14 August 2026
Going to the beach? You’re certain to see shorebirds but who are they? They may be difficult to identify if they’re not in breeding plumage.
To give you some practice, check out this video by Get to Know Nature. Filmed at the New Jersey shore, it highlights six species. You might not see a piping plover at your beach. They are Near Threatened.
Good luck and have fun!
13 August 2026
Late July through September is the best time of year to see funnel webs in Pittsburgh. The spiders that build these webs have been present since spring but they were so small I overlooked their webs.
Late summer webs show nicely, especially in dew. Here’s my selection of photos from 2016 to 2026, including two from Acadia National Park.
Funnel web spiders rely on stealth, speed and strength to capture their prey. Their non-sticky carpet webs have a hiding place in the middle — a funnel — where the spider lurks and waits for prey to jiggle the web. When they feel the right vibration they zoom out of the hole to grab a meal.
Funnel weavers are FAST and they have a backdoor escape route if something large and scary is messing around at their front door.
— The SpiderMentor: Funnel Weavers — Fast and furious!
The good news about American funnel web spiders is that they are not dangerous to humans. When I jiggle a web to entice the spider to come out, it never works for me. Apparently I am “something large and scary” that is dangerous to funnel web spiders.
Learn all about funnel web spiders in Pittsburgh in this blog post by Amy Bianco, the SpiderMentor.
12 August 2026
“Is it real or is it artificial intelligence (AI)?”
A decade ago only dedicated photographers and videographers had good editing tools because the software cost money and it took time to learn. But in the past two years AI became embedded in my cellphone photo editor. The tools are so easy to use I don’t need to know anything about how to make a good photo. I just look at it on my phone, click Edit, choose [Auto] and then [Enhance] or [AI Enhance]. It takes no training and no photo editing skills. The results are marvelous … in more ways than one.
As a matter of principle I do not use the AI editing tools because the result can be as inaccurate as autocorrect and the danger is that, just like autocorrect, I may send/post that fake result. Embarrassing typos, inaccurate photos.
The photos at top show, on the left, a brilliantly blue heron statue that I saw in Shadyside. Its color is why I took the picture. On the right is the AI Enhanced version, quite inaccurate. If this was a real bird I was documenting on an eBird checklist the AI Enhanced version is bad for science and will lead viewers astray. eBird doesn’t need altered photos. It needs truth.
eBird and Macaulay Library have noticed AI fakes in their media archives and have developed a new policy about photo uploads, described in their article: From Truth to Fake: The Threat of AI to Media Archives.
The ebird.org story leads with this AI enhanced photo of a green heron posted on an eBird checklist (photo is embedded from the article). Notice the caption. AI gave the bird a 3rd leg.
From Truth to Fake: The Threat of AI to Media Archives describes why AI is a threat and includes additional photo examples. For instance, AI turned a South American species, the Epaulet Oriole (Icterus cayanensis), into a red-winged blackbird!
Meanwhile here’s a summary of the new policy in a screenshot from the article. See eBird & Macaulay Library’s full AI Policy here.
11 August 2026
On a walk last week on Joncaire Street near Schenley Park I was struck by the size and diversity of the weeds by the sidewalk, especially the grasses.
Why look at weeds?
Peter Del Tredici explains in Wild Urban Plants of the Northeast that cities have become novel (“new”) ecosystems. We have a mix of natives and aliens, never seen before, that survive and even thrive in the cities’ microhabitats. Weeds are the thrivers so they’re worth a look.
One thriver I did not notice at Joncaire — I probably ignored it — is green foxtail (Setaria viridis) or green brittlegrass. It grows everywhere in disturbed soil, vacant lots, the cracks in sidewalks, in lawns and along roads. According to Wikipedia it is very common and the wild antecedent of the crop foxtail millet. I’ve seen birds eat it when the seeds are ripe.
Green foxtail has a completely green head. Both photos are from Wikimedia.
A little less common that the green one are yellow foxtail and giant foxtail, both at Joncaire.
Yellow foxtail or yellow bristlegrass (Setaria pumila) has upright heads like green foxtail but the seeds are yellowish and there are red flower parts (?stamens?) protruding from the head.
The giant foxtail (Setaria faberi) a.k.a. Japanese brittlegrass stood out on Joncaire because the plants were almost over my head. This alien from Asia is pictured at top on Joncaire Street and below from Wikimedia.
Grasses are annuals that dry out at the end of the growing season. When foxtail invades the wildlands in the West it is dangerous fuel in wildfire season.
Fortunately we are not in fire danger in western PA. Today we are under a Flood Watch.
10 August 2026
In August in southwestern PA you may notice a tiny white ball floating above the trail, maybe at eye level. If you walk into it you discover the ball is on a thread. It moves horizontally in a light breeze and can raise and lower itself. On closer inspection you can see it’s a white insect.
The white balls are the caterpillars of the planthopper parasite moth (Fulgoraecia exigua), one of the very few carnivorous moths in North America. The species is not rare but its dietary habits are.
In a super-closeup the tiny caterpillar looks like this.
The adult moth is also tiny with a wingspan from 8-13 mm (0.3 – 0.5 inches).
Since their life cycle is not tied to a host plant, the female lays her eggs on any vegetation where her young will find planthoppers to parasitize. Perhaps she chooses a site where planthopper nymphs are already present.
When her eggs hatch the tiny caterpillars seek an adult planthopper, latch onto it under the wing, and proceed to suck all the juices out of it. Here’s an example of what they’re looking for, the most common green planthopper in PA: Acanalonia conica the green cone-headed planthopper.
Two closeups from iNaturalist show the caterpillars actively parasitizing green planthoppers.
Planthopper is green and is facing downward.
Planthopper is facing right.
Eventually this sucking of body fluids kills the planthopper. The caterpillar drops off and, when it’s ready to pupate, it drops from the trees on a silk thread to find a place to make its cocoon.
The shape of the tiny cocoon is unusual. Brandon Woo of The Incorrigible Entomologist likened it to the Sydney Opera House in 2018. That’s what everyone calls it now.
Eventually the moth emerges and the cycle starts again.
Watch for a tiny white ball on a thread this month. It’s Bug Season!
9 August 2026
A year ago, on 10 August 2025, a mega tsunami flooded the Tracy Arm fjord south of Juneau, Alaska. It began at the foot of the South Sawyer Glacier.
The tsunami was truly “mega” with a wall of water 1,578 ft tall (481m). To put this in perspective, the wave would have over-topped Acadia National Park’s highest peak, Cadillac Mountain (1,530 feet) and was almost twice the height of the U.S. Steel Tower in Downtown Pittsburgh.
The tsunami was triggered not by an earthquake but by a landslide where the South Sawyer Glacier has retreated.
Fortunately it happened so early in the morning that no one was there. At midday as many as 100 sightseeing boats would have been in the fjord. This simulation by Patrick Lynett shows what it would have looked like from a boat viewing the toe of the glacier.
simulation by Patrick Lynett on YouTube
Here’s a simulation of the tsunami from above.
Within days USGS scientists conducted aerial surveys of Tracy Arm to measure the tsunami and the force of the water. They were amazed at what they found.
Scientists have known for years that glacial retreat can trigger landslides.
As glaciers retreat with ever-increasing speed, ice that for millennia has held up potentially unstable mountainsides disappears, a process called debuttressing. Geologists debate specifics of the process, but they acknowledge it contributes to slides, some of which are big enough to block rivers or trigger deadly tsunamis in lakes or oceans.
— 1 Oct 2020, The Revelator: A recent string of massive landslides in Alaska and around the world bears the fingerprint of climate change, by Tim Lydon
In making a fjord, the glacier carves a steep U-shaped valley. As it does so it loosens rock and exerts pressure against the walls it is creating. When the glacier retreats, the pressure against the walls disappears. Loose material sags and becomes a landslide.
Here’s the origin of this image showing the life cycle of a glacier and the walls it created. The animation does not show the landslides.
Glacier Valley Formation, animation from Wikimedia
What’s disturbing is that the frequency of glacial-retreat tsunamis has increased dramatically in Alaska in the past 15 years. Where is it dangerous? Should sightseeing boats avoid certain glaciers? Which ones? And what about coastal towns within reach of the tsunamis?
As climate change heats up, glaciers are retreating fast and gets the brunt of it. Alaska is the poster child for climate change.
8 August 2026
Spotted lanternflies (Lycorma delicatula) became more abundant this week but are still just a handful compared to 2023. In fact I had to go looking for them.
At the Herrs Island back channel on 3 August my experience was: “I found you, spotted lanternfly!” instead of three years ago: “Ewwwww! Yuk! So many spotted lanternflies!!”
The bug at top landed on the bike trail and was buffeted by passing bicycles. Another perched near this year’s favorite host plant — invasive grapevine. They don’t seem to be using the Ailanthus trees as much. Perhaps they sucked them dry.
My favorite bug of the week was this leaf-footed bug that landed on my window. I usually see them as silhouettes but this time he started low enough that I could see his colors and his eyes. Way cool!
It’s been seven years since I saw a scarlet pimpernel in Pittsburgh. This one was growing among the grass on the Cathedral of Learning lawn.
Why is the flower’s name so familiar?
It is the title of a 1905 novel The Scarlet Pimpernel by British author Baroness Orczy.
Within the novel: Calling someone a scarlet pimpernel means they live a double life, acting silly or unimportant in public while secretly doing brave, clever, or heroic work behind the scenes. It also describes someone who is very hard to catch, find, or pin down.
— Google AI search for the term scarlet pimpernel
Seven years between sightings must mean the flower is hard to find. But then, I don’t go looking for it.
7 August 2026
Candice Burke posts wonderful bird photographs at @candiburke on X. In the past two weeks her yard in Hyrum in Utah’s Cache Valley has been a Little Bit of Hummingbird Heaven.
Three species are possible at this time of year: black-chinned, broad-tailed, and rufous. Can you identify these?
On 6 August 2026.
On 29 July 2026.
6 August 2026
Have you seen this plant? Its wavy leaves are nothing like the plants I’m used to in Pennsylvania so I was surprised when I saw it at Bear Run Nature Reserve in late May. Was it a new wildflower? No!
This is wavyleaf basketgrass, an extremely invasive plant that is just starting to take hold in Pennsylvania. This month the Pennsylvania iMapInvasives Program is holding a statewide blitz to find it so we can beat it back before it covers the state. I learned about it on The Allegheny Front.
Wavyleaf basketgrass (Oplismenus undulatifolius) doesn’t look very grassy, but it’s a perennial grass native to Eurasia. It spreads in North America by hitchhiking on people and animals that are moving through the forest.
Wavyleaf basketgrass was first found in North America in Howard County, Maryland in 1996 and spread quickly into connected natural areas and other Maryland counties. By 2004 (8 years) it had crossed into Virginia in Shenandoah National Park and Fraser Reserve. In 2016 (20 years) it was identified in Pennsylvania for the first time. This year, 2026, it was found firmly established in Smith County (east) Texas. This stuff travels!
And it is under-reported. Here’s the “Listed as Invasive” map.
By now it’s been documented in 8 Pennsylvania counties.
Some counties won’t ever see wavyleaf basketgrass because it prefers moist, shady environments. It takes root in our forested natural areas, the places we’ve saved because they are so unique, places like Bear Run. It ultimately covers the forest floor similar to Japanese stiltgrass. Ironically wavyleaf basketgrass has been found growing under Japanese stiltgrass.
Wavyleaf basketgrass seeds are expert hitchhikers. They attach to you, your gear, your dog, wildlife, and of course, deer. Click here for a photo of a dog covered in seeds from the Virginia Native Plant Society website.
If you encounter this invader, be sure to clean it off your gear. If you don’t, the seeds will drop off at your next hiking location and you will unintentionally spread the problem.
On the Allegheny Front’s A new invasive plant threatens Pennsylvania forests you’ll learn how to identify the plant and where to connect with the statewide blitz. Once you know what it looks like, here’s the form for Reporting Wavyleaf Basketgrass in Pennsylvania.
And here’s why we care right now.
Once a population has become established, complete eradication from a site has proven to be extremely difficult due to a long-lived perennial life cycle, a long seed germination season (April–November), and considerable seed mobility of the species.
— Wikipedia: Wavyleaf basketgrass, invasive
5 August 2026
This very large green caterpillar is a tobacco hornworm (Manduca sexta). Though its name suggests it feeds only on tobacco, its hosts include many plants in the Solanaceae family including tobacco, tomatoes, Datura (ex: jimsonweed), bell peppers.
From hatch to full-grown, the caterpillar feeds for two to three weeks before it begins to wander, looking for a place to pupate underground in loose soil. 7 to 10 days later it emerges as a large moth, the Carolina Sphinx moth also called the tobacco hawk moth.
(video embedded from entomology_1 on YouTube)
The Carolina sphinx moth is famous for its ability to hover like a hummingbird as it drinks from deep flowers. Here it is in slow motion in a wind tunnel.
When it’s time to lay eggs this moth must find a host plant that doesn’t smell sweet. How do they find it?
In a recent study, researchers examined the tiny hairs on the wings of Carolina sphinx moths (tobacco hawk moths) and found they have a sense of smell!
Looking at tiny wing hairs with both light and scanning electron microscopy, [researchers] found the hairs were porous: a telltale sign of olfactory function. …
The team placed the delicate detached wings between two electrodes and wafted odor molecules representing various chemical classes over them, hoping for a response. They reacted to … two amines—a group of smelly organic compounds derived from ammonia)—called pyrrolidine and piperidine … found in pungent, rotting smells, but also in the olfactory bouquet of tobacco plants..
— Science: These moths smell with their wings
These same compounds are part of the “smell” of tomato plants and probably other members of Solanaceae.
So when a Carolina sphinx moth flies past your tomato plants, its wings smell a place to lay eggs.
Read more at the Journal of Experimental Biology: Tobacco hawkmoth wings have a sense of smell. Watch a tobacco hornworm develop from egg to adult in this 6-minute video: Manduca sexta, from egg to adult on YouTube.
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