Posts in Category: butterflies and insects
Ragged Swallowtail
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I spent the day on Sunday at the Wine Country Optics and Birding Fair at Cornerstone in Sonoma California. Cornerstone is Wine Country Visitor Center, in-door and out-door sculpture gallery, wine tasting venue for 4 vineyards, and collection of demonstration gardens from the area’s best know landscape gardeners and designers. It is a popular wedding destination, but on one Sunday of the year the extensive grounds are given over to the pop-up tents and tables of birding and conservation organizations and birding optics makers. I was, of course, there for ZEISS.
In the afternoon, when the sun and the air got hot, the crowds dwindled and I had a chance to wander the grounds. I sent 30 minutes chasing butterflies in a row of purple flowered shrubs. There were lots of skippers, several Monarchs, and this one lone, very worn, Western Swallowtail. The color contrast in this image is almost more than the eye can tolerate :). And the butterfly is so worn I am amazed it was still flying.
Sony HX400V at 1200mm equivalent field of view. ISO 100 @ 1/1250th @ f6.3. Program with -1/3 EV exposure compensation. Processed in Lightroom on my Surface Pro 3 tablet.
The spider and the dragon
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When I went out yesterday to mow the front yard, there were a dozen or more tiny, late-season, dark-legged, off-colored Meadowhawks flying low and perching often. Most likely they were female or immature male White-faced Meadowhawks, but I can not be at all certain. As I was photographing this one close in under the eves of the house, it flew up and right into a spider web. I considered freeing it, but then the spider, which had been hiding under the lower edge of the siding on the house, scuttled out and attacked. So be it. Spiders got to do what spiders got to do. And I am almost as fond of spiders as I am of dragonflies. I think this is just one of the grass spiders…a funnel weaver of some kind, though the web seemed sticky enough at least to trap the dragon…or else its legs just got so well tangled that despite best efforts it could not free itself. An hour later the spider had worked the dragon almost completely up under the siding on the house. For scale here, the dragonfly is maybe an inch and a quarter long (3 cm) and I was shooting from about that same distance.
Sony HX400V. 68mm equivalent field of view, macro. ISO 200 @ 1/80th @ f3.5. Processed in Lightroom on my Surface Pro 3 tablet.
Honey Bee. Happy Sunday!
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I was delighted to find the overgrown meadows at Emmons Preserve in Kennebunkport full of Honey Bees yesterday. I have lamented, several times here, the small numbers of Honey Bees I have been seeing this summer…I had seen perhaps two until yesterday. At Emmons that is particularly odd since they have an active hive in the meadow just down the Batson River Trail from the Conservation Trust building. There have been lots of bees at Emmons all summer, but they were all Bumble and Wood Bees. Yesterday they were mostly Honey. I am not privy to the workings at the Conservation Trust. I don’t know if they replaced the hive, or if the bees were dormant until now…or what happened, but the difference a week made was remarkable.
Sony HX400V at 124mm equivalent field of view. ISO 80 @ 1/1000th @ f4. Processed in Lightroom on my Surface Pro 3 tablet.
And for the Sunday Thought. Honey Bee populations are threatened in many ways right now. Besides all the known disorders a hive can fall prey to, there is Colony Collapse Disorder, where the worker bees suddenly abandon an apparently healthy hive…living queen, honey, and all…during the winter when they should be resting. No one knows why. Some recent studies are pointing to the effects of a common class of fungicides used on a wide variety of crops, from soy beans to apples, and in many lawn products. There is still a lot of work to be done before we really know what is going on, but no one disputes that Honey Bees are in trouble…which means, in fact, that we are in trouble. Honey Bees are the primary pollinator for an amazing variety of crops we depend on. Can you imagine a world without apples, almonds, fennel? Trucking hives of bees to where they are needed for intensive agriculture is a big business today. The fields of North Dakota are pollinated by bees from Texas. Take a look at the list of crops pollinated by bees on Wiki. Those marked essential are at risk if the populations of Honey Bees continue to decline.
Which is one of the reasons I pay attention to the number of Honey Bees I encounter in my time in the field. Not that there is anything I can do about it, or at least, not yet. It could be this is one of those “problems” caused by our attempt to maximize yields in our fields. Actually, I find the whole practice to trucking in bees to where the crops are so concentrated that the native bees can’t handle the pollination load to already be somewhat troublesome. Asking for trouble. When you combine that with the chemicals used on intensive crops…well…you just might get Colony Collapse Disorder.
I believe, as I have said before, that it is our job, a part of our essential spiritual nature, to care for all that lives on this earth. The way I read the Bible story and my experience of the Spirit both tell me that we were made to be the keepers. We can not deny that our attempts to keep ourselves fed have transformed much of the surface of the earth into crop factories. And that our attempts to keep the crop factories at maximum yield have effected more of the web of life than we currently in know in ways we do not know or do not understand. Yet. And that is an important _yet_. It is easy to feel both guilt and despair when confronted with a problem like Colony Collapse Disorder and the decline of Honey Bees. But, we are the keepers, and though we do not know enough to always foresee the consequences of our actions, we do learn. We adapt. We change. We solve problems when we see them.
Colony Collapse Disorder and the decline of Honey Bee populations is a problem. It is a spiritual problem. One that should engage our spiritual nature as keepers until we find a solution. It might be as simple as a change in the chemicals we use…or as complex as reinventing agriculture to eliminate the kind of crop factories that we currently rely on…but, where there is a will, there is a way. And the will is spiritual. Has to spiritual.
I could recommend that, today, as part of our Spiritual Sunday, we all go out and try to find a Honey Bee to admire. You have to start somewhere, and, in the spirit, that feels right
Happening Cabbage Whites!
Yesterday there were many Cabbage White Butterflies working what I think is Moth Mullen on the backside of the dunes at our local beach. Cabbage Whites are not very exciting as butterflies go. Even the name is lack-luster. Still, they were just within reach of the 1200mm zoom, and the out of focus beach grass behind them made a wonderful bokeh…and the contrast between the yellow flowers and the white butterflies in the morning light had potential. When I started shooting this butterfly, there was only on on the plant. The second flew in a just the right second. Can you say Photo Bomb!? I could not have planned this shot, but I feel particularly blessed to have gotten it. It made me laugh out-loud!
Sony HX400V at 1200mm equivalent field of view. ISO 80 @ 1/400th @ f6.3. -1/3 EV exposure compensation. Processed in Lightroom on my new Surface Pro tablet.
Another GSF! Emmons Preserve
There certainly has been no lack of Great Spangled Fritillaries this summer. I see them every time I go to Emmons Preserve. At first they were working the Knapweed…by now they are reduced to Goldenrod and much lower numbers. They are still there though. I caught this one in a sunny alcove at the edge of the overgrown meadow behind the Conservation Trust building. I love the richness of the light and the way it illuminates the wings and makes them look like they are lit from inside.
Sony HX400V. 1200mm equivalent field of view. ISO 80 @ 1/500th @ f6.3. Processed in Snapseed on my tablet.
Flower Crab Spider on Blazing Star
When I checked the Blazing Star bloom after getting back form a week in Tucson, it was looking well past prime. There were still flowers in bloom, but they were smaller, and somehow drier, than the week before. I was on my way back to the scooter when this well posed Flower Crab Spider caught my eye. I might not have seen it but I was pretty much checking every remaining bloom for Clearwing Moths, since I had a fleeting glimpse of one taking nectar at a flower just before heading back. Serendipity! I am still amazed by this particular color contrast.
I love just being able to zoom in for a macro like this with the Sony HX400V. At 80mm or so you can get to less than 5cm. As it was I only got the one shot before the spider scuttled down over the shady side of the blossom. Processed in Snapseed on my tablet.
Life Bug!
Since beginning to photograph dragonflies seriously a few years ago, I have become much more aware of all insects…wasps, bees, and beetles will catch my eye and bring the camera into play. I am sure I have seen many new bugs in the past year, but most were wasps and bees and beetles that I might have looked at hundreds of times in the past and never given a second look. This bug however stopped me in my tracks. Not only had I never seen it…I had never seen anything remotely like it! Life Bug for sure.
Taken at Emmons Preserve in Kennebunkport ME.
It turns out it is an American Pelecinid, a wasp relative, and a female at that. Though females are apparently fairly common in late summer across a range that stretches from Central America up into Canada, males (with shorter abdomen) are so rare that it is assumed they are not needed for reproduction (which begs the question: why are there any males at all?). That ferocious looking abdomen is in fact pretty harmless…no sting…and the bug itself is not aggressive. No bother at all unless you are a scarab grub larve, in which case you could become a unwilling host to Pelecinid eggs.
Sony HX400V at 2400mm equivalent field of view. ISO 80 @ 1/250th @ f6.3. Processed in Snapseed on my tablet.
Butterflies of August
And late August in Maine at that. The Common Buckeye in the upper left is a late summer migrant in Maine. In fact it does not breed anywhere in New England. It wanders north seasonally. And then we have the Monarch. Monarchs have been rare in Maine this summer so far. This is maybe the third one I have seen. There is no lack of Milkweed. The fields at Laudholm Farm, where all these pics were taken, are full of ripening Milkweed pods. Just, for whatever reason, very few monarchs. Next (bottom left) we have a very worn Red-spotted Purple. Amazing that it is still flying. Finally my first Black Swallowtail of the season, though I am sure that have been flying for many weeks now. This one is certainly already showing signs of wear.
Sony HX400V at 600-1200mm equivalent field of view. Processed in Snapseed on my tablet. Assembled in Pixlr Express.
Nectar
Great Spangled Fritillery taking nectar from a Clover flower. All business 🙂 I never noticed that GSFs have furry eyes until looking at this shot, and confirming it in others from yesterday. Emmons Preserve, Kennebunkport ME.
Sony HX400V at 1200mm equivalent field of view. ISO 100 @ 1/250th @ f6.3. Processed in Snapseed on my tablet.
Wood Nymph on Blazing Star
With Bumblebee bonus! I have photographed Wood Nymphs before. They are, at least this year, our most common Butterfly…everywhere I go in forest and field. However this year they have also been remarkably uncooperative as photographic subjects. Until this week I had not one decent shot for the season. And then of course I encountered this specimen feeding on emerging Northern Blazing Star on the Kennebunk Plains. And I got the Bee as a bonus! How blessed can you get?
This shot is also unusual for the spread wings, caught as the Butterfly teetered on the Blazing Star in the breeze. Wood Nymphs perch with wings closed 99% of the time.
Sony HX400V @ 1200mm equivalent field of view. ISO 80 @ 1/640th @ f6.3. Processed in Snapseed on my tablet. Cropped for composition.