Bugs
Almost, not quite… I leaned over a squash blossom to photograph the pistil and stamen. Aha! A caterpillar! And then a bee? Landed. My focus was not quite dead on. I got shots. They were okay but not quite …. Oh well, you can see…pollen all over the bee. Unfortunately, there are no do-overs.
Lately
What’s up?
Today is a series of non sequiturs. Bugs? Caterpillars? They walk into my pictures and jump onto my camera sensor on the way to my memory card. See the fine hair detail on the bug? There’s not much detail in the caterpillar. Was it me or the worm? Colleen made a cobbler from fresh picked white peaches. Yum! Cats preoccupy our attention. I am charged with getting their pictures. It’s a specialty. Cats do not pose on demand. Ever! Clouds? Lately the clouds have been distinct against a bright blue sky. Great! Flowers? Macro lens and super detail. The featured flower gives me the impression it is waiting to devour an unsuspecting bug that wanders into its maw. So many pictures so little time…
Rated well
I go with what strikes me as I edit. No overthinking. I just go with the gut. One star – ok, but not quite. Two star – good solid technically good. Three star – rare, it just stands out. Four and five – hardly ever.
Water is always good in a flower shot. It’s above ordinary. I don’t get water too often. Cats – my black cat is hard to image and she is hard to pin down for a focused shot of her eyes. You’d think it’s easy. I get the eyes on all my other cats. Nope! And getting texture on the fur is a challenge too. But the eyes… except, it’s nice to see the tongue. Cats do not stick out their tongue. It’s different. Worms and bugs – not so easy. I got this caterpillar by chance. I nearly missed it. It was so tiny. Focus! It’s critical. Otherwise, it’s not a shot. And the moth? Not so simple, this one was all over skittering from blossom to blossom. I stood still and just waited to shoot when it landed again. Focus, otherwise, it’s not a shot. There were a lot of “not” shots. Among thousands of shots there are only a very few rated three stars.
Back…
… home. Can you say wilted? My flower garden wilted in my absence. We have just returned. A cousin watered. The garden took a hit. You’d never know from these pics. A bee fly? Yup! Never seen one, it’s new to me. No longer. I got to leisurely shoot one out in Colorado. Deja vu all over again?? Meanwhile, a caterpillar walked into my picture. Really! And another bug, looks like a firefly, but it’s more ominous, I’m sure. The colors have changed. The flowers missed me. Return to normal? We’ll see. Meanwhile, Miracle Gro for all!
Dog days
90/90 – temp/humidity. Enough said. We got corn! I guess some of the bird seed germinated. Yup! A single corn stalk grows in the midst of one of the containers. Ha ha! Veggies? This is the garden harvest. It’s going to sauce. We are unable to keep up with the cherry tomato crop. The peppers? Four months of diligent watering and all I got were a handful. I have to rethink what I am planting. The flowers are fading. Bugs are all around. I like detail. It’s time to prepare for fall.
At a loss for words
Nature is cruel, survival, and all of that. Feather found a tomato worm. She worried the thing across the deck, pawing, and toying with it. She licked it – taste test. Then, she bit it and swallowed it. I was a bit shocked. Not surprised. Just amazed that her base instinct took over. Gone. Hardly a meal, a mere snack. Done.
This end…
Sphinx moth, tomato horn worm. I got ‘em. How? Dunno. They showed up eating a bite out of my green tomatoes. They proceeded to eat the leaves leaving bare stems. They pooped leaving droppings outside the tomato pot. Finally!!! I caught on. Duh!! First one, then another, then another… Colleen said they had to go. She’s got the farm background. Ok! They stick to the plant like glue. I fashioned chop sticks from two BBQ skewers. No luck. (They stick, remember?) The anatomy is fascinating. Fake “eye” spots. Horn! Multiple pairs of “clinging” legs in clustered pairs. The mouth end looks to have row upon row of teeth to chomp the leaves to the stem. They poop! But! They seem to poop near the head not the tail end. (Yes! That is pictured, top center.) That was interesting (too). I mistook the horn for the head and the head was so non-descript to be mistaken for the tail. Ha ha! My bad. I know my vision is fading with age… but maybe there’s something worse when you can’t tell the head from the tail.
Wooly Bear
At least this is what I call them. And it’s what I taught my kids to call them. Do you recall Proust’s La Madeleine? No matter. The appearance of a wooly bear recalls to me the childhood of my children and that magic moment when they first saw a wooly bear themselves. I was the one to point it out. And so, I passed down knowledge. Ah, they can’t take that away from me.
Antenna?
I’ve been shooting images of the swallowtail caterpillar. I don’t touch them or disturb them. But, Mike came to collect some for his garden. Transplant. When I harvested this fellow from the parsley – yes, they eat/love parsley – he sprouted a yellow antenna? It’s probably not an antenna. Wow! I never expected that detail. Surprise! Neat!
“Black swallowtail caterpillar with extended osmeterium. A feature shared by all swallowtail caterpillars, this strange forked protuberance is not found on any other kind of butterfly larva. It has a bad smell and is used to ward off attackers.” http://www.austinbug.com/larvalbugeye/gallery-swallowtail.html
Swallowtail
We have monarch butterfly caterpillars. Where do they come from? Ha! Well, we have a bunch of caterpillars eating my parsley. So, they aren’t monarchs. They are swallowtail butterfly caterpillars.
It’s all figured out from what they eat. Monarchs only eat milkweed. Okay! The identification is solved. I’d like to have had monarchs. Alas, it’s not to be. Meanwhile, it’s devilishly hard for me to get a properly focused picture. The depth of field is shallow. The caterpillars are small. There are ways… but a point and shoot isn’t the best tool. I got shots.
I didn’t try to go out and find my macro lens. Well, I did it. I was curious to see if I could get a better shot. No, not better, different. There were pros and cons. But I was in much better control with manual focus. Autofocus has been around forever. You become dependent. Or, you adapt. Solve the problem. Okay!
Which End Is Up?
It’s a monarch butterfly caterpillar. It’s a lace wing butterfly. The earlier caterpillar (previous post) did not have antennae. This one has two sets. Which end is forward? I think the front is on the short end? But you could fool me. Yeah, I don’t know which end is up. No, the downside is the head and mouth?
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