Being sent on a snipe hunt in the past served as a prank played on an unsuspecting innocent, offering laughter and jocularity to the perpetrators.
Often a group of youth played the trick on a single youth, having them stand for hours with a gunny sack, maybe a club or rock for protection, and some promise of great celebration at the end of successful sniping. This Angelkeep columnist could proudly declare having never fallen to such deceit, trickery, and tomfoolery. Well … until now.
The old snipe-hunt trick came full circle. Angelkeep did fall for a snipe hunt. However the snipe hunt came in a reverse format. The discovery of a snipe, the photograph evidence of a snipe, the awe and grandeur of multiple snipes, sent Angelkeep into a whirlwind of research. Only after the snipe became identified via the internet did the evidence prove that it was the snipe that had tricked Angelkeep into the hunt.
So what is a snipe, anyways?
“Chrysopilus thoracicus,” or commonly known as the golden-backed snipe fly, is a species of the snipe flies in the family Rhagionidae. Okay, enough for entomology, Latin (or is it Greek to me?), and unpronounceable words. E. Bruce Williamson, Bluffton’s world-famous entomologist could have rattled on for hours about this snipe. With apologies to Bruce, Angelkeep will carry onward with common jargon related to the recent snipe hunt.
It was easy enough to spot a golden-backed snipe fly. The thorax, that’s the center of three insect parts, was topped with a circle of golden fur. Real gold, we’re talking 12-carat gold as shiny as a new $20 double-eagle gold piece in 1849. Gold as bright as the finest sold at Daniel’s Jewelers. It looked metallic.
The two large compound eyes on the head nearly covered the head with a perfectly patina bronze color, displaying as the richest of semi-dark chocolate. So far this newly discovered fly was to die for, although at the time of the photography, its name remained yet undiscovered. The snipe’s beauty sent Angelkeep on an entomological world-wide-web hunt with no gunny sack, just a mouse and keyboard.
The snipe rested on a wild honeysuckle leaf and appeared to be about the size of a small horsefly, a bit larger than a deer fly. A fly it was, but not one ever encountered at Angelkeep in the past. Then finding a second (or did the first follow on the trek through the underbrush) the need to know its name piqued Angelkeep’s inquiring mind.
The hind third of the fly had abdominal yellow-white horizontal stripes numbering five. Nikon perfectly captured it all in painstakingly precise focus. Auto-focus comes in so handy in the underbrush of wild natural habitat.
The wings. Look closely at those wings.
The wings’ cells, the spaces between the veins, were like isinglass but clearer. The top portion appeared smoky, the center cell segments relatively clear with the green of the leaf showing through, but the hind edge cells carried a light tint of yellow orange. The veins themselves were dark black, like the space between the abdomen stripes. Each vein widened in gradual change from black, to charcoal, then gray. No specific line of color change in the gray variations existed. One simply blurred into the next. This created the amazing appearance of the wings captured by the camera in a very blurred form, when in reality the entire snipe fly insect had been caught in perfect focus.
It appeared as if the snipe fly had tricked the camera. The golden-backed snipe fly certainly sent Angelkeep’s camera operator on a snipe hunt, as it turned out. Once realizing the name of the most awesome fly ever captured on digital, the self-recognition of having been sent on a snipe hunt became apparent and comical.
The late, great, Bruce Williamson would have mentioned that Chrysopilus meant “golden hair” and thoracicus referred to the thorax, so if Angelkeep would stick to entomology terms, discovery might be scientifically easier. Angelkeep recognized too late that the pair photographed could have made Gwen a beautiful gold-and-black set of earrings, as fine a look as a local jeweler’s best 24 carat pair.
Mr. Daugherty is a Wells County resident who, along with his wife Gwen, enjoy their backyard and have named it “Angelkeep.”
