I was hoping to find a Monarch butterfly when I checked out some patches of milkweed last week at Jackson Miles Abbott Wetland Refuge, but ended up instead with some action shots of an Eastern Carpenter Bee (Xylocopa virginica). The bee was quite distracted while feeding, so I was able to get really close to it for these shots.
I like the way that I was able to capture some wonderful details of the bee as well as those of the beautiful pink milkweed.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Mike Powell 
[…] Bee and Milkweed — Mike Powell […]
Excellent capture, Mike He looks too interested in his feast to worry about you.
Just viewed full screen on my IPad… wow !
Very nice Mike! Love the detail in your images!
Very nice, Mike! The detail on the milkweed is quite interesting; I like that some of the florets are completely open and others are those closed poms. That and the color made me think of cotton candy.
I think the differing states of growth of the milkweed definitely adds a lot of interest to the photo and, of course, means that that patch should stay active for a while longer. I love cotton candy and can see how that pink color makes you think of it. At other places that I visit there is also swamp milkweed that is a darker red in color.
Beautiful captures, Mike, love the details. The bee nearly looks like a bumblebee with all it furry back!
I initially thought it was a bumblebee, but it has a really bare and shiny backside, which is more typical of a carpenter bee. I noticed that the angles I presented showed only the top side of the bee and that both types of bees look really similar from those angles of view.
Fantastic! I love the contrasts, in many ways!