blocker that prevented people we write to from responding to us directly. There must be a way that SPAM blocking programs could allow responses from direct communications. We try, in addition to posting our responses, to reply directly to the querant via email, but the response we just received from Cyndi’s computer is a slap in the face. No, we do not have the time to decipher the cryptic letters so that Cyndi can read our response. Here is what we got. Perhaps a few of our readers can tell Cyndi to turn off her SPAM blocker if she wants to hear back from people. “I apologize for this automatic reply to your email. To control spam, I now allow incoming messages only from senders I have approved beforehand.
If you would like to be added to my list of approved senders, please fill out the short request form (see link below). Once I approve you, I will receive your original message in my inbox. You do not need to resend your message. I apologize for this one-time inconvenience.
Click the link below to fill out the request: (address removed)”

Comment: About Earthlink Spam Blocker
Tue, Apr 21, 2009 at 11:33 AM
Aloha Daniel –
As you can see from my return address, I use Earthlink as my email server.
It has the most specific spam blocker I’ve seen. If your address is not in the server level address book, you get that generic note. The note can be adjusted by the user to make it more personal, but some just let that techno speak be sent out.
I have both this address and the Bugman@whatsthatbug in my server address book for your name.
Sorry that it caused you grief… you’re a sensitive kinda guy. Like many on the planet. If I were in your shoes, I would be repsonse shy if I would see an earthlink address in the inbox.
Thanks for all you do – attached a sunset from Feb. Nice reds from the volcanic activity, huh?
Eliza
PS have juvie argiope on my front porch. No boyfriend yet. She’s got a few more mm to grow, I guess. She managed to make it through the roof tear off, gutter install and roof replacement with out being smushed.

Thanks Eliza, I guess I was so annoyed this morning I needed to vent. I kicked earthlink to the curb years ago, but Time Warner isn’t much better.

Thank you very much for that info.
I really appreciate your time and effort.
Make it an Adventurous April!
Cyndi Brinkhurst

Hi Cyndi,
You probably wouldn’t be so gracious to us is you saw our scathing post when we got your SPAM block message.

Daniel:
Oh, and can I ever empathize with spam blockers that keep you from helping someone! If I go to all the trouble of researching an answer and replying to someone, only to have that effort blocked, I get postively livid!! I don’t bother jumping through the hoops in those cases. That person is just SOL….
Eric

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