Pen and ink drawing of several long-legged water striders. Handwritten text reads: I love the dimples / shadows these guys make on the surface of the water: they remind me of freshly groomed show poodles. #InsertAnlnvert 48 Motion (Diver) Water strider (family Gerridae)

I realize that water striders aren't the *first* insect you might think of given the prompt "diving," but they CAN dive. And skate and jump and glide! I think they are the perfect little creatures to complete my quixotic #InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025 project. 🎖️🎖️

Pen and ink drawing of a pair of awkward-looking globular springtails (Collembola) with slightly hairy antennae. One is considerably smaller than the other and labeled: "Male, about to be carried over the female's head in a courtship ritual." The larger one is labeled: "Female, larger and about to lock antennae with the male." An arrow also points to an appendage underneath the female's body and is labeled: "Furcula tucked underneath the body, used for sproinging." Handwritten text reads: #Insert An Invert 46 Motion: Jumper Water/Aquatic Springtail (Sminthurides aquaticus) -Approximately the size and sometimes the color of nerds (the candy)

Oops reposting with the tag!

One of my students earlier this year was an absolute springtail stan. This is for you, Riley.

#InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025

Pen and ink drawing of a small wingless insect tucked inside a 3 oz plastic condiment container. Handwritten text reads: #Insert AnInvert 45: Motion (Scuttler) Ice crawler (Grylloblatta sp.) Drawing after a photo of a 2016 field-collected specimen belonging to then post doc Rachel Slatyer, resting in the freezer at Nisqually House

During my second season of fieldwork on Mt. Rainer, an entomology postdoc from UW-Madison was also on the mountain, collecting grylloblattids. We stayed in the same field house for a few nights.

#InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025

Pen and ink drawing of a scattering of small 5 to 10 armed star-shaped animals on a jagged rock surface. Handwritten text reads: #InsertAnInvert 44: Blobfest (Blobbageddon) Star Tunicate (Botryllus schlosseri) This colonial tunicate has individual zooids (~1-3 mm) that fan outwards from a central point like the arms of a star. Human transport (on ships, for example) has given this tiny organism a nearly cosmopolitan distribution.

11 months of #InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025 down! I can see the finish line!

Pen and ink drawing of what looks like a bunch of crinkly-edged cheetos clustered together, clinging to a plant stem. These goofy worms are colonies of freshwater bryozoans. There is a closeup of part of an individual zooid showing its lophophore (feeding organ) with many tentacles Handwritten text reads: #InsertAninvert 43 Blobfest (Blobchain) Freshwater bryozoan (Cristatella mucedo) Colonies can range in size from 1-20cm; zooids are usually no larger than 1mm

Transparent blobs are hard to draw. These guys are so much cooler than I can render them; please look up some macro photos! #InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025

Pen and ink drawing of a pomelo-sized jelly being held upside down in someone's cupped hands. Handwritten text reads: #InsertAnInvert 41: Blobfest (Danger blob) Cannonball jellyfish (Stomolophus meleagris) "It's like there are flowers in the sea." —Venezuelan fisherman Elvis Morillo about a cannonball jelly invasion off the Caribbean coast in 2024

Pen and ink drawing of a ctenophore. It looks like a large striped grape with two long fringed tails. In real life they are transparent and bioluminescent! Handwritten text reads: The first (possibly last?*) time I dared to call myself a biologist was during my first UWBio department retreat at Friday Harbor Labs on San Juan Island. It was also the first time I saw ctenophores. They will always make me feel brave. #InsertAnlnvert 42 Blobfest (Disco Blob) Pacific Sea Gooseberry (Plurobrachia bachei) *("Ecologist" feels better)

Me to myself this morning, realizing it's mid-month and I hadn't done anything for #InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025 yet: "You're not allowed to do any other hobbies until you draw."

Pen and ink drawing of a millipede. Handwritten text reads: Tiny! Social! Pink! Fungus-eating! Dad's brewed the eggs! Dads will adopt abandoned eggs to brood! ANGELS. #insertaninvert 40: Eyes (Eyeless) Feather Millipede (Brachycybe lecontii)

Finishing up October with this COMPLETE PERFECT ANGEL #InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025

Digital art of an invertebrate that the artist does not remember, but it is cream-colored and vaguely shaped like an angel with four legs. It looks semi-translucent potentially. Text next to it says "not much like you."

one of my fave #insertaninvert2024 drawings I did but I don't remember what invertebrate this is, so I'm just haunted as fuck by this creature. heeeeeelp.

Black ink drawing of a mayfly. Handwritten text reads: Males in this group have so-called "Turbinate" eyes that search for UV light to find females in flight (their wings reflect ultraviolet radiation). #InsertAnlnvert 40: Eyes (Compound eyes) Blue-winged olive mayflies. (family Baetidae)

Not my favorite (I swear insects are the hardest inverts to draw) but HOW AMAZING are these guys' eyes? Look up male mayflies of the Baeditae family.

#InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025

Pen and ink drawing of a gorgeous squid. It has one large eye and one small eye. Handwritten text reads: #Insert An Invert 38: Eyes (Lens eyes) Strawberry squid / Cockeye squid (Histioteuthis heteropsis) An arrow pointing to the large eye is annotated: Scans the sea surface above for shadows An arrow pointing to the small eye reads: Scans the depths balow for bioluminescence

This cockeye squid wishes everyone on the streets a day of safety and ferocious community. #InsertanInvert2024 in 2025

I am about to try drawing this guy for #InsertanInvert2024 (which I am obviously doing in 2025) and appreciate having your work as a source because as noted, there is not much out there where you can see both eyes at once! <3 ty ty

Pen and ink drawing of a clam whose mantle is absolutely covered in spots, squiggles, and stripes. Handwritten text reads: "#Insertaninvert 37: Eyes (Lensless) Giant Boring Clam (as if!), Tridacna crocea An arrow pointing to the clam shell is annotated: Typically you wouldn't see any of the clam shell, because it's all burrowed deep into the substrate!"

Fuck Bruce Harrell. Anyway, here's a clam! #InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025

Pen and ink drawing of a sea cucumber. Handwritten text reads: #InsertAnInvert 35: Deep Sea (Abyssal) "Gummy Squirrel" (Psychropotes longicauda). "I think I'm the only one who sees this, but the gummy squirrel looks like a bicycle handle with an open brake to me. I keep wanting to squeeze down its sail and ring its bell!" Annotations point out its tail (which is thought to act as a sail) and feeding palps, that it is 2 feet in length, and that it lives 16,000 feet below sea level.

Pen and ink drawing of a sea cucumber. Handwritten text reads: #InsertAnInvert 36: Deep Sea (Hadal) "Headless Chicken Monster" (Enypniastes sp). "Only found in the deepest sea and colored pink to red, these fantastic animals are more prom princesses than monsters in my eyes!" Annotations point out its anterior veil for rowing, its tentacles for feeding and swimming, and its visible intestine.

Second set of deep sea weirdos/cutie pops for #InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025! These are both hella cool Holothurians (sea cucumbers).

Pen and ink drawing of three creatures that are basically just open mouths attached to stems. Handwritten text reads: "Do they look like small, transparent submarine turrets that also happen to have hungry, gaping maws? Yes. Do their yawning hoods trip-trap shut when a small crustacean or diatom enters? Yes! Should "Predatory Tunicate" be a band name? Definitely. #InsertAnInvert 33 Predatory tunicate Deep Sea (Mesopelagic) (Megalodicopia hians)

Pen and ink drawing of what looks like a cross between a flower and a bunch of balloons. Handwritten text points to one of the balloon shapes and reads: Covered in tiny hooks ("spicules") that form a velcro-y texture to trap foods. Can be 20 inches tall! The Internet claims that the U.S. Navy saw these & thought they were Russian listening devices. Apocryphal? #InsertAnInvert 34 Deep Sea (Bathyal) Ping Pong Tree Sponge (Chondrocladia lampadiglobus)

Drew two deep sea creatures today for #InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025, both surreal, stalked carnivores.

Pen and ink drawing of a squishy, sea cucumber with bushy feeding tentacles standing up. Handwritten text reads: #Insert An Invert 32: Coastal (Sand) The handsome red sea cucumber (Cucumaria miniata) is always a special sight. I try to resist poking them gently, but cannot always.

It's a two-drawing day and I am officially caught up with #InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025! This is sketch 32 of the year. Phew.

Photo of a purple and orange pen and ink drawing of a whole mess of messy sea stars on a white card. It sits on a table surrounded by pens. Handwritten text reads: #InsertAnInvert 31: Coastal (Intertidal), Ochre Sea Star (Pisaster ochraceus)

A characteristic cluster of ochre sea stars (which are also local ecological stars) to continue #InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025.

Handwritten text reads: "Giant" is a relative term, I suppose, since these masters of camouflage would stillonly come up to about my knee. I love their flippy / foldy / curly anatomy. Even their eyes, which like other cephalopods' allow them to perceive polarized light, are wavy... #InsertAnInvert 30 Coastal (Temperate reef) Giant Australian Cuttlefish (Ascarosepion apama)

August's coastal theme continues with a cuttlefish. EXTREMELY underrated animals.

#InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025

Pen and ink drawing of an anemone. It looks like it is wearing a wig made of pacifiers. Handwritten text reads: "A nipply fella, friends with anemonefish (famously). #Insertaninvert (29) Coastal (Tropical reef) Bubble-tip anemone (Entacmaea quadricolor)

Hello. I drew an anemone.

#InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025

Adorable #stygofauna art. I love that #InsertAnInvert2024 is still inspiring art

Handwritten text reads: #Insert An Invert 28: Subterranean (stygofauna) Hay's Spring Amphipod (stygobromus hayi) Stygofauna live in groundwater ecosystems. This tiny crustacean is endemic to groundwater beneath Rock Creek Park in Washington, D.C., and only occasionally is seen spilling out into shallow seepages.

The latest #InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025 is a minute resident of a park my sister in law's family loves. They'll probably never see it but I think they'll enjoy hearing about it!

Ink drawing of a very long-legged cricket perched over a pine cone. Hand written text reads: "#Insertaninvert 27: Subterranean (Troglofauna). Square-legged Camel Cricket (Tropidschia xanthostoma) These adorable cave dwelling Orthopterans rarely see the light of day. ❤️

The latest #InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025 needed some color to differentiate this little dude and the pine cone he is standing over.

Black ink drawing of a many-legged worm-like animal with charming curly antennae and chunky little legs. Handwritten text reads: Velvet worms (phylum Onychophora, for "carrying claws") walk softly towards their unsuspecting prey on their foot pads. This troglobiotic (care-dwelling) species lacks both eyes and pigment. white Cave Velvet worm (Peripatopris alba) #InsertAnInvert 6 Subterranean (underground)

Velvet worms are the cutest. Here's another little dude with 3 observations on iNat. :)

#InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025

Dark blue ink drawing of a ground beetle nestled in a mass of moss. Handwritten text reads: #Insert An Invert 25: Subterranean (Surface) Beller's Ground Beatle (Agonum belleri) These beautiful creatures are endemic to sphagnum bogs in the Pacific Northwest. They prey on the same small invertebrates as the carnivorous sundews that also dwell in these wet, acidic habitats. They are rare and critically endangered in much of their range. This drawing is a wish to someday see one.

A new month of #InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025 takes us down to earth. I loved sketching this dude in his bed of sphagnum.

Black ink sketch of a fly in disguise as a lady bird beetle, complete with spotted abdomen. In the upper left corner of the picture is a leaf on which a neat cluster of pencil eraser-shaped eggs have been laid. Handwritten text reads: "This adorable parasitoid fly disguised as a lady beetle lays her eggs inside Pentatomid that her larvae can snack on other babies (shield bugs/stink bugs) while they grow! This is such an efficient reproductive strategy that an estimated 10% of all insect species adopt it. #InsertAnInvert 24 Parasites (parasitoid) Gymnosoma rotundatum, Ladybird Fly

Finished this little one last month and forgot to post her. I didn't know ladybird mimics were a thing, so thank you #InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025 for the prompt!

Dark blue ink sketch of what looks like a half-open clam attached to a fleshy tongue that is covered with tiny branching corals. Except the whole thing is really a parasitic barnacle! Hand-written text reads: #InsertanInvert 23: Parasites (mesoparasite). Anelasma squalicola is a large barnacle species that has chosen as its substrate the flesh of a variety of shark species. It lives half-embedded in its host and generally seems like a major pain in the side.

Rapidly sketched from a challengingly hard-to-parse set of reference images, the latest #InsertanInvert2024 in 2025 is a badass barnacle that parasitizes sharks!

Black ink drawing of a snail perched on the stem of a plant. It is rather ordinary looking except for its eye stalks, which are covered in fantastical stripes and dots. Hand written text reads: #Insect An Invert 21 Parasites (Endoparasite) Green-banded broodsac (Leucochloridium paradoxum) is a helminth (flatworm) -albeit a rather round one -that has achieved its 15-minutes of farme through various viral videos showing specimens pulsating gently (or sometimes frenetically) inside the eye stalks of the snails it infects, in order to attract its primary hosts (snail-enjoying birds). (1 L. paradoxum in each eye stalk)

June is escaping me but snails cannot escape their zombifying parasites

#InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025

Black ink sketch of a fish head that takes up almost the entire card. Its mouth is open and its eye stares widely. Five fish lice (translucent little buggers nearly the size and about the shape of its eye, with short little appendages) are suckered onto its cheek, between its eye and its mouth, and behind its ear. Honestly everyone pictured looks pretty anxious, but the fish host the most so.

Ok I have to say, it was great fun to draw a terrorized vertebrate for #InsertanInvert2024 in 2025.

Black ink sketch of what looks for all the world like a coral in the shape of a large cross, with what might be a small blobby head. Hand written text reads: #InsertAnInvert 20 Carcinization (Absolutely Not crab) Dendrogaster antarctica (no common name) These endoparasites of sea stars are beautiful! I resent them being described as abominations just because they don't look crustace-y. They're like little tummy corals!.Just little bitty corals You keep inside you (if you're a sea star), that's all!

Well this one's a weirdo. But pretty, in my opinion! #InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025

Black and white pen and ink drawing of a brine shrimp. It is a female with a huge egg sac between her 11 legs and her tail. She also has cartoonish looking eye stalks and antennae. Handwritten text reads: #insertaninvert 19 Carcinization (not crab). Brine shrimp (Artemia sp.). When I was 8 or 9 years old we had a little tank of sea monkeys. I was so excited for them to arrive! I thought they would really be busy living their magical lives in their tiny yet magnificent kingdom. I was disappointed not to see them busy working, playing, and running schools and hospitals in there. On the whole, I prefer being grown up :-)

Sea monkeys! If only I'd had a microscope back when my sister and I had a tank of these guys. #InsertAnInvert2024 in 2025

Pencil drawing of a hermit crab with antennae tucked down in front of his legs and eye stalks looking out warily at the world. It looks like his shell is actually a knitted beanie. Handwritten text reads "they remodel shells to live in, usually making them lighter and roomier. Mostly nocturnal. Omnivorous scavengers. Superfamily Paguroidea: Hermit crab "

I forgot to share that I invited my husband to draw a (false) crab with me that same evening.. Here's his hermit 😭

#InsertanInvert2024