This is an off-the-shelf leaf blower/vacuum that I adapted for collecting arthropods living on the soil or low-growing plants such as lawn and groundcover where a sweepnet is ineffective. It is also useful for collecting arthropods living in and under debris such as fallen leaves, shoreline flotsam, dead mushrooms, fallen fuit, and bark shreds. I tried it out on three short forays around the property today and it performed exactly as planned. Leaf hoppers, tiny flies and wasps, ants, spiders, springtails, mites, true bugs, bark lice, and even a couple small beetles were among those sucked into the long, narrow, cloth bag inside the vacuum wand. I plan to shoot them this evening.

I built this device for use at the Seacoast Science Center (of New Hampshire) All-taxa Bioblitz Sept. 22 where I will use it to collect arthropods living in diverse habitats, including seaweed deposits if there are any to be found.