Collecting trips, tips, and pics.

[Black Hawk]

ok, i'll try to explain it the best i can...
1. buy the vapor light, should come with the transformer, bulb and bag with stuff to attach it to your house.

2. take out the transformer and unscrew the ceramic bulb socket.

3. attach electical cord to extend the bulb out of the transformer, in mine it's the yellow lamp cord. make sure it can handle the volts the transformer uses.

4. get out the instruction manual on how to connect the light to household current, and attach a male socket to it instead of the house current (in mine its the black power cord i stole from a hairdryer i took apart, make sure it's not an old crummy socket. you don't want it to fall apart, it needs to be sort of rugged)

5. put all cords out the back hole and use something to cover the hole from where the bulb would normally come out, on mine i just duct taped it up.

just another note: make sure not to mix up black and white wires, don't attach a red/white cord to where a black should be. i might come back later with photos and update this discription to make it easier to understand. please tell me if you don't understand anything i said so i can post photos or clarify for you. don't want you to fry urself pickle

 

[Dark Raptor]

Thanks again friend

I feel much better when I see so many buprestid, cerambycid and scarabaeid beetles hmmm.... I see even my favourite tenebrionid beetle - Blaps Everything looks great.


I don,t understand only one thing. Why they just pinned very small beetles (like ladybirds in the last picture). I usually glue them to small cardboards. They look much better and you don't dammage them:

Like this small Rhagium inquisitor between R. sycophanta (left) and R. mordax (right).

Again, thanks! I'll try to take some pics of my collection, but I don't know when I'll be able to get digital camera.

 

[Black Hawk]

well it was only a collection for a high school project. i don't think they intended for it to last very long so i don't think they took the time to preserve the smaller specimens as well i knew you'd like to see all those beetles, i personally love the ones in the collection with the scorpion

 

[CustomNature]

Thanks Black Hawk, I think I understand the basic construction of the lamp so far. We shall see though once I actually try to build one. The most electrical rigging I have really done is cutting up extension cords and splicing in a dimmer switch and connecting that whole setup to pieces of heat tape. I might end up back here with some questions though. :?

 

[CustomNature]

Here's a few of my pics from the critters I collecting on my last trip (in the begining of this thread).

I haven't IDed any of this stuff yet, so maybe you guys could just make it easier and quick for me. I found this little guy dug in a hole on a rotted stump:

This is a really really wierd spider I found. Well, at least I think it's weird as I have never seen one before. Who know, they might be super common in Lancaster, but certainly not where I live. It had a very unusual and spikey abdomen.

And finally this is another spider I found that I havent seen around where I live. I thought it was neat looking so I grabbed it.

All in all it was a good trip. I didn't find as many beetles as I would have like to, but oh well... ya cant win 'em all.

 

[CustomNature]

New light trap

Well I whipped up a light trap tonight that is out there as we speak. I'm trying to come up with the best design and a friend of mine suggested this set up. What it is, is a free standing work-light stand with two halogen lamps ontop. I point the halogens over an open field shining directly at the wooded areas beyond the field. Behind the halogens, I have two blacklights set up shining on sheets, one sheet haning and one on the ground. The theory is that the bright halogens attract the insects and the blacklights help the insects to stay. Only after about 10 minutes or so I'm getting alot of moths and such (as expected), but I'm really hoping to get some sort of coleoptera. However it is awefully cool out, so I am not expecting much in that department.

The first pic is a pic of the over all light trap. The second is a closer pic of the back half of the trap, the blacklights. I'll keep you posted on how things go.

 

[GQ.]

Here is a link you might appreciate for a cheap mercury vapor light setup. Those MV lights are hot as ever so watch your skin.

http://nitro.biosci.arizona.edu/zEEB/butterflies/JoelMV.html

 

[CustomNature]

Welp, it's 3:45a.m. and I'm callin it quits for tonight. I think I was a bit pushy with going out tonight anyway since it was so cool and rather foggy out. None-the-less, I brought in a few bugs here and there. Below are pics from the nights finds.