Hoverfly approaching wildflower... whirr of wings... Sweden, 2011.

Oh dear... it's very late in the evening, or early in the morning... and I just realized I need a post for Macro Monday over at Lisa's Chaos... so here you go! If you haven't stopped by yet to check out the lovely macro images, do stop by and have a look.

This is an image from our visit to the Västerbottens open air museum in Gammlia, Umeå, Sweden. If you'd like to read more about that visit, please check my vacation blog. As for this image, I just happened to wander over to some lovely flowers for a closer look and spotted the hoverfly... I've never managed to capture one 'on the move' before so hope you like this!

Sweat Bee on Star of Bethlehem flower... Spring 2011.

I believe this tiny Sweat Bee is Augochlora pura based on research in BugGuide. They move really fast while gathering pollen so it's tricky to get a clear shot. Their iridescent colors always catch my eye in the garden.

As for the flower, it seems to be a defective Star of Bethlehem in that it only has five petals whereas every other one blooming in my garden has the typical six-petal flower form of Ornithogalum umbellatum. The flowers are gorgeous and have volunteered themselves all over my garden.

I'll be posting this to Macro Monday over at Lisa's Chaos... you should check it out! Her blog is pretty terrific!

Julia Butterfly under any name is gorgeous...

Going back to images from our December visit to the Butterfly Conservatory of the National Museum of American History in New York (Manhattan), NY today, I realized I'd never posted this one. When I went looking for the ID of this butterfly, I found lots of references to it as Julia Butterfly (some even as Orange Julia). It wasn't until I looked at the Wikipedia entry on this beauty that I found the scientific name Dryas iulia correctly spelled. Wikipedia also noted that the scientific name is "often incorrectly spelled julia" which is most probably why we commonly know it as Julia Heliconian or Julia Butterfly.

Great Eggfly Butterfly ... Butterfly Conservatory...

The Great Eggfly Butterfly, Hypolimnas bolina, is also called the Blue Moon Butterfly and lives in the South Pacific islands, Australia, New Zealand, Madagascar, and southeast Asia. It also lives in the Butterfly Conservatory of the American Museum of Natural History which is where this photo was taken in December, 2010. The upper side of the wings of the female is dark brown and the female does not have the spots (white circles) that the male, seen here, does.

Variable Cracker Butterfly... Butterfly Conservatory Image...

There is quite a lot of information on the "Blue Cracker" butterfly to be found when searching for butterflies similar to this one. BUT, when a search was done on the scientific name for the so-called Blue Cracker, MANY references to the Red Cracker butterfly were found... but none of those images had the "red bar" on the fore-wing that this butterfly has.

More exhaustive searching around on Google finally turned up an image that looks very similar to this one, leading me to believe this is Hamadryas feronia, commonly called the Variable Cracker. The "cracker" part of the name refers to the noise the male of this butterfly species makes as part of their territorial display. Isn't he just gorgeous?! (I certainly have no idea if it is a he or a she butterfly... either way... I'm quite pleased with how this turned out!)

Atlas Moths mating... Do not disturb... Butterfly Conservatory at the National Museum of Natural History`

I'm a bit laid up with a bum ankle so am posting this as my apology for not visiting your blogs as I'd promised. I hope you all are having a better week than mine has turned out to be after falling yesterday and banging myself up… the sore ankle is making it quite difficult to do much of anything other than lay around! (although I may lay around WITH my laptop this afternoon and see how that goes because it could work to allow me to keep my feet up while on-line via wireless)

The Atlas Moth Attacus atlas) is believed to be the largest species of moth with wing spans that may reach 25–30 cm (10–12 in). We were told by one of the guides at the Conservatory that they mate for hours... they have no mouths so cannot eat... they do nothing except mate, lay eggs and then die. The female is the larger of the species and is mostly hidden behind the male in this close view that shows the lovely, feathery antennae of this species. Refer to Wikipedia for additional information.

I visited the Butterfly Conservatory of the American Museum of Natural History in New York, NY twice to get this picture... the first day we were there, they were mating on a glass window too far away for capturing and I didn't have my macro lens anyway. The next day, they had relocated (maybe it was even a different pair) to a MUCH better location AND I had my macro lens with me.

Late fall visitor to late blooming Blanket Flower... November, 2010

Because I was expecting visitors for Thanksgiving dinner, I decided to go out and do some garden cleanup (dead/dying tomato plants and some other dead growth) so I wouldn't be embarrassed at the condition of my garden. Imagine my surprise to find this charming sweat bee exploring a Blanket Flower in search of pollen.

The weather has finally turned colder so I doubt I'll have any more opportunities to photograph insects in my garden until spring!

Fifth of Five in Round One Portfolio for Photography Slam competition...

As I've been typing the titles for these images, I cannot help but think of Star Trek: Voyager and Seven of Nine (the Borg character played by Jeri Ryan). (OK ... so I like sci-fi on television... but I like to read sci-fi too!)

Anyway, this imge, Tiny dancer..., is of a hoverfly on a balloon flower petal and is the last of the images in my winning first round portfolio in the contest described in an earlier post.

Yoda... Bumble-bee in Plumbago larpentae... October, 2010

The rear view image of this fat bumble-bee, wings upraised, immediately brought to mind Yoda, from the Star Wars movies, when I saw it appear on my computer monitor after uploading it. I hope this sight amuses you as much as it did me and that you are having a wonderful weekend wherever you are! (The very next image I tried to capture had no bumble-bee because he had taken flight.)

Mr. Bumblebee having a chat with a Spotted Cucumber Beetle in Basil... October, 2010

I first saw a Spotted Cucumber Beetle (Diabrotica undecimpunctata) in my Korean Chrysanthemum 'Apricot' blossoms last year... they seem to enjoy flowers and munching on their petals quite a bit! Imagine my surprise, though, to discover one in my Basil while trying to get up close and personal to a Bumblebee! The imagined conversation goes something like this (from bumblebee to beetle): "Hey Beetle... what are you doing in MY Basil?!"

Bumblebee on Blanket Flower... Summer, 2010

I've been experimenting with extension tubes paired with my 105mm macro lens. The trick is to follow bugs and snap a shot without using a tripod... hand holding a heavy lens with the added extension tube(s) is quite tricky but every now and then I get lucky! Hope you enjoy viewing this image... I was sure happy to see it once I got it onto my computer.

Update on Spam jerk who keeps trying to post comments on my blog: Blogspot finally has it set up so we can flag jerks such as this one by clicking the "Mark as spam" link in the message received when comment moderation is turned on. And I've followed up on a few of the reports I made by trying to find the jerk and his account generally disappears in short order. So I'll keep clicking the "Mark as spam" links and MAYBE one day he's going to give up completely.

Sharing... three hoverflies on a wildflower... September, 2009

While traveling, I choose to not carry my macro lens... it's quite heavy! This was taken using my 70-300 mm telephoto lens (a leftover from my film camera days) mounted on a tripod. I'm not sure what the wildflower is, but the bees and hoverflies were busily gathering pollen and I watched them (and photographed them) for quite awhile along the shore of Stanley Lake in Idaho.

(This image and the other images that will be included in my gallery show are in a set on Flickr that may be viewed as a slide show if you care to have a look.

Carpet Beetle munching on Stokes Aster... June, 2009

I'm TRYING to be more regular about posting... so many distractions involved with getting ready for my upcoming gallery show. This is from this past summer when I went out to photography my Stokes Asters and discovered this little guy munching away on the petals. Carpet beetles are so named because their preferred habitat (supposedly) is carpets where they can find all manner of food droppings to munch on. They also seem to enjoy exploring my flower garden! (This image and the other images that will be included in my gallery show are in a set on Flickr that may be viewed as a slide show if you care to have a look.

Should I stay or should I go? Decisions...

This is another image that will be included in my gallery show in February, 2010. At the time that this photo was taken, I'd gone out to the garden to photograph flowers... but this carpet beetle just HAD to be captured on camera and I'm so happy with how it turned out. (another image that hadn't made it onto the blog yet because it was taken before starting this blog... the previous image is quite chilling (temperature wise) so thought I'd post a warmer one to counteract it)

Sun lights up this green beauty... resting on Lemon Balm leaf...

This image will be included in my gallery show... the owners say people like bugs... and I love the way the light hits this guy!

Busy beetle type bug... not sure what he is...

But he clearly has been eating away at my daisy mum leaves as evidenced by the holes on every flower he has already visited... here he is making a fresh hole in an otherwise perfect flower... dining!

Bumble-bee in Plumbago Larpentae... in my garden!

It is so intriguing to watch the bumble-bees gathering pollen from the tiny blossoms of Plumbago larpentae... an excellent ground cover with a spreading habit that will quite literally take over your garden if you let it. The bumble-bees wrap themselves entirely around the blossoms as they make their way around gathering pollen. (A bit more about the spreading habit of this plant... ONE tiny plant put into my garden some years ago has now spread over half my front garden and well down the way toward the back of my house in my side garden. If it does grow where you don't want it, it's quite easy to yank up... but it grows by underground runners and spreads everywhere as long as it has enough sunlight.)

Ants in my PArsley...

I have NO IDEA what the ants are after... but they are certainly after something.

Butterfly gathering pollen in Echinacea...

Happy First Day of Summer! Caught this butterfly going after the pollen in my Echinacea today... not sure of the butterfly ID but am sure this flower is commonly known as Coneflower.

And now I'm all caught up and back on track for posting a photo a day... Have a nice summer everyone!

Sweat bee? Fly? Iridescent pollen gatherer on Yarrow...

Am posting several photos today now that I've worked out how to get them incorporated without artifacts... cannot seem to do that without adding the photo to a Picasa album first (using "Blog this" link from Flickr sends photos over the wrong size for my blog and adjusting sizes introduces artifacts.) Please also note that I'm using the large size photo from my Picasa album so if you are viewing this blog on a small screen, you may not see the full image without scrolling... check to see that you see the tiny black border on all four sides and enjoy!

During a break in the rain on June 18, 2009, I wandered down the street to see what wondrous things I could find in my neighboring gardens... who needs an arboretum when one is lucky enough to live in a neighborhood filled with gardens! Caught this guy scoring some pollen and then he flitted away...