After the warm "non"winter: Summer 2012 Bugs....and Wildlife

I remember back several months ago...much of North American experienced a much warmer than normal...almost non-existent really...winter.
Kids and skiers and my Siberian Husky were bummed. Folks paying heating bills were thrilled.

Many here, including me, predicted bugs coming our of our ears....and then some.
I'm hear to report my unofficial 2012 Bug Report for SE Michigan

I'm curious as to what others here have to report.

Pretty much a normal number of butterflies....and bees.
What I saw fewer of: yellow jackets, carpenter ants, flies, mosquitoes. Didn't see many dragonflies either. Heard fewer crickets. Only one or two grasshoppers.

What there were a overabundance of: grubs.
There are many lawns in my subdivision that are decimated bu grub damage. Some almost 100% taken over...total lawn destruction.
Should mean lots of June bugs next year.

ETA
There was no early spring season of household spiders, either.

one of mine from a few years back

Here in Washington it was cold enough for people to ski on July 4th. I expected a higher number of spiders but that did not happen

Right now in my neck of the woods we are still seeing orange and black caterpillars. I don't normally see them this late in the year.

Not a very buggy season. I usually photograph unusual ones. I don't recall having seen one for a while.

I'm posting from my cell so I can't share any of mine from this year. Maybe some of you can post this year's bugs that caught your eye and where you were?

Thanks Supermod

This is somewhat anecdotal, but my gf and I have both seen way more butterflies in the past month in the S.E. U.S. than we expect. Almost as many as we would see in the spring. Not so much other bugs, but I don't really have any way to quantifying it and I'm no etymologist, so take it with a grain of salt.

Originally posted by MeesterB
This is somewhat anecdotal, but my gf and I have both seen way more butterflies in the past month in the...

Now that you mentioned it, we have had more monarchs than usual. They stuck around until about 6 weeks ago. I moved and thought that it was just the new area. Maybe it was

I live in Ontario Canada, and the one thing i have noticed, well lack of noticing, is the mosquito population.

The fluctuating weather this year seem to have had a significant effect on their populations this year.

I was up at the cottage for half the summer, happier then a pig in mud with no mosquitos to ruin my time on the dock or around the fire pit.

East coast Canada-
We were over run with spiders. Not uncommon for here, but even the old timers took note of it.
Most pleasing to me was butterflies and moths. some were so beautiful.
There was 2-3 days of warm sunny weather and my yard was covered with damselflies.
They were even flying around me and landing on the laundry I was hanging on the line.
If there was some new kind of bug the kids couldn't identify they stuck it in a jar and googled it.
My two boys gathered a jar full of caterpillars and watched them all create cocoons and hatch into moths.
If it's not bugs in jars somewhere around the house, it's reptiles.

I wonder if now that it's more cool, they've hatched (butterflies, moths etc)...but now will they have time to create next years batch? I'm no entomologist so I'm just curious.

Originally posted by MDDoxs
I live in Ontario Canada,
I was up at the cottage for half the summer, happier then a pig in mud with no mosquitos to ruin my time on the dock or around the fire pit.

I don't know what the mosquitoes were like at my parents cottage, but I'm up here now, and let me tell you.... there is a shyte load of little wooly aphids floating around.

www.google.ca...

Here in my part of South Carolina: lots and lots of butterflies, a lot more than I remember seeing before.

Also a lot more Flys.

Not so much anything else. Actually, we normally have a invasion of lady bugs, but they seemed to have disappeared this year.

So this is your basic bug out thread Missouri here, I noticed fewer June bugs, oddly no web worms this year, the year before we had massive black and fuzzy caterpillar invasion, that stripped many trees completely. Not many flies. Did have the annual fruit fly fest, as did several others here on ATS, the vinegar works! Not many mosquitoes. A few monarchs, but not many, I think this next year is when the big migration is due, but I could be wrong. The weather definitely had a big impact this year on the bugs.

I live in Eastern Ohio.
We all thought the insect population would thrive this summer, but to no avail.
It seems the numbers are somewhat normal and not "hordes" like we imagined.
I've watched numerous honeybees in the spring and summer, among other bees.
I will say this, all the predator insects/arachnids I saw were eating well this past summer.
I've watched/killed more fat, large, and well fed spiders than I can remember.
But I didn't notice a massive jump in the actual numbers of any major species.
Maybe we will see next year, as the non-winter cold could affect this coming summer too.

I've journeyed into southern parts of the state and into WV last week and noticed one thing:
That Chinese lady bug that stinks and bites seemed to be rampant down there.
Maybe because it was a bit warmer, maybe other reasons, but those insects are true pests.
I'd like to feed rotten corpse maggots to the person that brought them over here!

Other than that, no big change.

I forgot to mention, and while they are not bugs, we also had an increase in frogs.

reply to post by eriktheawful


Well, that could be on account of a higher winter survival rate...maybe I should branch out the thread
And maybe more flies = more frogs

Last winter the grey squirrels did NOT get their little "hair bows"....extra white fur for their ears...I'll be watching the little guys this year.....