Love nature? There’s an app for that

Painted Schinia, Schinia volupia, Courtesy & Copyright Mark Brunson
Painted Schinia
Schinia volupia
Courtesy & Copyright Mark Brunson
We hear a lot these days how people spend too much time with their electronic devices. The internet is full of advice on how to get kids away from their screens to enjoy nature, and that’s great. But for me, as someone who has always loved natural spaces, I’m finding that a screen can actually enhance my time outdoors.

My iPhone is packed with apps that help me connect to nature. One lets me identify birds by their song. Another recognizes constellations in the night sky. I’ve got several plant identification apps. But my favorite nature app is called iNaturalist. When I see a plant or animal in the wild, I can snap a photo, and the app’s artificial intelligence will help me identify what species I’m seeing. Then I can upload the photo and its GPS coordinates so others can see what I found and where I found it. In doing this, I help scientists learn where species are found and how common there are. And if the AI turns out to be wrong – which does happen – experts who use the app can tell me what they think I really saw.

I’m outdoors a lot, and I use iNaturalist a lot. It’s almost an obsession. But this obsession helps me learn to see nature in new ways. Here’s an example: Earlier this year, my wife and I were walking along a cattle trail near Canyonlands National Park. It was early May, and we were delighted to see wildflowers blooming in the desert. And of course, I took photos as we went. At one point, I happened to see a bright yellow, daisy- shaped flower with a red center. I knew it was a red dome blanketflower, closely related to the bright red and yellow Gaillardia plants that many Utahns grow in their waterwise gardens.

But when I knelt to take a closeup photo, I saw something I hadn’t noticed. Feeding on nectar from some of the flowers were small, brightly colored moths, their wings a deep red with white stripes in a pattern like a woven blanket, their heads a vivid orange. iNaturalist told me I’d found a group of painted schinia moths – a species I’d never encountered or even heard of before.

Intrigued, I wanted to know more. I learned there are at least five species of painted schinia moth in the U.S. Southwest, each of which feeds only on a particular kind of blanketflower. This sort of plant-insect specialization is common. It benefits the plants, because as moths move from flower to flower, they carry pollen with them, and a specialist pollinator won’t bring its pollen load to a species that can’t use it. And it benefits the insects. As they adapt to the unique chemical and physical features of their host plants, they can gather and use food most efficiently. And – as I learned when I had to look closely to even see my painted schinia moths – they can evolve to use camouflage to avoid predators.

Of course, the downside to specialization is that if something bad happens to the host plant, it also endangers their insect specialist. Luckily for the painted schinia moth, blanketflowers are abundant in late spring in the southeast Utah desert. That’s lucky for us humans, too, as we enjoy the brilliant color they bring to red rock country – even more so if we take time to kneel down, snap a photo, and examine them more closely.

I’m Mark Brunson, and I’m Wild About Utah.

Credits:

Images Courtesy & Copyright Mark Brunson, Photographer
Featured Audio: Courtesy & ©
Text: Mark Brunson, https://www.usu.edu/experts/profile/mark-brunson/
Additional Reading: Mark Brunson, https://www.usu.edu/experts/profile/mark-brunson/

Additional Reading

Mark Brunson’s archive: https://wildaboututah.org/?s=brunson

Loarie, Scott. The surprising power of your nature photos. TED talk, April 2025.
https://www.ted.com/talks/scott_loarie_the_surprising_power_of_your_nature_photos

Southwest Desert Flora. Gaillardia pinnatifida, Red Dome Blanketflower.
https://southwestdesertflora.com/WebsiteFolders/All_Species/Asteraceae/Gaillardia%20pinnatifida,%20Red%20Dome%20Blanketflower.html

Painted Schinia Moth, Schinia volupia, iNaturalist, https://www.inaturalist.org/guide_taxa/1565242
Photos of Painted Schinia Moth Schinia volupia, iNaturalist, https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/230575-Schinia-volupia/browse_photos

Las luciérnagas encuentran el amor en Utah

Las luciérnagas encuentran el amor en Utah: Las luciérnagas (Firefly), Courtesy Pixabay, Francisco Javier Corado Rivera, Contributor
Las luciérnagas (Firefly),
Courtesy Pixabay, Francisco Javier Corado Rivera, Contributor
Mi nombre es Kate, y me llamo Carlos, y hoy este Wild About Utah está en español e inglés. Esta historia también, se puede escuchar on line en UPR.org

Contra todo pronóstico, las luciérnagas encuentran el amor aquí en Utah. En lugares como el Parque de las Luciérnagas en Nibley, puedes ver estas deslumbrantes linternas bailar y rebotar a partir de principios de junio. Ver estas luciérnagas es mágico, aún más cuando sabes lo que les costó brillar cada noche.

El primer desafío que enfrenta una luciérnaga es encontrar un buen hábitat húmedo aquí en el árido Utah. Encontrar un hábitat oscuro y húmedo puede ser difícil, pero de alguna manera las luciérnagas lo han logrado y lo han hecho en Utah desde posiblemente 1929. Una vez que una luciérnaga encuentra un buen lugar, ahora tienen que encontrarse entre sí. Hacer esto requiere precisión y química. En su linterna abdominal, la enzima luciferasa debe abrazar tanto la luciferina como una molécula de energía estrechamente para ayudar a combinar sus partes.

Luego, la luciferina se combina con oxígeno para formar la energética oxiluciferasa. Al igual que un niño con demasiados dulces, la oxiluciferasa ahora está desesperada por liberar algo de energía antes de que sea demasiada. Esto lo hace liberando un fotón que emite luz y vemos la magia ante nuestros ojos. Como si crear luz dentro del cuerpo no fuera suficiente, ahora deben ajustar su señal a su especie y encontrarse entre sí. Cada especie tiene un código morse único de luz que necesitan parpadear para encontrarse.

Ahora, digamos que una luciérnaga llega a un hábitat pantanoso y conoce al amor de su corta vida de 3 semanas, ahora puede comenzar el romance. Los machos y hembras copulan durante horas, permaneciendo quietos y pegados de extremo a extremo. Durante este tiempo, el macho le da a la hembra lo que se llama un regalo nupcial lleno de proteínas junto con su esperma. ¡Si eso no es romántico, no sé qué lo es!

Las hembras almacenarán este regalo y lo digerirán durante varios días para ayudarla a obtener las proteínas necesarias para poner sus huevos. Una vez puestos, estos huevos tardarán entre unos pocos meses a 2 años en convertirse en adultos, donde iluminarán su corazón para repetir el proceso.

Para mi entender la naturaleza y los pequeños detalles de ella me llena de satisfacción, el saber que es tan perfecta. Esa pequeña luz llena esperanza, nos muestra que el mañana sera mejor.

Mi nombre es Kate y me llamo Carlos y estamos locos por Utah.

Credits:
English Version: Fireflies Find Love in Utah, https://wildaboututah.org/fireflies-find-love-in-utah/
Images: Courtesy Pixabay, Francisco Javier Corado, Rivera, Contributor, https://pixabay.com/photos/insect-nature-yard-firefly-5151913/
Featured Audio: Courtesy & Copyright Anderson, Howe, & Wakeman
Text: Kate Hunter & Carlos Ramos, https://logannature.org/staff
Additional Reading: Lyle Bingham, https://bridgerlandaudubon.org/

Additional Reading

Wild About Utah Pieces by Kate Hunter https://wildaboututah.org/author/kate-hunter/
Wild About Utah Pieces by Carlos Ramos https://wildaboututah.org/author/carlos-ramos/

Strand, Holly, Firefly Light, Wild About Utah, June 20, 2013, https://wildaboututah.org/firefly-light/

Hellstern, Ron, June Fireflies, Wild About Utah, June 19, 2017, https://wildaboututah.org/june-fireflies/

Bills, Christy, Fireflies, Wild About Utah, May 15, 2019, https://wildaboututah.org/fireflies/

Heers, Mary, Fireflies at Nibley Firefly Park, Wild About Utah, May 23, 2022, https://wildaboututah.org/see-fireflies-at-nibley-firefly-park/

Join Stokes Nature Center for their firefly tours, from 9:15-10:15 at Virgil Gibbons Heritage Park/Firefly Park in Nibley, UT!
All nights are offered in English while June 6 and 7th will also have Spanish Tours
Dates and Links to Ticketing are Here:
–   June 3rd-https://givebutter.com/firefly25-june3
–   June 5th-https://givebutter.com/firefly25-june5
–   June 6th-https://givebutter.com/firefly25-june6 (Tours offered in Spanish as well)
–   June 7th-https://givebutter.com/firefly25-june7 (Tours offered in Spanish as well)

Fireflies Find Love in Utah

Fireflies Find Love in Utah: Firefly (Las luciérnagas), Courtesy Pixabay, Francisco Javier Corado Rivera, Contributor
Firefly (Las luciérnagas),
Courtesy Pixabay, Francisco Javier Corado Rivera, Contributor
My name is Kate and my name is Carlos. Today’s Wild About Utah is in both Spanish and English. The Spanish version will be read by Carlos Ramos. You can also listen to this story in Spanish this Wednesday evening between 9:01-9:06 or online.

Against all odds, fireflies find love here in Utah. Out at places like Firefly Park in Nibley, you can watch these dazzling lanterns dance and bounce, starting around early June. Watching these fireflies is magical, even more when you know what it took for them to glow each night.

The first challenge a firefly faces is finding a good wet habitat out here in arid Utah. Finding dark, wet habitat can be tough, but somehow fireflies have done it and have done so in Utah since potentially 1929. Once a firefly finds a good spot, now they have to find each other. Doing this requires precision and chemistry. In their abdominal lantern, the enzyme luciferase must hug both luciferin and a molecule of energy tightly to help combine their parts. Then luciferin combines with oxygen to form the energetic Oxyluciferase. Much like a kid with too much candy, Oxyluciferase is now desperate to release some energy before it’s too much. It does this by releasing a light-emitting photon and we see the magic before our eyes. As if creating light inside one’s body wasn’t tough enough, now they must attune their signal to their species and find each other. Each species has a unique Morse code of light they need to blip in order to find each other.

Now, let’s say a firefly makes it to a marshy habitat and they meet the love of their short 3-week life, now the romance can begin. Males and females copulate for hours, remaining still and stuck end to end. During this time, the male gives the female what’s called a nuptial gift full of protein along with his sperm. If that isn’t romantic, I don’t know what is! The females will store this gift and digest it over several days to help her get the protein to lay her eggs. Once laid, these eggs will take between a few months to 2 years to become adults where they will light their heart out to repeat the process.

For me, thinking about all the chemistry involved, both molecular and romantic, is moving. I hope we can protect their light for generations to come.

My name is Kate and my name is Carlos and we’re Wild About Utah.

Credits:
Spanish Version: Las luciérnagas encuentran el amor en Utah, https://wildaboututah.org/las-luciernagas-encuentran-el-amor-en-utah/
Images: Courtesy Pixabay, Francisco Javier Corado, Rivera, Contributor, https://pixabay.com/photos/insect-nature-yard-firefly-5151913/
Featured Audio: Courtesy & Copyright Anderson, Howe, & Wakeman
Text: Kate Hunter & Carlos Ramos, https://logannature.org/staff
Additional Reading: Lyle Bingham, https://bridgerlandaudubon.org/

Additional Reading

Wild About Utah Pieces by Kate Hunter https://wildaboututah.org/author/kate-hunter/
Wild About Utah Pieces by Carlos Ramos https://wildaboututah.org/author/carlos-ramos/

Strand, Holly, Firefly Light, Wild About Utah, June 20, 2013, https://wildaboututah.org/firefly-light/

Hellstern, Ron, June Fireflies, Wild About Utah, June 19, 2017, https://wildaboututah.org/june-fireflies/

Bills, Christy, Fireflies, Wild About Utah, May 15, 2019, https://wildaboututah.org/fireflies/

Heers, Mary, Fireflies at Nibley Firefly Park, Wild About Utah, May 23, 2022, https://wildaboututah.org/see-fireflies-at-nibley-firefly-park/

Join Stokes Nature Center for their firefly tours, from 9:15-10:15 at Virgil Gibbons Heritage Park/Firefly Park in Nibley, UT!
All nights are offered in English while June 6 and 7th will also have Spanish Tours
Dates and Links to Ticketing are Here:
–   June 3rd-https://givebutter.com/firefly25-june3
–   June 5th-https://givebutter.com/firefly25-june5
–   June 6th-https://givebutter.com/firefly25-june6 (Tours offered in Spanish as well)
–   June 7th-https://givebutter.com/firefly25-june7 (Tours offered in Spanish as well)

Cuckoo Bees

Cuckoo bees: Indiscriminate Cuckoo bee Courtesy & © Mark Brunson, Photographer
Indiscriminate Cuckoo Bee
Courtesy & © Mark Brunson, Photographer

Indiscriminate Cuckoo bee Courtesy & © Mark Brunson, PhotographerIndiscriminate Cuckoo Bee
Courtesy & © Mark Brunson, Photographer

I’d like to tell you a crime story. At least, it would be a crime story if told from a human perspective. But is it still a crime story if it’s about the natural world? I’ll tell it and then let you decide for yourself.

First let me set the stage: Not long ago I was hiking in Northern Utah’s Bear River Range. It was the height of wildflower season, and I was enjoying the colorful variety of blossoms along the trail. I stopped to admire a tall, showy plant with dozens of purplish-green blossoms: Frasera speciosa, commonly known as monument plant or green gentian. It’s often seen near the top of Logan Canyon, but what struck me about this particular monument plant was that it was full of bumble bees.

I knew that a Utah-based conservation science organization, Sageland Collaborative, is asking community volunteers to help them measure bumble bee diversity in the state, so I took out my phone and snapped a few photos. Later I uploaded the best photos into an app called iNaturalist so they’d end up in the Utah Pollinator Pursuit database maintained by the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources with Sageland’s help. Then I waited to learn what species of bumble bee I’d seen. The answer came back: indiscriminate cuckoo bumble bee. I thought: What an unusual name. I needed to know more.

It turns out “indiscriminate” simply means that, unlike many native bees that are particular about what they eat, this species doesn’t much care where it gets its nectar. As for “cuckoo”? Like the birds they’re named after, these bumble bees are thieves.

Or to say it more scientifically: these bumble bees are kleptoparasites. Parasites – animals that take resources they need from other species to the detriment of those species – and “klepto,” as in stealing. Like cuckoos or cowbirds, they lay their eggs in the nests of other bumble bee species, letting the workers from the host species do the work of raising them.

Here’s where our crime story gets even more sinister. When a cuckoo bumble bee queen finds a suitable nest to rob – one with a good-sized group of workers to raise the bee larvae, but not so many workers that they can easily protect their queen – she kills the host queen and becomes part of the colony, laying her alien eggs for the host workers to feed.

Cuckoo bumble bees don’t need their own workers, so they’re less often seen on wildflowers. In fact, there’s a good chance that some of the other bumble bees on my monument plant – the ones I didn’t get a picture of – were members of the host species. They also don’t need to take pollen back to a nest of their own, so they don’t have those “pollen baskets” we often see on the hind legs of female bumble bees.

But they do move pollen from flower to flower when it sticks to their bodies as they feed. In other words, they do play a role in sustaining the wildflowers we enjoy every summer. So is this really a crime story? Or is it just another example of the amazing diversity of behaviors found in nature? While you’re deciding about that for yourselves, I hope you get a chance to enjoy watching Utah’s various kinds of bumble bees as they do their all-important work.

I’m Mark Brunson, and I’m wild about Utah’s native bees.

Credits:

Images Courtesy & Copyright Mark Brunson, Photographer
Featured Audio: Courtesy & © Kevin Colver, https://wildstore.wildsanctuary.com/collections/special-collections and J. Chase and K.W. Baldwin. https://upr.org/
Text: Mark Brunson, https://www.usu.edu/experts/profile/mark-brunson/
Additional Reading: Lyle Bingham, https://bridgerlandaudubon.org/

Additional Reading

Wild About Utah pieces authored by Mark Brunson

Sheffield, Cory S., Cuckoo bees, Epeoloides pilosula, The Xerces Society, https://www.xerces.org/endangered-species/species-profiles/at-risk-bees/cuckoo-bees

Smale, Parker, Understanding cuckoo bumble bees: terrors or treasures?, Wildlife Preservation Canada, February 29, 2024, https://wildlifepreservation.ca/blog/understanding-cuckoo-bumble-bees-terrors-or-treasures/

Barth, Amanda, The Unique Lives of Cuckoo Bees, Sageland Collaborative, July 25, 2024, https://sagelandcollaborative.org/blog/2024/7/25/the-unique-lives-of-cuckoo-bees