I’m eager to see more of the Santa Rosa-Paradise Peak wilderness, and another volunteer named Mike offers to join me. I warn him that I’m considering some bushwhacking, and he tackles it gamely, even when it turns out to be a LOT of bushwhacking.
Our first climb to a ridge up a steep sage-covered slope goes well.
Mike on our first ridge
After that we encounter more vegetation. It’s harder to hike through, but interesting to look at! We see blue elderberry, snowberry (I think), and a couple of hardy limber pines that I wondered about from afar yesterday. There are also a lot of red mound ant hills.
Blue Elderberry
Snowberry?
Limber Pine
Red Mound Ants
We climb a lot, passing a lone spring.
Steep Hiking
Spring
Finally the ridge evens out, and the last stretch to Abel Pass is easier, with great views.
View west from Abel pass
View northwest from Abel pass
If anyone can tell me what this wingless hopping insect is, I’d love to know. It moves its antennae, but doesn’t move otherwise. Is it molting?
No idea what this is
The descent is thankfully easier, following the route we used yesterday. Lots of dried buckwheat and blooming rubber rabbit brush on this ridge.
Striped stems
Rubber Rabbitbrush
6 responses to “Abel Creek Pass Loop”
That bug appears to be a camel cricket, one of 150 species in 23 genera in North America, most of them live in caves.
You can browse some pictures at
http://bugguide.net/node/view/153
It’s possible they may have a pix of yours.
Thanks BioBob! I couldn’t find a picture that looks like mine, but I have a feeling I found this critter in an unusual place or stage of life…
Always possible, but not all that likely, lol. This group of insects are often parasitized by horsehair worms, etc. which can modify behavior.
If it was cold at the time you passed, it could have just in torpor. If you want a more wierd possible tale, just consider zombie bugs:
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=fungus-makes-zombie-ants
Ok, I thought that was crazy talk, but then I started looking more closely at the photo and saw something growing out of the cricket’s head:
and something fuzzy under the abdomen:
Now I’m kicking myself for not looking closer when I saw it!
I did not notice that myself but it appears this is a female and her ovipositor is deployed into the ground just to the left of that fuzzy stuff. Wierd.
It just goes to show you, the more we know, the more nature is stranger than we know.
Oh wow! Thanks for all of the information, BioBob. Now when I am caving, I am going to wonder if those are zombie crickets on the walls… eeek!