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MALE Anna's Hummingbird. There ought to be a project: Birds With ATTITUDE!

Did you know that hummingbirds . . .

Are the smallest migrating birds? Their average weight is less than a nickel.
Get their name from the humming sounds their wings make.
Can perch, but cannot hop nor walk on their tiny legs.
Have no sense of smell, but have excellent color vision.
Can consume nectar up to twice their body weight in a day.
In a flock may be called a bouquet, hover, glittering, shimmer or tune.

Irene's Hummingbird (Trochilidae family) observations on INaturalist, worldwide: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations?place_id=any&taxon_id=5562&user_id=aparrot1&verifiable=any

COMPARISON OF 4 California Hummingbirds: Costa's, Anna's, Allen's and Broad-tailed Hummingbird:

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Costa's Hummingbird (Calypte costae) is a medium-size hummingbird in the (Trochilidae) family that is 9cm (3.5 inches) long. Costa's are a bit smaller with a more hunched posture than Anna's. Bill is a little longer than Anna's Hummingbird. Both sexes have a green upper body. Adult male has a deep violet crown and a gorget that extends far down the sides of neck. Female is green above, white below, with NO chin spots (like Anna's). Immature males have streaking on neck, with spots of purple feathers increasing with age. Costa's has longer length wings than Anna's (when perched, the tail of Anna's extends farther past the wings).
Costa's is a desert adapted hummingbird. Natural desert habitat includes washes, stream sides, creosote brush scrub, mostly in dry and open places having a good variety of blooming plants.
Conservation Status: Vulnerable in California. It is common but numbers have declined where the desert has been cleared for development. In some places it has adapted to nesting in suburbs.
Diet is mostly nectar and sometimes tiny insects, especially during nesting season. It looks for nectar on native desert and garden plants. (See https://www.desertstrawhouse.com/plant-nursery for native plants to attract birds and butterflies to your garden). You can supplement native plant nectar with a hummingbird feeder. 4:1 (or even 3:1) is a good ratio of water to sugar. Change the solution at least weekly before it gets cloudy or moldy, and NEVER add red dye!
Feeding Hummingbirds (The Cornell Lab) https://www.allaboutbirds.org/news/feeding-hummingbirds/

Link to successful hatch of Costa's hummingbirds in a neighbor's orange tree in the desert in February. Nest is the size of half a golf ball made of feathers and small bits of plant material: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/151012296

Link to brilliant adult MALE Costa's Hummingbird: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/144253292

Link to dozens of Costa's peacefully sharing hummingbird feeders: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/144476737

Male Costa's call is a loud "zing," a thin, high-pitched whistle.
Xeno-canto Bird songs, sound recordings, and species range map: https://xeno-canto.org/species/Calypte-costae

Ebird with species description, range map and sound recordings: https://ebird.org/species/coshum/

Audubon Guide to North American Birds https://www.audubon.org/field-guide/bird/costas-hummingbird

National Geographic Field Guide to the Birds of Western North America, ed. Jon L. Dunn, 2008, pp. 238-239.

National Geographic Field Guide to the Birds of North America, ed. Jon L. Dunn, 7th ed., 2017, pp. 96-97.

Merlin Bird ID: How to use/get the portable App (Bird ID help for 8,500+ species) https://merlin.allaboutbirds.org/

Comprehensive Feather I.D. tools and more: https://foundfeathers.org/resources/

Found Feathers (Worldwide): https://www.fws.gov/lab/featheratlas/idtool.php

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COMPARED TO

Anna’s Hummingbird (Calypte anna) is a medium-size hummingbird in the (Trochilidae) family that is 10cm (4 inches) long. Anna's are larger with a less hunched posture than Costa's. Bill is straight (and shorter than Costa's Humminbird). Both sexes have a green upper body. Adult male head and throat are fuchsia (deep rose red), with color extending a short distance onto sides of neck. Female's throat usually shows rose-red flecks or spots. She is dingy gray below with extensive green flanks turning to green spots at tail end (compared to female Costa's that is more pure white below). Anna's has shorter length wings than Costa's. When perched, the tail of Anna's extends farther past the wings (Costa's wings are a bit longer). Gorget can look like black upward-pointing triangle.
Range: Abundant in coastal lowlands and mountains in California, and also in deserts, especially in winter. It is a year round resident in Monterey County. In recent decades the species has expanded its range north to British Columbia and east to Arizona, probably helped along by flowers and feeders in suburban gardens.
Anna's Hummingbird is a very distinctive bird with its iridescent ruby-colored throat, which is called a gorget. The male's gorget extends over its head, like a hood. Interestingly, the female Anna's also has a very small gorget, a red patch on her throat, whereas most female hummingbirds do not.
Back in the early 1900s, Anna's Hummingbirds were found only in Baja California and Southern California. Today, their range extends from southwestern British Columbia to southwestern Arizona and extreme northeastern Mexico.

Link to close-up of MALE Anna's with bright fuchsia gorget : https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/190601885

Ebird with species description, range map and sound recordings: https://ebird.org/species/annhum

Audubon Guide to North American Birds https://www.audubon.org/field-guide/bird/annas-hummingbird

National Geographic Field Guide to the Birds of Western North America, ed. Jon L. Dunn, 2008, p. 238-239.

National Geographic Field Guide to the Birds of North America, ed. Jon L. Dunn, 7th ed., 2017, pp. 98-99.

Monterey Birds, Don Roberson, 2nd ed. 2002, sponsored by Monterey Peninsula Audubon Society, p. 297.

Xeno-canto Bird songs, sound recordings, and species range map: https://xeno-canto.org/species/Calypte-anna

The Cornell Lab (Birds in U.S. and Canada) https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Annas_Hummingbird

You can supplement native plant nectar with a hummingbird feeder. 4:1 (or even 3:1) is a good ratio of water to sugar. Change the solution at least weekly before it gets cloudy or moldy, and NEVER add red dye!
Feeding Hummingbirds (The Cornell Lab) https://www.allaboutbirds.org/news/feeding-hummingbirds/

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COMPARED TO

Allen's Hummingbird (Selasphorus sasin) is a small, fast-flying bird in the Hummingbirds (Trochilidae) family. It common breeds along the Central Coast of California and in lower Carmel Valley and Salinas Valleys. Diet is mostly nectar and insects. It takes nectar from flowers, and will feed on tiny insects as well. It favors red tubular flowers such as penstemon, red monkey-flower, red columbine, paintbrush, scarlet sage and also flowers of other colors, such as the yellow blooms of tree-tobacco. It will also feed on sugar-water mixtures in hummingbird feeders.

Link to young MALE Allen's Hummingbird: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/214726565

Audubon Guide to North American Birds https://www.audubon.org/field-guide/bird/allens-hummingbird#
"A close relative of the Rufous Hummingbird, Allen's has a more limited range, nesting mostly in California. This is one of the two common nesting hummingbirds in northern California gardens (Anna's is the other). Females and immatures of Allen's Hummingbird are almost impossible to separate from Rufous females without close examination."

The Cornell Lab (compare 4 hummingbirds): https://www.allaboutbirds.org/news/search/?q=Selasphorus%20sasin

National Geographic Field Guide to the Birds of Western North America, ed. Jon L. Dunn, 2008, pp.240-241.

Monterey Birds, Don Roberson, 2nd ed. 2002, sponsored by Monterey Peninsula Audubon Society, p. 301.

You can supplement native plant nectar with a hummingbird feeder. 4:1 (or even 3:1) is a good ratio of water to sugar. Change the solution at least weekly before it gets cloudy or moldy, and NEVER add red dye!
Feeding Hummingbirds (The Cornell Lab) https://www.allaboutbirds.org/news/feeding-hummingbirds/

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COMPARED TO

Broad-tailed Hummingbird (Selasphorus platycercus)
Males do NOT have an iridescent crown (like male Anna's Hummingbird).

Link to confirmed observation of Broad-tailed Hummingbird in Morongo Valley, CA: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/45882012

Ebird with species description, range map and sound recordings: https://ebird.org/species/brthum/

Xeno-canto Bird songs, sound recordings, and species range map: https://xeno-canto.org/species/Selasphorus-platycercus

Audubon Guide to North American Birds https://www.audubon.org/field-guide/bird/broad-tailed-hummingbird

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Irene's Ebird Profile: https://ebird.org/profile/MTIwNjIzMg and my worldwide checklists: https://ebird.org/mychecklists

Irene's Bird (Aves class) observations worldwide on INaturalist: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations?place_id=any&taxon_id=3&user_id=aparrot1&verifiable=any

White-Ray Coreocarpus (Coreocarpus parthenioides var. parthenioides) Common, annual plant up to 50 cm tall. Leaves are opposite, with 1 - 2 pinnately divided leaves. The flower heads are radiate with yellow disc flowers in the middle surrounded by a variable number of white rays with distinctive rose-purple lines on the underside. These purple lines are not evident when looking down onto the white petals. Peak bloom time is in the spring months in northern BC and in the fall in the southern areas.

Baja California Plant Field Guide, Jon P. Rebman , Norman C. Roberts, 3rd. ed, 2012, pp. 136-137.

Large spherical Gall, almost the size of a golf ball, on Creosote Bush (Larrea tridentata). The resinous spot is Exuviae (the molt or cast off outer skin of a pupa).

Large Creosote Gall Midge (Asphondylia auripila) Creosote gall midges are a species of gall-inducing Flies "in the Asphondylia auripila group (Diptera: Cecidomyiidae). Their life cycle begins when the female oviposits into the part of the plant which her species prefers, she inserts her egg along with a fungal spore from a mycangia (a small pocket to store fungal spores). A gall forms and the fungal mycelium grows to line the inside of the gall, when the egg hatches the developing larva feeds upon the fungus. Adult emergence is timed with periods of plant growth associated with winter, spring, or summer rain fall." https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/343241-Asphondylia-auripila

BugGuide https://bugguide.net/index.php?q=search&keys=Asphondylia+auripila&edit%5Btype%5D%5Bbgimage%5D=on

18 species of Galls on Creosote Bush are listed as options on Gallformers website as of (11/29/23): https://www.gallformers.org/id?hostOrTaxon=Larrea+tridentata&type=host&detachable=&alignment=&cells=&color=&locations=&season=&shape=&textures=&walls=&form=&undescribed=false
Per Steve Jones: "Of the 18 galling critters affecting creosote bush at Gallformers, 16 of them are in the genus Asphondylia; one Asphondylia species has not been named (Asphondylia l-tridentata-scimitar-leaf-gall). The other two are Contarinia l-tridentata-clasping-leaf-gall and Tachardiella larreae (arguably not a gall - tissue is produced by the scale insect, not the plant).
AFAIK all of the Asphondylia species should have exuviae that can be left behind in the gall; I think they all mature in the gall rather than dropping to the soil to mature. I've found them on a number of galls."
More info available at INaturalist Project-- Creosote Bush Galls: https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/creosote-bush-galls

Exuviae is the molt or cast off outer skin of a pupa. Oddly enough the midge larva in several of these Asphondylia gall formers pupate in their exit hole, and after metamorphosis or even just overwintering, the adult emerges to fly away.
Here are a few others with remnant exuviae:
Asphondylia pila : https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/13029709
Asphondylia resinosa: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/13066192
Asphondylia discalis: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/13100364
Asphondylia apicata: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/70794493
Asphondylia rosetta https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/192569803
Here's one where the midge hasn't exited or left yet https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/147802786, so it's a Pupa.
Here's one where the adult has exited so it's an Exuviae https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/156913910

Book: The Asphondylia (Cecidomyiidae: Diptera) of Creosote Bush (Larrea tridentata) in North America

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What is a Gall? Gallformers: https://www.gallformers.org/
"Plant galls are abnormal growths of plant tissues, similar to tumors or warts in animals, that have an external cause--such as an insect, mite, nematode, virus, fungus, bacterium, or even another plant species. Growths caused by genetic mutations are not galls. Nor are lerps and other constructions on a plant that do not contain plant tissue. Plant galls are often complex structures that allow the insect or mite that caused the gall to be identified even if that insect or mite is not visible."

GALLS
Plant Galls of the Western United States: a photographic guide to 536 species of plant galls found west of the Rockies, with 400+ color images and plates, Ronald A. Russo, April 2021. (Available on Amazon)
Gallformers: Identify Galls by name or by host plant https://www.gallformers.org/id
INaturalist Project, Galls of California https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/galls-of-california
California Oak Galls (photo guide), Joyce Gross: https://joycegross.com/galls_ca_oak.php
California Oak Galls Induced by Unknown or Undescribed Species (photo guide), Joyce Gross: https://joycegross.com/galls_ca_oak_undescribed.php
Nancy Asquith Journal: California Oak Galls https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/california-plants-with-mystery-galls/journal/44142-california-oak-galls
Nancy Asquith Journal: https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/galls-of-california/journal/44203-where-to-learn-more-about-galls
BugGuide: Identification, Images, & Information for insects and other gall-inducers, (US & Canada) clickable categories or use search bar: https://bugguide.net/node/view/3/bgpage
BugGuide: Unidentified Tracks, Larvae, Webs, Parasites, and Other Mysteries: https://bugguide.net/node/view/696662/bgpage
INaturalist Project: https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/all-your-galls-are-belong-to-us

This is the second of three types of "gall" on a single Ericameria ericoides bush (California Goldenbush):

A. https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/159784180 This apparently undescribed gall seems to consist of five plate-like bracts much wider than a typical leaf but approximately the same length.

B. (this one) https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/159784447 Prodiplosis falcata (Goldenbush Bud Gall Midge)

C. https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/159784834 In this case the terminal leaves are bound together to form a chamber for the larva. If you pick one apart you will find a caterpillar and a bunch of frass. Several people have made an observation of this gall and based on http://www.troplep.org/OCR%202001%20Holaritc%20Vol.%208%20Sup.%201%20Powell%20&%20Povolny.pdf (see p. 8 of publication, 12 of PDF) it is thought perhaps to be Gnorimoschema ericameriae in the Family Gelechioidea.
See also:

• https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/118745975

See notes https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/107933243

Anther tips not obtuse and anthers yellow-black.

Yellow patches at base of anthers.

Very interesting patch of Padre's Shooting Star restricted to a sunken circular area where it looks like two or three inches of soil was removed (See photos 5 & 6).

For once I got a clear view of the sinus appendages. For a view of the wide winged petiole see: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/107933538

Nice botany video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UDaL02zJdTA&t=38s

https://ucjeps.berkeley.edu/eflora/eflora_display.php?tid=37885

• Calyx sinus appendages 0; calyx not enclosing mature fruit ..... P. membranaceum
• Calyx sinus appendages present; calyx enclosing mature fruit
• - Petiole narrow-winged; style 1–3 mm; seeds 1–2 mm ..... P. racemosum
• - Petiole wide-winged; style 4–8 mm; seeds 2–3 mm ..... P. auritum
• - - Corolla < 10 mm wide ..... var. arizonicum
• - - Corolla 10–30 mm wide ..... var. auritum

Recorded with Tascam DR-05X.
Edited with Audacity according to the recommendations in the following video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYqogvHYn28

High-pass Filter:
Frequency: 1000 Hz
Roll-off: 48 dB
Normalize Peak Amplitude: -3 dB
Silenced a few clicks.

The burl could be prominent but maybe not... it was under a lot of leaf litter.
Here is the path I followed on Jepson (Keybase CW) to get to ssp. crustacea:

• I did not see a burl, but the branches leading into the base suggested on (see photo #2 )
• Leaves with stomata generally only abaxially, surfaces generally differing in color and/or hairiness
• Old stem bark generally smooth or peeling, +- red {This gets it to A. crustacea}
• Plant erect, not prostrate; burls at base of main stem; leaf blades oblong-ovate to lance-oblong;
• Twig with short and long hairs
• Leaf abaxially +- nonglandular-hairy, not densely hairy; in age glabrous

Comments/disputes welcome as always!

I observed this mushroom on December 8th, three weeks ago ( https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/102822427 ) and decided to come back to see how it was getting along. Fortunately no one had disturbed it despite being in the center of a soccer field.

Collected in early 1990s. 4th image shows "windows" in shell arranged in two lateral rays. Animal is largely nocturnal, and avoids bright light by sensing light levels in part through these translucent areas.

Go out at dawn, and you'll see these limpets out in the open on rocks (as 1st image here: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/26303620); have a look at the same rocks after sunrise, and they will all be largely out of sight, tucked into crevices, or underneath overhangs, etc. (see 2nd image here: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/26303620)

Katydids (family Tettigoniidae) are also called longhorned grasshoppers. The nine species of Scudderia are the bush katydids. Males have distinctive tail plates that can be used to identify the species. All species lay their eggs between layers of leaves.
Kaufman Field Guide to Insects of North America. Eaton and Kaufman, 2006, p. 76-77.