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Project Noah Nature School
Anisoscelis affinis
The body of this brightly colored flag-footed but is golden orange beneath and a more sober brown and black on top. The flags on the legs are spotted red on gold, and serve as a good distracting camouflage, making it difficult to make out the outlines of the bug. Body is about an inch long, and the antennae are about 1.5" long.
These appeared the day a passion flower bloomed on my veranda railing. It was the vine's first bloom, and they appeared shortly after its opening -- I first noticed them when it had been open about five hours. There were four of them present most of the day, and they stayed on the flower the entire time it was open, not appearing to visit other parts of the plant. The surrounding rainforest is in the foothills of the Maya Mts in western/central Belize
The four bugs weren't uniform in size, the largest were half again the size of the 3/4" one, and they were quick to fly if bothered. The two largest spent much of the time mating, connected tail to tail. There's not much to be found online for this species -- Anisocelis flavolineata is the much more commonly noted species.
Spotted on Sep 2, 2017
Submitted on Sep 4, 2017
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