This observation is of the Fish, rather than the Snake that ingested it (listed separately).
My colleagues and I took this photograph of an actual original and unique X-Ray (physical "hard copy") film made in the Emergency Room of the University hospital in which I worked night shifts back in 2002. It was the regional center for medical treatment of snake bites in north central Florida. This Florida Cottonmouth's (Agkistrodon conanti) coiled body, head to tail, can be measured on the original film by laying a piece of string on the image, tracing the course of the backbone. At 58 inches, or 4 feet 10 inches (147 centimeters) then, this a pretty large snake as Water Moccasins go.
What's more, one of the main reasons we X-rayed it at all was that it had clearly recently eaten something. It had a large bulge in it's stomach, down about a third of it's body length, just past its air-filled lungs that are visible on the film as well defined darker shapes. We found the bulge was a big fish with a large blunt bony skull and easily discernable swim bladder, which we thought to be a catfish (though we lacked an Ichthyologist amongst the E.R. staff of course).
I can follow the fish's spine for much of its length in the image, but lose it somewhere along the snake's lung in the extreme right of the picture. There is an interesting and distinct structure visible at the top that looks to me like a bony spine at the front of the dorsal fin. The skull is about 7 centimeters long, and the fin spine about 3 centimeters long, measured directly from the actual film. I don't know whether the loose dense material below the swim bladder represents the fish's stomach contents, or something else in the snake's stomach. The X-Ray film was 11 by 14 inches in size, so the fish must have been roughly around a foot (30 centimeters) long in total. We did not, in any case dissect the snake in the E.R.
My impression at the time was that this was most likely something like a Brown Bullhead, just judging from what I could make out of its size and shape. It would be fascinating to hear from someone more familiar with fish skeletons and anatomy. I am sure identification from an X-Ray is possible, considering what can be done with even fossil remains among experts. I will defer to anyone with more experience reading fish X-rays.
The Radiological Technician that made the actual exposure for us on film, at my request, wrote the details of the exposure for future reference on the film itself, which, though the film suffered damage when it was later stolen from my vehicle inside a locked briefcase and dumped out in a back alley and further mistreated both by the thieves and the weather, I can still read most of what he wrote with a "magic marker":
"40(or 46) MA
1 MAS
56 KV"
Are there any X-Ray Tech's out there who can confirm that that is in fact a good exposure for a big dead snake with enclosed fish?
Sometimes you just gotta mash the shutter for too long
This is the female red fox and her two kits playing.
Hierba frecuente a un costado de la carretera en planicie y lugar de fácil encharcamientos
Fotos feitas durante trabalho de registro da expedição BIOTRIPS AMAZÔNIA, realizada pelo parceiro Thiago Silva-Soares.
Creciendo a cielo abierto, tiene un olor muy agradable, dulce.
Note climbing structure:)
This species didn't evolve among tall weedy non-native grasses, but it still manages to just barely emerge from the weedpit when rain and winds knock down the Avena. One wonders how long it can survive in such conditions.
This species can be identified from some distance due to its lighter color and very long filaments.
See the next observation for close-ups of some nearby plants in a habitat without tall Avena:
The color of the close-ups isn't accurate; see the last pix for their true color in the field.
These plants don't have to contend with tall Avena, since they are in a wetter area. See the previous observation for unluckier plants:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/167769170
The first pix here shows a normal B. santarosae flower, and the second pix shows how robust the flower is.
The third pix shows an aberrant flower where two staminodes and/or stamens have been converted to being petal-like! Between those two you can see a typical white laid-back staminode of B. santarosae, and you can see two normal stamens.
Some Brodiaea species are prone to having infrequent aberrant flowers.
I didn't notice this in the field, or else I would have taken a pix from a different angle to better understand the origin of the petal-like things.
These flowers may have been in the same scape, or may have been from plants very close together. Even if they were from plants very close together, those plants were almost certainly genetically identical. B. santarosae corms multiply in number by 5.5 x per year (under potted conditions), and so form large patches that have all originated from a single seedling a long time ago.
Miranda Kennedy told us she had seen blue dicks with inflated stems, which none of the rest of us had ever noticed, so we were on the lookout for one. It didn't take long for Ted Caragozian to find one! It turned out that at the location of the first stem gall Ted found, there were something like five other blue dicks stems with similar inflated stems. They were much less common elsewhere.
I cut open one sample, and found at least five little insects inside. One is shown in the pix here, in pix 1, 2 and 5.
Measurements on the insect: 0.5 mm long and ~0.15 mm wide.
The chamber inside the stem is shaped like a groove through the axis of the stem, and is ~14 mm long and ~0.9 mm wide.
The stem enlargement is 33 mm long and 5 mm wide. The stem below the gall is 1.8 mm wide.
I've placed this under the host species, but if someone knows what critter this is, please give it a proper determination.
See:
https://bugguide.net/node/view/1115360/bgimage
Those appear to be the same critters, but in my obs, the critters are all in one chamber, not in the parallel chambers that @silversea_starsong observed.
Gall on Tritileia ixioides stem below flower.
Appeared to be hollow within, but I wasn't willing to completely tear open.
No frass visible within, large cavity. Many seen along this trail.
4 adults merged from a gall collected in this area:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/153729350
Collection date: 04-01-2023
Emergence date: 04-27-2023
4 more identical midges emerged (no photos added here):
04-28-2023
Time-lapse of emergence:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1apsuYRoAc
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/6argssxK8uE
Elevation 5800'. Massive woody root about the diameter of a fat guy's thumb, explains how it is flowering profusely despite the very dry climate. Note the glandular bracts that cover immature flowers and are shed once the flower opens.
Sisyrinchium bellum, branched stem with 2 nodes. Several individual plants looked at in the area. May be hybrids? Two other Sisyrinchium idahoense entries for this site. There are exceptions to every rule. "All generalizations are false, including this one." - Mark Twain
My wishful thinking is a maugean skate egg. But not sure. Found on West Strahan Beach, Strahan. A beach in Macquarie Harbour.
A number of iNaturalist observations have been posted of this undescribed taxon from Kelso Dunes and Soda Lake Basin sands, past collectors have placed under M. transmontana. Tasha La Doux and I in the process of compiling background information and conducting morphological and genetic research leading up to the publishing of this as a new taxon.
moist meadow surrounded by burned forest, above Johnsondale, Sierra hwy 99
cool pattern of insect activity
This is the second member of the Ambohitantely species that bred out today 1 March 2023. The images are of what (I suspect) is a live female Madagascar silk angel moth? The final two images are of the casing the pupal skin and the dried dead adult. Len