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Pityococcus rugulosus lifecycle
4. Second stage quiescent larva
5m. Immature male crawler (this set)
6m. Prepupa

Specimen 1, along with the needle upon which it is attached, was collected on 21FEB2016 from a Pinus edulis (pinyon) tree on Embudito Trl. (No. 192) at 6983 ft elevation in the Sandia Crest 7.5’ quadrangle, Sandia Mountains, Bernalillo Co., NM. It was kept at room temperature until its attempt at eclosure on or before 28FEB2016, when this image was taken. It died during the attempt, and was at least partially desiccated when imaged.

The male and female lifecycles diverge at this stage. Second stage quiescent larva females form cysts and continue to develop on their needles, while males molt into immature male crawlers, as shown here, and move to bury themselves in the ground detritus under the tree to pupate. The great majority of the males crawl to the forest floor to pupate in the detritus under the tree. A small number pupate in the tree (a pre-flight teneral adult male was collected there). One sees from Specimen 1's ventral view that the long proboscis is shed during molting. The male does feed thereafter.

Specimen 2 (3'rd image) was shaken from the same tree on 06MAR2016. It was stored for in 95% ETOH for a few days, then transferred to glycerin for a few more. It was then removed from the glycerin, rinsed briefly with water, then quickly dried for imaging. This procedure replaces internal fluids with (nonvolatile) glycerin to prevent excessive shrivel for the time it takes to image.

This image is from a CombineZP processed stack of 159 images with a 1.8 µm step taken with a Mitutoyo BD Plan Apo 50×/0.55 ∞/0 mm microscope objective + Nikon 135 mm F2.8 AIS telephoto lens + Nikon D810 camera (magnification 33.75×; technique described here).

The main pages for each linked image set documenting a stage of development for this species are linked here: