Wanted to share some of the things I've seen this term...
Went to the UCSC Natural History Collections to pick up a grasshopper and to photograph some butterflies. You'll see those blue butterflies in an upcoming piece, as well as the grasshopper.
While I was visiting the collections I had a lot of time to kill...so I looked through more of the insect collections and found this super awesome box of blue beetles. Wish I could tell you what it was, but alas, I forgot to find that out, however, in attempting to identify this bug, I discovered the futility of Google Image searching "blue beetle."
A couple days later, I decided to venture down to Asilomar State Beach in search of a specific type of buckwheat that I hoped would be in bloom. Sadly, the buckwheat was nowhere to be found, but I did meet this lovely deer in the dunes.
Inside this glass jar are two paper straws. Why do I keep a glass jar with paper straws on my dresser? Because those paper straws are filled with over-wintering Osmia aglaia bees, of course! This pair of paper straws was sent to me by a wonderful researcher at the University of Utah, who studies these bees extensively and was only-to-happy to send some live bees to a science illustrator in California who has the crazy idea that she wants to illustrate them along with their plant of choice for an upcoming assignment in Botanical illustration. They should emerge from their cocoons inside the straws in about a week, after which time I will take 2-3 and freeze them so I can study them for my painting. The rest will be set free upon Marina, but don't worry, they are native to Central California, so it's okay.
Anyway, that's what I've been up to so far this term...that and getting ready for our show, Illustrating Nature which opens 3 weeks from today. You can find out more about the show here: www.scienceillustration.org.
After our show, there will be only 4 weeks left of classes! After which I will return home for a little less than two weeks before I leave for Denver for two and a half months!
Be back soon when I've got some artwork to share...
