Breakfast to go

A few shots of a "daddy longlegs" spider as it was schlepping its latest victim, another spider, along the wall outside my house.

Something of value to ants, apparently

Yesterday, I was clipping my fingernails out in the front yard. I noticed that ants were carrying away the clippings. (These are the ubiquitous Argentine ants.) I went in to get my camera, but when I came back out, my neighbor was walking by with his granddaughter. I was embarrassed to tell him what I was going to take a picture of, so I kept my camera in my pocket and made small-talk with the old guy. When he finally continued on his way, I turned my attention back to the ants, only to realize they had already taken the clippings away.

So today I decided to clip my toenails, and I brought my camera with me. I was not disappointed.








Jerry came home from work while I was in the middle of taking pictures of ants carrying away my toenail clippings, but I wasn't embarrassed this time. After almost 30 years of marriage, this is pretty much what he expects from me.

A selection of arboretum bugs from today

A nice shield bug


Katydid nymph



Tiny gray bird nymph



Harlequin cluster


Spotted cucumber beetle



Looper

A resting bee.

A handsome fly.

When I was looking over these photos on my computer, they looked too grainy. Then I looked at my camera settings, and I think I had the ISO set too high. I still have a few things to learn about my new camera.

My desert gecko

I brought him home from Joshua Tree a couple of months ago. He's like Stanley, only fully grown. He has been eating well. I have him on a paper towel substrate, as unsightly as that looks, but at least he won't get impacted from ingesting sand like Stanley did.

Mystery squash with bugs

This pumpkin-looking thing sprouted in my compost a couple of months ago, and I transplanted it in my front yard. I've found similar plants before and tried to nurture them, but they've never actually produced a full sized fruit. I'm expecting this ping-pong ball sized fruit to fall off at any time. But the flowers are attracting some insects.


This bee seemed like it was old and tired and ready to die.


Lucky for me, that made it easier to photograph.


Near another flower, a skipper had a head full of pollen. Like the bee, it seemed more sluggish than it should have been. It made me wonder if the pollen of this mystery-squash has some kind of tranquilizing effect.

♪ Getting to know you ♪

(as sung to my new camera)

Even though it's very similar to my old camera, it's still different. A little more sensitive, perhaps. Or maybe I still have to find the best settings for my point-and-shoot bug macros. But I'm finding my way. Here are some of my better shots from yesterday.


I love this picture, not just because it's pretty sharp for how little the spider is, but because this is the first time I've ever captured the big beautiful eyes of a jumping spider.


As I was focusing on this little thing, I wasn't even sure it was a bug until I took the picture. The legs were so skinny, I could not see them with my eyes, even with my glasses!

This spider's abdomen was about the size of a sesame seed.

Mantid nymph

This little guy was a funny color.

Back in the saddle again!

This ended up being the last bug picture I was able to take with my old camera. These are the eggs from this post. I was excited to see they were hatching until I realized that tiny parasitic wasps were coming out of the eggs.




So here's those eggs again, empty this time, taken with the new camera, a Canon SD950 IS. It's comfortingly similar to my old camera.

Last bug photo for a while?

My camera is on the fritz. That's bad news!

The good news is now I'm going to get a new camera. But I need to figure out what kind to get first. That might take a while.