Sometimes I stray away from my nature art to create comics (like this) more about current events. Read more on my latest blog post https://paulaborchardt.substack.com/p/its-time-for-another-comic

Yellow-legged Pachyiulus (Pachyiulus flavipes)

Muscleman tree ant (Podomyrma gratiosa), so called because the large femur makes her looks like she lifts!

Now Bug of the Year is over, normal service can resume!

Here's an incredibly feathery velvet mite (Chyzeriidae) from New Zealand. These active predators wander the forest floor, looking for springtails to ambush and drink dry using their piercing mouthparts! Beautiful but deadly.

Chelifer sp.

I have a special love for Rhiscosomides meineri, this little millipede. I've been finding them a lot in my local area, and I was the first person to have a confirmed record of it on iNaturalist - I even got to submit the request to add the species to the database!

A little silver springtail, probably Lepidocyrtus.

A symphylan! These are a secretive group of myriapods, a sister group to millipedes and centipedes. They are usually quite small and hard to find.

I love Polyxenus millipedes. Saw this one yesterday!

A tiny Ptenothrix springtail hanging out in the frost.

1/2 For Valentine’s Day here’s my watercolor & pen art of a pink flower (Black Dalea in bloom, Tucson, AZ) in my Perpetual Journal.