Halloween decorating with a little help from my garden friends

I'm not much into holiday decorating. Just this thing I have about keeping stuff around that you only take out once a year.

I have a few Christmas things I have been given that I like to take out here and there because of sentimental reasons, but as I : 1) have no children who care about that stuff and 2) no one visits during those times to see it, yeah, I'm kind of boring in that regards.

I do have a soft place for Halloween though because I loved it as a child and I decorate a bit then because pumpkins can be bought, eaten and used/composted each year, so there's nothing left to store/put away once it's over!

This year however I have some little (well, not so little depending on your definition) friends to help me with some extra special decorating!


I was surprised too by their enthusiasm! On a recent rain I only noticed this :
(pardon some bad pics, it was rainy and some angles were difficult and shot from inside my sunroom grainy screens)
(over 3 ft in diameter! ...and near the hummingbird feeder, hmmmm...)

(This is web is unfortunately by the back door, however built intelligently out of the way of human traffic!)


(Once again, I keep tilting the camera video feature the wrong way. My apologies, but I think it's still worth it when you tilt your head right a bit. The rain and wind make this so beautiful I think. Ah spiderwebs, lightness and strength.)

(Hi-five for effort!)(ooh! Click on this one above! The hairy detail is great! I had to get really close to this, it was in the huge web and the background was cloud white, thus the brightness)

So, yeah, Halloween decorating? Me and my little friends have got it down.

Now if only I could convince them that the front door would be an excellent place to catch introduce children to the joys of spiders.

(N.B. The golden orb spider traversed to my next door neighbor's backyard, and spun a huge web outside her kitchen window.  My neighbor hates spiders, dubbed it Bruinhilde and then called me and asked me if I might want the spider back.  So I brought it back, let it loose and the next day it ate the spider in the last pic :(

Tachinid flies, aerial hornworm marauders (Now, with video goodness!)

Na na na NA NUM! (to the melody of Ride of the Valkyries)

Na na na nah NUM!

Na NA NA NA NUM! DUM DUM DUM DUM!
A couple days ago I came upon this incredible sight in the garden:

Though I'm still an amateur at recognizing beneficial insects, the only fly of use I could recall in my head was the Tachnid fly and after the great pics and footage I confirmed it on the web. (pardons for the weird angle... I don't tend to use my video feature on camera often, so I forgot about the angle).

The tenacity of the fly in the video incredible, to take on such a large, flex-y caterpillar, reminds a person of David and Goliath, or more precisely as this is so far from human relationships, of a great sci-fi action scene flick. If I had the abilities or patience to add little human people running around or hanging onto the leaves this would make this video truly superb :)

Tachinid flies parasitize quite a few common pests such as this hornworm here. This tachinid fly is either directly laying eggs upon the hornworm or is laying live larvae (I know, the phrase" laying larva" is odd enough) onto the caterpillar body, and the larvae will burrow into the host body to FEED before exiting the host to pupate, thus killing the host. Other species of tachinid flies will simply lay their eggs on leaves so their host can eat them and the larvae will hatch inside. (remind me to not eat tomato leaves)

It is my understanding too that a host organism infected by tachnid fly larva are also weakened and do not feed as much, so I left the hornworm alone to serve as a vessel for the cult of Tachinidae and allow their brood to burst forth and populate my garden universe thereafter. (Too sensational?)

The temptation is often great to squish bugs in the garden or unrecognizable eggs, but as I have taken to heart from my readings from the Rodale Institute (http://www.rodaleinstitute.org/), most bugs are good to innocuous, so let them be! (unless you have a serious infestation going on, break out the neem oil)

I'm actually a little surprised to find that I have tachinid flies as the adults feed on little tiny flowers and as my dill, parsley and cilantro bloomed and were then voraciously eaten by the swallowtail caterpillars I didn't think I have enough flowerage to attract them.

Speaking of which, some good flowers to plant to attract and keep the tachinid flies in your garden include:

•Anthemis tinctoria (Golden marguerite)
•Eriogonum fasciculatum (CA Buckwheat)
•Melissa officinalis (Lemon balm)
•Mentha pulegium (Pennyroyal)
•Petroselinum crispum (Parsley)
•Phacelia tanacetifolia (Phacelia)
•Tanacetum vulgare (Tansy)
•Thymus serpyllum coccineus (Crimson thyme)
(Many thanks to FarmerFred.com for the info)

Last but not least, I leave you with another video!
(FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! :)


LINKS OF INTEREST:
http://www.ipm.ucdavis.edu/PMG/NE/tachinid_flies.html
http://www.nadsdiptera.org/Tach/Ohara/Oharahome.htm
http://www.geocities.com/brisbane_flies/TACHINIDAE.htm
http://www.entomology.wisc.edu/mbcn/kyf409.html
http://mothphotographersgroup.msstate.edu/Files/Live/BP/MothTalk/MothTalk015.htm
http://jenny.tfrec.wsu.edu/opm/displaySpecies.php?pn=1040
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tachinid_fly