It's well into summer, and I have done very little bug hunting. In spite of having acquired a macro lens for Christmas... Money can buy stuff. What it can't buy is time. I mean, I keep seeing this nifty pen set I'd like, and I have money in the art account, but... But I don't have the time. So I made a little time, while sitting on the porch chatting with the First Reader. We'd lapsed into mutual silence, reading, as we often do when the day is over and we've both talked our fill. But I looked up and thought - there's still light. The camera is on my desk, I can do this.
His comment, sometime later as I came back to sit with him again, was that he thinks I'd be happiest if I could do this for oh, an hour every day. Chase the tiny things, lie in the grass, prowl the brushline for interesting models.
Probably. I was certainly feeling happy about having done it.
The moral, if there is one? Take a little you time, do something you love, even if for only thirty minutes or so. I doubt bug hunting is your thing, but I'm sure you have that itch to practice your craft from time to time... give in to it.
A member of the slant-faced grasshopper clan, this Short-winged Green Grasshopper is a common yard denizen.
The shed exoskeleton of a spider dangled in a web, waving in the breeze like laundry out to dry.
These aphids don't seem to 'get' camouflage. But that bright orange droplet is being exuded to ward off predators - it contains a nasty stinky liquid.
The ladybug on the prowl, just a few stems away from those aphids.
A juvenile House Cricket. Fuzzy, just like a kitten!
Back inside later to stretch out with my photos and the book for identifying some of the critters I'd spotted.
note the large pedipalps of this spider - Might be Lycosidea, might be Dolomedes, I didn't get a good shot of his eyes - that mark him as male.
You can see my reflection in the polished armor of this Japanese Beetle. Shame they are such pests, with that pretty metallic coating.
The tiny details you can see when you really get close...
Aft first I thought it was a fly, then I looked closer and it seems to have four wings. I'll have to try for a better look another time to identify this pretty black-winged guy.
Firefly on a coreopsis
I initially thought she was carrying an egg sac, but when I looked at the photo, I think it's just her abdomen markings.