arthroart

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Insectember day 2: gibbium psylloides

Common name: Hump beetle/ Smooth spider beetle✨

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attack on DannyFly

he drew my fly sona [bottom left] first so obviously i had to revenge!

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butch-transman solidarity!! (also we are both flies)

Art fight attack for @itsdannyfly !

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A bee for Twispan on Art Fight! I went with a toonier style for this one to match the existing reference. The character is based on a blue-banded bee, but I think I made the abdomen sort of resemble that of a sharptail's (Coelioxys sp.)!

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The legendary wasp gf (and pet mite) stack Art fight attack for @fractalbeehive ! The characters were too adorable to pass up.

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Webspinner lady with.... I can't remember what that art is called

I'd like to find a webspinner in person, they're such interesting little fellas

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Revenge for @arthroart 👊🤜

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"I love what you did with your hair"

artfight revenge for @hissydyke with @arthroart as collateral damage. thought it'd be fun to draw both of the colorful bee ladies on my 2024 hit-list together.

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Q: Are We Not Bugs? A: We Are Wevo! Art fight attack for @mojavewastes

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Made a reference for a new oc !

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A dobsonfly.

I think that the lace like design on her body is very cute😊

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Since the last reference I did of this character is 5 years(!) old, I've decided to make a new one for my main sona, Gemma! She studies rotifer ecology and has a sweet proboscis.

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So called high charisma vault anthropologists when you take their citizenship photo

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As per my last post: I'm on team seafoam this year! Here's my art fight profile, and the link to my page :)

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team seafoam: are we ready?

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Fantasy beetle - no real species for this one, just playing with shading.

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Alright, it's time! The species is...

Hey, you guys figured it out! She is indeed Halictus ligatus. For those interested in how to tell, here are some diagrams and tips:

The best way to figure out a species is to go through a dichotomous or multivariable key, but those are often hard to follow if you don't know the terminology. Halictus ligatus is in the family Halictidae, which is most readily determined from other bees by the super curved basal vein on their wings (see it next to the curved red arrow on the image). In comparison to Megachilidae, they have very few hairs on the underside of their abdomen. The numbers in the image correspond to the number of submarginal cells, which is always 2 in Megachilidae and often (not always) 3 in Halictidae.

As for getting to Halictus, there are only so many halictid genera in the northeast US, most of which are colored bright racecar green. The two most common halictid genera that have totally non-metallic representatives are Halictus and Lasioglossum. The mega-diverse Lasioglossum is usually totally without stripes of short hairs called fimbria, but some larger specimens have that sort of banding. When they do, you can tell the two genus apart by where those bands of fimbria arise: Halictus has hairs at the very end of the segment (apical), while Lasioglossum has them jutting from the very beginning of the segment (basal).

The last part, identifying to species, is actually fairly easy. Halictus ligatus has a really prominent knob at the bottom of their cheek, and they're the only Northeastern US bee to have that property. More southern states also have the practically identical H. poeyi. Scientists haven't figured out how to tell them apart without DNA analysis, so a limited range hint was the only way I could represent that difference. Putting it all together:

Little native bee anthro sketch! I'm trying to find a medium between accuracy and stylization. I want to get to the point where people can identify my characters down to species just from the drawing. If you can successfully tell what this is, extra brownie points to you! (I'll reveal the species in a couple of days anyway.) Hint: assume this bee lives natively in the northeastern US.