Past midnight

Last night, the rains finally came through, mostly sideways, and it’s safe to say we’re saturated now. The treefrogs were signaling their approval even before it started, while remaining mostly out of sight (yes, even to me,) but they prompted me to go out after it stopped, just barely into this morning now, and look around a bit. I got no photos of the frogs, but found a couple of other read more

You never doubted it, did you?


Because I’ve featured so many mantis photos in previous years, I have been lightening up on pursuing them recently unless I can see some specific behavior, but I still take the opportunity to snag a few photos when I can – especially if I find one feeding when I can take advantage of it. This Chinese mantis (Tenodera sinensis) is on a potted curry plant, so-named read more

Arthropopourri

Just a handful of collected arthropod photos from the past few weeks, specifically excluding mantids.


Above, while pinning down focus on a pollinating sweat bee, a bumblebee flew into the frame as the shutter tripped, in a pretty optimal position compositionwise. Too bad the focus was so short.

And before I get to the next image below, a brief bit of background. While out at the nearby pond one night, read more

Looking back, part one

In the past week, I shot about 600 images in four sessions or so, which partially explains the lack of posts. So we’ll play catch-up over a couple of days, and in the process see the difference in approach used, depending on the subject and circumstances.

For instance, in meetings with students, most times I’m not shooting at all, concentrating instead on instruction. However, in some read more

Because I’m me

I actually took all of these photos before I shot the fossil rock for the previous post, but I intentionally posted them in this order to break things up a bit. It probably doesn’t help, but I get credit for the effort, right?

After the heavy rains Monday night and Tuesday morning, I went out to do a walk-through of the yard, and one of the first things I noticed was what you see here, a leaf read more

Beans & burritos, part one

You may well ask, what, exactly, is that title supposed to mean? Well, it refers to the idea that I don’t really do artsy stuff, so this must be fartsy stuff instead. Basically, just throwing down a bunch of recent photos for the sake of it – not everything has to have exposition.

This little guy might be the same green anole (Anolis carolinensis) seen in read more

Not spiders


You know, if I’m telling you in the title that spiders will not be found in this post, that only means some following post is not going to be good for arachnophobes…

Since the move, I’ve been taking the opportunity on occasion to scope out the new area, trying to determine what kind of decent shooting locales can be found nearby. One stroke of luck is a large pond, close and easy read more

Spring and equinox and all that jazz

Shocked as I am to report it, the calendar event of the vernal equinox and the weather coincided quite well – the skies cleared and the temperature got into the twenties (or the seventies, if you prefer,) so I did indeed get out to chase a few spring subjects. It was exceedingly few – it’s still a little early for spring in North Carolina, and more so with the temperature fluctuations read more

It’s a tad humid


I got out the camera to chase a particular subject, which disappeared on me, so while the strobe was still charged I decided not to waste that electricity and went looking for something else to photograph. Yeah, I really do think that way sometimes, though if I do find another subject, I’ll fire off a lot more frames (and flashes) than if I simply discharged the capacitor read more

2012’s Not-Quites, the Insects

So as I mentioned, I went ahead and put together my best images of this year – or, as it really should be, my favorites, since no one is voting on these but me. However, this year was notable in that most of my images, by a wide margin, were arthropods (which I still call ‘insects’ solely for convenience.) read more