This week’s Expiscor is coming to you on a holiday Monday across much of Canada. This is the day that many Canadians feel that the ‘warm season‘ has officially arrived. We can plant things in our garden without fear of frost; the lawn shall be mowed, the birds are busy, the butterflies are flying.

What is Expiscor? …it’s a weekly digest of discoveries from the world of entomology, biology, and so much more.

• It seems that every week there’s a story about ‘dangerous spiders‘ – this week, Bug Girl wrote a post to help FIX THE INTERNET – in this case, to discuss a bogus spider poster.

• Cannibalism is not so taboo with spiders. We always talk about female spiders eating male spiders… but this story turns the tables – males eating females (thanks Malcolm Campbell for that link)

• Jumping Spiders – the darlings of the Arachnid world. I found an amazing site this week – one that shows some lovely videos of dozens of species, including some courtship displays.

• On the topic of jumping spiders – they can make you look twice – WOW, WOW and WOW again. (thanks Alex Wild, for that photo, and permission to use it)

• Hungry for bugs?  Amazing infographic about entomophagy.

• How about hungry for Cicadas? It is pretty hard to talk about entomology these days without mentioning Cicadas! (thanks to Kimberly Moynahan for that link)

• 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, 17, 19 –>  What about Cicadas and their love affair with these kinds of numbers…

• Know your ticks. A nice post by Eric Eaton that explains ticks concisely and accurately.

• Flower power! How planting flowers can bring so much more than beauty and nice odours. (spoiler – they can promote “good” insects, spiders in orchards)

• Biodiversity under foot – great video about threats to soil biodiversity (thanks to my former MSc student, and recent PhD graduate, Zach for posting that link.

• Biodiversity under snow…. yes, there is a lot of it under the white stuff. And the decline of snow cover could be trouble for plants and animals (including lovely spiders)

• Gutsy Barcoding – a great use of barcoding in ecology. (thanks Morgan Jackson for that link!)

• Lord of the Butterflies. This week’s Real Scientists is featuring entomologist Andy Warren – worth a follow!

• Bug music. Heck yeah! Bug music! Gotta love RadioLab.

• Fireflies: I always find the larvae of the Lampyridae beetles to be odd-looking, and I sometimes have trouble reconciling their habitus with adults.  This is a lot easer thanks to Derek Hennen for this lovely photo of an adult – check out that abdomen! (and thanks, Derek, for allowing me to use this photo)

• Scale it. This is VERY worth checking out. I personally like 10 to the power of -2.5

• Looking back, looking forward – some reflections about teaching from Graham Scott – here, Graham points out that it’s important to remember that students are not a younger version of yourself!

• A worthy ordeal: Another great post from one of my heroes, Simon Leather – a terrific tradition in the British University system.

• World’s 10 weirdest medical museums. Hmmm – a bit creepy, but in a good way (thanks to Laurie Devine for the link)

• Explosive poop foam is killing hogs, destroying barns and stumping scientists. Yes, that is the title. Seriously. (thanks Alan Townsend for the link)
  

• Lego geek-fest. Star Wars, LOTR, Arrested Development & so much more.

• To finish, as usual, with some music. I’ve been a fan of Steve Earle for quite a long time, and his latest album (the Low Highway) does not disappoint. Here’s a video from one of the songs from that album. Worth a listen (and a good lesson in there, too)