Pleas ID (not even sure if it's a bug) - Callirhytis furva

Moved

… Charley Eiseman, 5 December, 2009 - 11:26pm

did u have 2 comb the area 2 find it

ahhh it's like a little feather duster very nice pic :)

… Steve and i dont give my full name, 31 August, 2008 - 10:26am

I've always wondered about those, too!

They look like the things I used to find stuck to oak leaves in Louisiana when I was a kid. Is that an oak leaf? Since you reminded me about them, I went searching on Google and discovered they are called oak leaf galls. An insect causes the leaf tissue to produce the gall.

http://www.upenn.edu/paflora/plantclinic/oakgalls.htm

It appears our particular culprit is the Wooly oak gall:
http://www.cals.ncsu.edu/course/ent525/close/gallpix/

And the gallmaker is a Callirhytis wasp:
http://creatures.ifas.ufl.edu/trees/horned_oak_gall_04.htm

… Ashley Bradford, 22 August, 2006 - 4:19pm

Interesting find - Thanks!

Should I remove this picture from the gallery then?

… Michael Pettigrew, 22 August, 2006 - 4:37pm

Don't remove it

I will move it to the family page for now, eventually someone will make a species page for it.

… A.W. Thomas, 22 August, 2006 - 6:08pm

Good question!

It's certainly insect-related, but I'm new here and don't know all the rules. I guess technically it's a photo of an insect's house? Like the bag of a bagworm?

… Ashley Bradford, 22 August, 2006 - 5:05pm