HiveComb

The year of our lord 2024 didn't have many high points for me. I didn't have much time to do things I love, and I had plenty of chores that made my everyday life feel mostly dull and sometimes annoying.
I rarely visited my favorite outdoor places, and even more rarely searched for things to photograph in the woods and meadows of my area.

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Every now and then, however, insect and spider activities inside the house I live in somehow managed to catch my attention and reignite my fading enthusiasm for macrophotography. In this post, I'll show you part of the fairly rich biodiversity of the man-made ecosystem under my roof.

This carpet beetle belongs to the Dermestidae family. The scientific name of the species is Anthrenus verbasci. Adult beetles live mostly outdoors and feed on pollen and nectar, but females often lay their eggs in houses becouse human environments can provide plenty of food for the larvae.

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Anthrenus verbasci larvae feed on keratin and chitin of natural fibers. Sources of those edibles can be dead insects or various natural fibers, such as wool, silk, fur, or feathers. The beetle shown in these two photographs was resting on one of the four walls of my room.

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Pholcus phalangioides is probably one of the most common spiders found in homes, if not the most common and widespread. Here, you can see one of the three or four present in those days in the room where I sleep and write my posts for Hive. The following photograph ...

... shows a significant portion of that chaotic and crammed room.

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Pholcus phalangioides feeds primarily on other spiders, but insects that can be found inside houses, caves, and other shady places this spider inhabits are also part of its diet.

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The Pholcus phalangioides shown here has just emerged from its old exoskeleton, which has become too tight for the spider's growing body.

This wide shot shows the small hallway of my ground-floor apartment. One day in spring ...

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... I came across an interesting scene at the end of that hallway, close to the bathroom door.

It was a scene I had never witnessed before ...

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... a centipede with its prey.

A centipede from the Scutigeridae family has caught a spitting spider from the Scytodidae family.

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In this photograph, the entire spider is visible and therefore easily recognizable. It was a moment after the centipede had injected the venom through its front legs, called forcipules, and left its prey to die.

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When it comes to the scientific name of the species, the centipede is Scutigera coleoptrata. It's commonly known as the house centipede.

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Scutigera coleoptrata originated in my area. I mean is indigenous to the Mediterranean region, but you can find it all around the world nowadays.

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The scientific name of the spider the centipede is holding in these photographs is Scytodes thoracica.

In this shot, the centipede is cleaning its legs after the action.

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Scutigera coleoptrata is a fast and agile predator that hunts a wide variaty of small arthropods that can be found in a house like the one I live in.

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Ants, spiders, silverfish, cockroaches; they can all be on its menu.

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It's a surprisingly inteligent predator too. Scutigera coleoptrata centipedes have been observed changing their hunting strategy depending on the size and defense strategy of the prey.

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It's a predominantly nocturnal animal. Its eyes are well-developed, but it seems that these centipedes rely mostly on their long antennae when hunting. The antennae are sensitive to both smells and touch.

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This silverfish ...

... was running around the upper surface of the small cabinet shown in the foreground of this shot when I caught it through the macro lens.

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The scientific name of the species is Ctenolepisma longicaudatum. The scales that cover its body reflect the light. That's why the silverfish appears shiny like silver in this photograph, while in the previous one, the same insect looks completely gray.

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This litlle thing was somehow attached to the wall there in the hallway. It looked like something made by an insect or a spider, so I decided to observe it from time to time while doing various chores inside the house in the hope of seeing what it had to reveal. About an hour after I took the above photograph ...

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... a minuscule head came out of the cylinder. A few more minutes ...

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... and the larva was dragging its house across the wall.

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It was a great scene, a joy to watch and photograph.

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The scientific name of the species is Tinea pellionella. This is the larval stage of the insect, of course. Tinea pellionella is a small moth from the Tineidae family.

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The larva eats mainly fibrous keratin. Hairs and feathers, for example. Inside a house, it can thrive on carpets, furs, woolen fabrics, stuff like that. But it was observed eating cobwebs as well. Adults do not eat or drink. They don't have functional mouthparts. Fat reserves accumulated during the larval stage keep them going for two or three weeks, during which they try to reproduce.

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Tinea pellionella larva uses the minuscule fragments of various materials found in its environment to build a comfortable, protective case. The shape of the case is always the same, but the overall appearance, especially the colors and textures, can vary a lot depending on the habitat.

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This interesting insect doesn't live inside houses. It accidentally entered; I took a few photographs and then took it to the garden.

It's a mayfly.

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A mayfly from the Baetidae family.

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The scientific name of the species is Cloeon dipterum. The larvae live in ponds, where they feed on algae and detritus. The adults live a short life and do not feed at all. The only pond in town, a big pond that looks like a litlle lake, is only about two hundred meters from where I live.

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When I found it, the mayfly was resting on the inner surface of the front door.

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Here you can see the spider ...

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... that has built a nest on the outer surface of the same door.

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It belongs to the Araneidae family.

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The scientific name of the species is Zygiella x-notata.

These spiders are very common in urban habitats in many areas all around the world. I saw Zygiella x-notata many times before, of course, but ...

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... but I had never seen a female guarding its egg sack. That was an interesting new situation to photograph.

This is my kitchen.

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On the tile floor, there in the kitchen, I photographed another accidental visitor.

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It's a firefly larva.

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The scientific name of the species is Lampyris noctiluca.

This is another scene from the kitchen.

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A silverfish, inside the salt container.

The scientific name of the species is Lepisma saccharinum.

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These tiny beetles ...

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... were running around on the walls of the entire house, but they were only present for a week or two in early summer.

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The scientific name of the species is Hypebaeus flavicollis.

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It belongs to the Melyridae family.

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In these photographs, you can see a male and a female ...

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... engaged in something that looked almost like a dance at times.

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The only thing I found about this species on the Internet is its scientific name. That's all. But ...

... but I did find a bit more about the genus Hypebaeus in general.

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All in all, I found enough to confirm my assumption that the behavior I observed in summer 2024 is courtship that precedes mating.

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Males use chemical organs called excitators to get females to mate with them.

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Excitators are situated on the male's elytra. These two shots show in great detail a female getting in contact with the pheromones secreted by those organs.

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To get to that moment ...

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... the male had to do a lot of chasing and many times repeat a series of ritualized maneuvers.

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As far as I could find out on the Internet, these beetles shouldn't be associated with houses and other man-made environments, but from my experience, they can be found there.

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Can't tell you what exactly attracted a small population of Hypebaeus flavicollis to my apartment, but I'm glad I had them. This post would be considerably less interesting without them.

Compared to the rest of the ground-floor apartment I live in, the bathroom is probably a biodiversity hot spot. Its warmth, humidity, and access to old pipes and the sewer create an inviting atmosphere for many small arthropods.

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This moth is an accidental visitor that probably ended up in the bathroom, attracted by the lamp.

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The scientific name of the species is Dysgonia algira. The family is Erebidae.

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This hairy litlle thing resembles a moth, but it's actually a fly. A fly from the Psychodidae family. The scientific name of the species is Clogmia albipunctata. Since this is a widespread insect that inhabits urban environments, it has quite a few common names. It's known as the bathroom moth midge, bathroom moth fly, or drain fly.
The larvae live in aquatic environments and feed on organic decaying matter. Drains of bathrooms can provide all that a Clogmia albipunctata larva needs to be well-fed and happy. Adults feed mostly on dirty water enriched with decaying organic matter, but sugary liquid things attract them as well.

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Some Psychodidae, while still having certain moth-like features, look more like furry mosquitoes.

Especially when seen laterally, not from above. This is the Phlebotomus papatasi. Larvae feed on decomposing organic matter, especially on fungi, leaf mold, and decaying plants. While adult males rely on small doses of plant-derived sugary liquids to get the necessary energy, females need blood. They feed on a wide variaty of wild and domestic birds and mammals, including humans. They can also spread some nasty diseases like cutaneous leishmaniasis and pappataci fever. Fortunately, I never saw this insect in my house before or after I took these two shots.

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Psychoda grisescens is the third Psychodidae species I wanna show you today.

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In appearance is quite similar to the Clogmia albipunctata, but a bit smaller, and its hair isn't that dense.

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Another thing that can help differentiate the two is the way they position their wings while resting. While the Clogmia albipunctata wings are spread horizontally, Psychoda grisescens prefers folding them in a roof-like shape over the abdomen.

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Psychoda grisescens is a classic, harmless drain fly. Larvae feed on organic debris in drains, while adults don't feed.

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This tryptich shows all three Psychodidae species next to each other so you can compare them.

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One thing I usually don't do is photograph dead insects. I like them alive. And I also like to catch them in action if possible. However, the gnat shown in the above picture has died in an interesting pose on the photogenic white background provided by the bathtub, so I broke that ... I don't know how to call it ... I mean, it's not a rule ... not a strict one at least ... it's just something I usually avoid becouse it doesn't inspire me.

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This fungus gnat from the Mycetophilidae family was posing, completely alive, on the toilet bowl cover. I can't tell you what species exactly this is. It could be something from the genus Sciophila, for example.

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Jumping spiders often enter the bathroom to hunt insects and other spiders that live there permanently. The jumping spider shown in this set of six photographs is a Menemerus semilimbatus. This species lives in urban and rural environments. More often in yards and gardens, but the house interior can also be a Menemerus semilimbatus hunting ground.

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This minuscule beetle on the interior ledge of the bathroom window belongs to the Ptinidae family. The scientific name of the species is Stegobium paniceum.

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In this shot, the beetle shows its antennae.
Both adults and larvae feed on a wide variaty of food and organic materials that can be found in houses, storage buildings, or museums.
Bread, grain, coffee beans, powdered milk, sweets like cookies and chocolates, spices and herbs, dried fruit, seeds, pharmaceutical products, museum specimens, wool, hair, leather, books, upholstery, and manuscripts can all be on their menu.
Stegobium paniceum has a symbiotic relationship with a yeast-like fungus that helps the beetle get the nutrients from some materials that don't look like food at first sight.

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In this photograph, a minuscule spider that I wasn't able to identify has caught a Stegobium paniceum beetle.

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This small wasp from the Braconidae family parasitizes on various moth larvae, including those of the case-bearing clothes moths from the Tineidae family. Tinea pellionella, shown earlier in the post, could have been a host inside my house.
The scientific name of the species is Apanteles carpatus.

Pavement ants (Tetramorium immigrans) are always present in my house, and probably in big numbers, but I photographed only one of them in 2024.

This fairly big beetle from the Tenebrionidae family is an accidental visitor that I saw only once inside the house.

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The beetle was big enough to be visible in a wide shot like this. The scientific name of the species is Pedinus femoralis.

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Filistata insidiatrix is a spider I rarely see, not becouse it is uncommon in my area, but because it spends most of its life hidden in holes, crevices, or under rocks where it builds a tube-like web that opens like a funnel.

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This one was photographed one morning in early autumn near its hole under the front door of my apartment.
Filistata insidiatrix is a species from the Filistatidae family.

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This Philodromus poecilus, a running crab spider ...

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... from the Philodromidae family ...

... was resting on the outer part of the house, on the front facade, very close to the entrance of my ground-floor apartment.

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The same can be said about this shield bug. The scientific name of the species is Sciocoris sideritidis. The family is Pentatomidae, of course.

AND THAT'S ALL. THE POST ENDS HERE. AS ALWAYS ON HIVE, THE PHOTOGRAPHS ARE MY WORK.

The following links will take you to the sites with more information about the protagonists of today's post. I found some stuff about them there.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varied_carpet_beetle
https://www.naturespot.org/species/daddy-long-legs-spider
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scutigera_coleoptrata
https://www.naturespot.org/species/spitting-spider
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ctenolepisma_longicaudatum
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tinea_pellionella
https://www.naturespot.org/species/cloeon-dipterum
https://www.naturespot.org/species/zygiella-x-notata
https://www.naturespot.org/species/glow-worm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silverfish
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/897473-Hypebaeus-flavicollis
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dysgonia_algira
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clogmia_albipunctata
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phlebotomus
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/451402-Psychoda-grisescens
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/83736-Mycetophilidae
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/248019-Sciophila
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/157990-Menemerus-semilimbatus
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drugstore_beetle
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/379951-Apanteles-carpatus
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/63187-Braconidae
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetramorium_immigrans
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/491529-Pedinus-femoralis
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/468121-Filistata-insidiatrix
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/1410465-Philodromus-poecilus
https://www.britishbugs.org.uk/heteroptera/Pentatomidae/sciocoris_sideritidis.html