The day dawned looking much the same as yesterday. Since my objective today was to get better photos of the dogwood aphids in better light, I delayed my departure hoping for brighter weather later and was lucky to be able to set off in early afternoon with the sun occasionally breaking through.

Back at the dogwood I found nothing but empty nymph exoskeletons on the leaf where I had seen the Common Dogwood-grass Aphid (Anoecia corni) yesterday. The Syrphus ribesii larva was gone too. Had it gorged itself on the nymphs?

In searching for signs of more aphids I came across a Common Green Lacewing (Chrysoperla carnea) on the underside of one leaf and several Dogwood Rivet Midge (Craneiobia corni) galls on others. Then I was aware of an ant crawling on my arm. Where there are aphids there are often ants, so maybe the aphids are not too far off. One of the ant species known to attend the Common Dogwood-grass Aphid is the Jet Black Ant (Lasius fuliginosus) so I’m guessing that may be what I had on my arm and on further inspection found a train of ants heading out along one dogwood stem to a very late flower head that still remained at the end of the stem. That’s where I found the Common Dogwood-grass Aphid (Anoecia corni) nymphs, clustered amongst the dogwood flowers with worker ants in attendance waiting for their honeydew. At least most of the aphids’ predators will now be kept at bay by the ants. Other small groups of aphids were found, some with just one adult present.

The only other photo of the day was of a Golden Dot moth (Stigmella aurella) larval mine on a Rubus sp. leaf.

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