Naturenotes With Rudy Mancke

The Mediterranean house gecko (Hemidactylus turcicus) is a species of house gecko common to the Mediterranean area which has spread to many parts of the world.

Anisomorpha buprestoides, the southern two-striped walkingstick, devil rider, or musk mare, is a stick insect (order Phasmatodea: otherwise known as "phasmids" or walkingsticks) which occurs throughout the southeastern United States. Anisomorpha buprestoides is a large, stout (for a stick insect) brown phasmid with three conspicuous longitudinal black stripes. Females average 67.7 mm (2.67 in) in length; males are smaller and more slender, averaging 41.7 mm (1.64 in).

Hypoconcha sp. (shellback crabs) are among some of the most interesting decapod crustaceans. As members of the Dromiidae family, these crabs have fourth and fifth walking legs that are modified to secure a bivalve shell on their back for protection. They can bear a fragment or a whole shell that is larger than their body size.

The bobcat (Lynx rufus), also known as the red lynx, is a medium-sized cat native to North America. It ranges from southern Canada through most of the contiguous United States to Oaxaca in Mexico. It is listed as Least Concern on the IUCN Red List since 2002, due to its wide distribution and large population. Although it has been hunted extensively both for sport and fur, populations have proven stable, though declining in some areas.

Rudy shares some words from John Lubbock.

There are any number of insects, cocoons or eggs that might be in the live greenery we like to bring into our homes during winter.

What happens to butterflies in the winter?

In the northern hemisphere today there will be the longest period of darkness of the year.

Rudy visits a very special piece of land in the Piedmont.

The larvae of most braconids are internal or external primary parasitoids of other insects. Most species kill their hosts, though some cause the hosts to become sterile and less active.

Rudy remembers his first books on nature.

Hericium erinaceus (also called lion's mane mushroom, mountain-priest mushroom, bearded hegehog mushroom, or bearded tooth fungus) is an edible mushroom belonging to the tooth fungus group. Native to North America, Europe and Asia, it can be identified by its long spines (greater than 1 cm length), occurrence on hardwoods, and tendency to grow a single clump of dangling spines. The fruit bodies can be harvested for culinary use.

Ringbill gulls and Bonaparte's gulls spend the winters on South Carolina's inland rivers and lakes.

Pantherophis alleghaniensis, commonly called the eastern rat snake, is a species of nonvenomous snake in the family Colubridae. The species is endemic to North America.

Exidia recisa (common name willow brain or amber jelly roll) is a jelly fungus in the family Auriculariaceae. It is a common, wood-rotting species throughout the northern hemisphere, typically growing on dead attached twigs and branches of willow and other broadleaf trees.

Rudy shares a quote from Amiel's Journal, by Henri-Frédéric Amiel.

Green lacewings are insects in the large family Chrysopidae of the order Neuroptera. There are about 85 genera and (differing between sources) 1,300–2,000 species in this widespread group. Members of the genera Chrysopa and Chrysoperla are very common in North America and Europe.

The cicadas are a superfamily, the Cicadoidea, of insects in the order Hemiptera (true bugs). They are in the suborder Auchenorrhyncha, along with smaller jumping bugs such as leafhoppers and froghoppers. The superfamily is divided into two families, the Tettigarctidae, with two species in Australia, and the Cicadidae, with more than 3,000 species described from around the world; many species remain undescribed.

The groundhog (Marmota monax), also known as a woodchuck, is a rodent of the family Sciuridae, belonging to the group of large ground squirrels known as marmots. The groundhog is a lowland creature of North America; it is found through much of the Eastern United States, across Canada and into Alaska. It was first scientifically described by Carl Linnaeus in 1758.

A listener wants to know how to properly keep a cocoon until a moth emerges.