Sometimes the beauty of Easter reveals itself in subtle ways, like this delicate orchid that I photographed yesterday in the conservatory at Lewis Ginter Botanical Gardens in Richmond, VA.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved
Archive for the ‘Flowers’ Category
Happy Easter II
Posted in Art, Flowers, Nature, Photography, spring, tagged Canon 50D, Canon 70-300mm telephoto zoom lens, conservatory, Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden, orchid, Richmond VA on April 20, 2014| 1 Comment »
Happy Easter
Posted in Art, Birds, Flowers, Nature, Photography, spring, tagged Alexandria VA, American Goldfinch, Canon 50D, canon 70-300mm telephoto zoom, Easter, Runnymeade, Spinus tristis on April 20, 2014| 5 Comments »
This brightly colored American goldfinch (Spinus tristis) reminds me of the marshmallow Peeps that I grew up with and the brightly colored spring outfits that people would wear to church to celebrate Easter (including some pretty outrageous hats). Best wishes to all for a Happy Easter, no matter how you choose to celebrate it.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved
Blossoming trees
Posted in Art, Flowers, Gardening, Nature, Photography, spring, tagged Alexandria VA, blossoming trees, blossoms, Bradford Pear, Canon 50D, Canon 70-300mm telephoto zoom lens, Runnymeade on April 19, 2014| 15 Comments »
Although I live in the Washington D.C. area, I didn’t feel like fighting the crowds to get images of the iconic cherry blossoms. However, the blossoming trees in my neighborhood were pretty spectacular too, albeit on a smaller scale.
I think the first two images are Bradford pear trees, the third is a forsythia bush, and I am not sure what kind of tree the final one is. The shapes and colors and lighting make each of these shots quite different, but I think my favorite is the first one, which reminds me of a Japanese painting.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved
Blooming tulips
Posted in Art, Flowers, Gardening, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, spring, tagged Alexandria VA, broken tulip, Canon 50D, Runnymeade, Tamron 180mm macro lens, tulip "Lady Jane", Tulipa clusiana var. 'Lady Jane', tulips on April 18, 2014| 1 Comment »
After seeing three of my recent postings that featured unopened tulips, some readers might come to the erroneous conclusion that I don’t like the colorful flowers of blooming tulips. How could that be possible? Everyone seems to like the cheery colors of tulips.
My neighbor, and fellow photographer and blogger Cindy Dyer, has planted quite a variety of tulips in her garden and I recently took some photos of two very different species. The first is a small, delicate tulip know as the “Lady Jane” (Tulipa clusiana var. ‘Lady Jane’). I am not sure that I have every seen a more petite tulip and I really like its subtle colors.
The second tulip is big and bold and multi-colored, almost a visual equivalent of shouting. This style of tulip is known as a “broken” tulip, because of the way that the colors are broken, resulting in intricate bars, stripes, streaks, featherings, or flame-like effects of different colors on the petals. According to Wikipedia, this effect was originally produced by a tulip-breaking virus, and bulbs with this effect went for exorbitant prices in 17th century Netherlands, during a period known as “tulip mania.” Today, tulips displaying a “broken” effect are stable variants and the result of breeding, not viral infection.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved
Grapes of spring
Posted in Art, Flowers, Gardening, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, spring, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, Grape hyacinth, hyacinth, Muscari, Runnymeade, Tamron 180mm macro lens on April 17, 2014| 3 Comments »
Like tiny bunches of grapes, growing out of the ground on a stalk, grape hyacinths are one of my favorite spring flowers. I moved in really close with my macro lens in the first shot to emphasize the beautiful details and the rich dominant bluish-purple color of the plant and moved back a bit for the other two shots to highlight the varied shapes and colors of the individual “grapes.”
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved
Anticipation III
Posted in Art, Flowers, Gardening, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, spring, tagged Alexandria VA, anticipation, Canon 50D, Runnymeade, Tamron 180mm macro lens, tulip, unopened tulip on April 16, 2014| 7 Comments »
This final image of my mini-series on unopened tulips is my favorite—I love the simple composition, the almost monochromatic palette (with the slightest touch of pink at the tip), and the sensual curves of the leaves.
It was almost six o’clock in the evening when I took this shot and the light was still pretty strong, but was starting to fade. I knew that I wanted to shoot some close-up shots of flowers, so I was using my 180mm macro lens. I probably should have been using my tripod for increased steadiness, especially because the lens does not have image stabilization (VR for Nikon folks), but I hadn’t brought a tripod with me.
As is often the case with my macro lens, I ended up focusing manually, trying to get as much of the tulip in focus as I could as I carefully composed the shot. The settings for this shot, for those who might be interested in such technical details, were ISO 400, f/8, and 1/50 second. The shutter speed is a bit slow, I’ll admit, but I was able to brace myself pretty well and I was trying to avoid increasing the ISO and introducing more noise.
If you haven’t seen the other images in this mini-series, Anticipation I and Anticipation II, be sure to check them out. Is there one that you like more than the others?
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved
Anticipation II
Posted in Art, Flowers, Gardening, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, spring, tagged Alexandria VA, anticipation, Canon 50D, Canon 70-300mm telephoto zoom lens, Runnymeade, spring flowers, tulip, yellow tulip on April 15, 2014| 5 Comments »
With the cold, gray days of winter receding in my memory and the world exploding with color, I’ve taken a brief break from focusing primarily on wildlife photography and have turned my attention to capturing the beauty of flowers and blossoms.
I’ve never quite figured out how to photograph broad expanses of color, so I tend to focus more on the details of a single flower and try to isolate it from the background. (One of my favorite bloggers, Camilla, of Calee Photography did an amazing job in capturing the beauty of tulip fields by photographing them from a small airplane. Check out her posting.)
In this case, my eyes were drawn to the not-yet-open tulip, where the color of the flower was beginning to be revealed. The composition is simple and graphic and a little abstract.
I can already sense the beauty that is to come—the anticipation makes it even more sweet.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved
Anticipation I
Posted in Art, Flowers, Gardening, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, spring, tagged Alexandria VA, anticipation, Canon 50D, Canon 70-300mm telephoto zoom lens, Runnymeade, spring, tulip on April 15, 2014| 6 Comments »
Anticipation, waiting for the moment when a tulip will burst open. For now, all we can see is a little tongue of color, a foretaste of the beauty that is to come.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved
Flowering tree
Posted in Art, Flowers, Gardening, Nature, Photography, spring, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, Canon 70-300mm telephoto zoom lens, flowering tree, magnolia, Runnymeade, tulip tree on April 14, 2014| 3 Comments »
The flowering trees in my neighborhood are spectacular right now. Here’s a couple of shots of the flowers of one of them, which I think is some kind of magnolia or tulip tree.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved
Simple purple flower
Posted in Art, Flowers, Gardening, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, spring, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, Canon 70-300mm telephoto zoom lens, flower, garden, purple flower, Runnymeade on April 13, 2014| 1 Comment »
I am always happy to visit the garden of one of my neighbors, Cindy Dyer, a fellow photographer and blogger, at this time of the year, because there is always something new in bloom. Yesterday’s treat was this simple little purple flower. I have no idea what it is, but I love its shape and colors.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved
Faded glory
Posted in Art, Flowers, Gardening, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged Canon 50D, Canon 70-300mm telephoto zoom lens, faded glory, red tulip, Runnymeade, tulip on April 12, 2014| 4 Comments »
This red tulip may have been at its peak a few days ago when it was in full bloom, but it has retained its beauty in its current faded state.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved
Natural stained glass
Posted in Art, Flowers, Gardening, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, spring, tagged Alexandria VA, backlighting, Canon 50D, crocus, Runnymeade, simple things, spring, Tamron 180mm macro lens on March 24, 2014| 6 Comments »
The late afternoon sunlight shining through this crocus from behind illuminated it like a natural stained glass window. I love the beauty of simple things.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved
First crocus of spring
Posted in Art, Flowers, Gardening, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, spring, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, crocus, Runnymeade, spring, spring flowers, Tamron 180mm macro lens on March 23, 2014| 5 Comments »
Yesterday afternoon, my dear friend and fellow photographer Cindy Dyer called to alert me that there were some crocuses blooming in her garden. The lighting was wonderful and the dirt in the background provides a simple backdrop for the gorgeous colors of this little spring flower.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved
Ice flowers
Posted in Art, Flowers, Landscape, Nature, Photography, Winter, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, Canon 70-300mm telephoto zoom lens, Huntley Meadows Park, ice, ice flowers on March 14, 2014| 11 Comments »
In this transitional time of the year, mornings are often frosty and ice forms in some areas of the marsh in beautiful patterns that look like crystal flowers. Spring is not far off and soon these ice flowers will be replaced by the real thing.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved
Pink Star
Posted in Flowers, Gardening, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, Winter, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, green spring gardens, greenhouse, Tamron 180mm macro lens, tropical plant on February 18, 2014| 5 Comments »
Although it has started to get a bit warmer, lots of snow remain, snow that has lost its initial pristine beauty and is now flecked with brown road dirt and various chemicals. I feel a need for color, so I am posting some shots I took last month of a tropical plant in the greenhouse at my local county-run garden.
One of the challenges in shooting in this small space was the often cluttered background. I tried to frame these shots in such a way that background is not too distracting. I have no idea what kind of a plant this is, but that doesn’t bother me, for it is the color, texture, and shape of the plant that I find most interesting.
It won’t be long before I’ll see bursts of color like this outdoors—I can hardly wait.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved
Beauty in a glass house
Posted in Art, Flowers, Gardening, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, Winter, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, green spring gardens, Lady's Slipper, Lady's Slipper orchid, Tamron 180mm macro lens on February 3, 2014| 13 Comments »
This past weekend, I was filled with an inexplicable urge to take some flower photos. With the exception of some clumps of snowdrops, nothing was blooming outdoors, so I slipped into the small glass-enclosed greenhouse at my local county-run garden to capture images of some of the tropical flowers there.
I was alone with the plants for an extended period of time and was able to set up my tripod and use my macro lens, which has been gathering dust the last few months. My eyes have grown accustomed to looking for birds in the distance and it was an interesting challenge to get them to focus on the smaller details of stationary objects.
I am not sure of the names of the flowers that I photographed (with the exception of the second one, which is a kind of Lady’s Slipper orchid), but my senses were satisfied temporarily with the sight and smells of these beautiful flowers.
I can’t wait for spring, when I’ll have the chance to to see more flowers (and the accompanying insects) outdoors.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved
Drop of snow
Posted in Flowers, Gardening, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, Winter, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, Canon 70-300mm telephoto zoom lens, Galanthus elwesii, green spring gardens, snowdrop on February 2, 2014| 5 Comments »
It’s a little too early for most flowers to be blooming, although I did find flowering snowdrops yesterday at Green Spring Gardens, a local county-run historic garden. I like the way that the white of the flower shines in the shadows, a reminder that the brightness of spring will eventually come.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved
Great exposure for my photography mentor
Posted in Art, Flowers, Gardening, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged Cindy Dyer, ferns, stamps, US Postal Service, USPS on January 31, 2014| 3 Comments »
What’s the coolest thing that could happen to you as a photographer? All of us would like greater exposure and I was thrilled on Monday when I learned that my dear friend and photography mentor Cindy Dyer had five of her fern photos issued as stamps by the US Postal Service. They are being issued in coils of 3,000 and 10,000 stamps with a total printing of 95 million stamps. Wow! That’s broad exposure.
Check out her blog to see some of her amazing photos. Her teaching, support, and inspiration have played (and continue to play) a huge role in my evolution and development as a photographer.
Yesterday, after more than a year in the making, my series of USPS-licensed fern photographs were released as 49 cent stamps in large coil format for business use. Special thanks to art director Phil Jordan for being so great to work with on the series! I’ll be back with more details on how we can POSSIBLY get a smaller amount than the issued 3,000 and 10,000 quantity rolls!
Read more about the stamps here: http://uspsstamps.com/stamps/ferns
Order a first-day-of-issue set within 60 days here:
http://about.usps.com/postal-bulletin/2014/pb22381/html/info_013.htm
Ginkgo preview
Posted in Art, Flowers, Gardening, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged autumn, Blandy Experimental Farm, Boyce VA, Canon 50D, Canon 70-300mm telephoto zoom lens, ginkgo, Ginkgo biloba, ginkgo grove, State Arboretum of Virginia on October 28, 2013| 5 Comments »
This past weekend I traveled with some friends to photograph a large grove of ginkgo trees at the Blandy Experimental Farm of the State Arboretum of Virginia in Boyce, VA. It was a beautiful day, with bright blue skies, and I took some shots that I will probably include in a more extended post, but I wanted to give you a sneak preview of the really-cooling looking leaves of the ginkgo (Ginkgo biloba) tree, a tree that dates back at least 270 million years, judging from ginkgo leaf fossils that have been uncovered.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Afternoon glory
Posted in Art, Flowers, Gardening, Humor, Macro Photography, Photography, tagged Alexandria VA, backlighting, Canon 50D, Canon 70-300mm telephoto zoom lens, family Convolvulaceae, morning glory on October 27, 2013| 4 Comments »
Despite the frost that we’ve had the last few mornings, the gorgeous Morning Glory flowers of my neighbors continue to flourish. I photographed one of the flowers yesterday afternoon—does that make it an afternoon glory?
When you look at the photo it looks like I used flash, which caused the background to go black. However, if you look carefully at the way the light falls, with some of it coming from the back, you realize I would have had to use an elaborate multi-light setup to get this kind of lighting. I took this shot in the early afternoon, with the light mostly coming from the side and back of the flower.
My fellow photographer and blogger CIndy Dyer says that the shadow in the bottom area of the white part of the flower looks like a photographer (possibly with a bald head) with a camera and long telephoto lens and she initially thought I had somehow managed to get a reflection of myself onto the flower. We may have spent too many hours yesterday out in the sun with our cameras!
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
House Sparrow
Posted in Birds, Flowers, Gardening, Nature, Photography, Portraits, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, Canon 70-300mm telephoto zoom lens, House Sparrow, Kingstowne, Old World Sparrow, Passer domesticus, sparrow on October 17, 2013| 14 Comments »
When I first saw this bird, I knew that it was a sparrow, but couldn’t identify it. I was baffled when I went to my Peterson Field Guide to Birds of North America, because I couldn’t find the sparrow. I went back and forth through the 14 pages covering sparrows, examining carefully the text and illustrations, but none of the species looked like this bird.
I was beginning to doubt my identification skills, so I kept looking through the field guide, desperately hoping to find the bird. On the very last page of the section of the guide with information on bird species, just before all of the range maps, I stumbled across a small section called Old World Sparrows and found the bird—it’s a House Sparrow (Passer domesticus).
Apparently Old World sparrows are non-native (as their name suggests) and are of a different family from all of the other sparrows that I have observed. The Cornell Lab of Ornithology website indicates that House Sparrows were introduced from Europe in 1851 and that they are common in places with houses, because the birds seem to prefer to nest in manmade structures, like the eaves of buildings, more than natural nesting sites. I took these photos at a little manmade lake that is partially surrounded by houses, rather than at the marsh where I do a lot of my shooting, which may explain why I have never noticed this type of sparrow before.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Camouflaged spider
Posted in Arachnids, Art, Flowers, Gardening, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, Canon 70-300mm telephoto zoom lens, Huntley Meadows Park, Long-jawed Orb Weaver spider, long-jawed spider, spider on October 3, 2013| 6 Comments »
This long-jawed spider is not really camouflaged, of course, but it positioned itself in such an artistic way that its elongated body and legs seem to be an extension of the plant, especially from a distance. The plant was growing at the edge of a small pond at my local marsh and the brown background color is the water of the pond.
Click on the image to get a higher resolution view of it.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved
Change of perspective
Posted in Art, Butterflies, Flowers, Gardening, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged Alexandria VA, butterfly, Canon 50D, Canon 70-300mm telephoto zoom lens, Huntley Meadows Park, Limenitis archippus, perspective, Viceroy butterfly on September 29, 2013| 6 Comments »
A familiar subject can look quite different when viewed from an unusual angle. It’s a lesson that every photographer is taught early on, but I need constant reminders to vary my approach.
I took this shot of a Viceroy butterfly (Limenitis archippus) yesterday while lying on the ground and pointing my telephoto lens up toward the sky. The perspective caused the shape of the wings to be different and permitted me to see the butterfly’s legs in a way that was completely new.
Not all such experiments are successful, of course, but I think that this one worked out pretty well.
Click on the photo to see a higher resolution view.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved
Late September Viceroy
Posted in Art, Butterflies, Flowers, Gardening, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, Portraits, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, Huntley Meadows Park, Limenitis archippus, Tamron 180mm macro lens, Viceroy butterfly on September 25, 2013| 9 Comments »
The days are getting cooler and leaves are starting to wither and fall, but there are still signs of the lingering summer, like this beautiful Viceroy butterfly (Limenitis archippus) that I photographed this past weekend. 
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Rainbow katydid depositing eggs?
Posted in Flowers, Gardening, Humor, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, Portraits, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, Handsome Meadow Katydid, Huntley Meadows Park, katydid, Orchelimum pulchellum, ovipositing, rainbow katydid, Tamron 180mm macro lens on September 22, 2013| 15 Comments »
As was watching this Handsome Meadow Katydid (Orchelimum pulchellum) through my viewfinder, it suddenly arched its body and assumed a position worthy of an world-class gymnast or yoga master. What was it doing?
My first thought was that the katydid was merely stretching, getting ready for the day’s activities. When you jump around as much as these insects do, you can’t risk a pulled muscle or other injury by not warming up properly.
Over the past year, this rainbow-colored katydid has become my favorite insect, but I confess that I don’t much about their anatomy. Looking over my photos, I realized that I needed to identify the orange-colored body part, a part that I don’t recall observing before, in order to figure out what was going on. What could it possibly be?
Well, it looks like this katydid probably is a female and the orange-colored thing is her ovipositor, the organ used for depositing eggs. So, is she depositing eggs in the photos? I am not sure.
A University of Arkansas website describes the ovipositing for a similar katydid with these words, “An ovipositing female embraces a plant stem with her prothoracic and mesothoracic legs and brings the curved and sword-like ovipositor far forward so its tip can scrape the substrate.” It’s not really helpful when the explanation contains so many words with which I am unfamiliar. I think that I will leave this kind of science to the scientists.
As a photographer, I continue to be amazed by the multi-colored beauty of this fascinating insect and especially by its alluring blue eyes. I know that it’s an illusion, but those eyes often seem to be looking right at me. I’m not sure if this Handsome Meadow Katydid is depositing eggs in these photos, but I am sure that I like the images a lot, including the final image, which shows the katydid in a more “normal” position following her brief series of gymnastics.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Natural still life
Posted in Art, Flowers, Gardening, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, Huntley Meadows Park, Ilex verticillata, still life, Tamron 180mm macro lens, Winterberry on September 20, 2013| 2 Comments »
Autumn is my favorite time of the year, a time when bright spots of spring-like color co-exist with the fading fall colors, a foretaste of the bleak winter landscape to come. Areas of my local marsh are dotted in bright red right now, the berries of a plant that I have been told is Winterberry (Ilex verticillata).
I’ve traipsed through lots of museums in my lifetime and seen innumerable paintings in which artists have arranged fruits and flowers and other objects into paintings that are generally known as “still life paintings.” I had those paintings in mind when I framed this shot in my viewfinder, attempting to capture a pleasing composition of colors and shapes. It’s rare that I don’t crop an image at all, but I decided to show this one composed just as it came out of the camera.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Orange Jewelweed
Posted in Art, Flowers, Gardening, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, fall flowers, Huntley Meadows Park, Impatiens capensis, jewelweed, Orange Jewelweed, Tamron 180mm macro lens on September 20, 2013| 4 Comments »
Summer is fading rapidly, but some flowers continue to bloom, like this beautiful Orange Jewelweed (Impatiens capensis) that I photographed recently at my local marsh.
Wikipedia claims that hummingbirds are the main pollinators of these flowers, which is not surprising, judging from their shape. Every time I pass by a cluster of these plants, I keep my eyes peeled for hummingbirds, but have not seen a single one and suspect that it is too late in the season for them.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Not a fuzzy caterpillar
Posted in Flowers, Gardening, Humor, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, fuzzy caterpillar, Huntley Meadows Park, Tamron 180mm macro lens, Y on September 18, 2013| 5 Comments »
When almost everything that you see looks like a bug, you know it may be time to take a break from photographing insects.
Recently I have been getting shots of different kinds of very fuzzy caterpillars and a posting on a fuzzy, white caterpillar has become my most viewed posting by a significant margin. This has whet my appetite to look even more intently for caterpillars and Monday I was pretty sure that I had spotted one with spiky tufts of hair on the thin branch of a plant. It was only when I got really close that I realized that my eyes had deceived me—it was not another fuzzy caterpillar.
Don’t get me wrong, it ‘s a pretty cool collection of seed pods and tendril-like branches, but it’s definitely not the caterpillar that I had in my mind.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Macro with point-and-shoot in Brussels
Posted in Flowers, Gardening, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, Travel, tagged bee, belgium, brussels, Canon A620, flowers, fly, leaf, macro photography, raindrops on September 14, 2013| 8 Comments »
It’s been gray and rainy almost all this week in Brussels, so many of these shots feature raindrops. When I am away on a trip for business, I generally carry only my point-and-shoot camera, an old Canon A620.
This trip I decided to experiment with the macro mode and see what kind of shots I could get. I was pleasantly surprised with the results and even managed to get some insect shots, despite the fact that I had to get really close to them, compared with the macro lens that I normally use. I never had to worry about harsh sunlight—I never saw any the entire trip—and mostly had to shoot a a high ISO and an almost wide-open aperture.
I did get some shots of the buildings in Brussels, which looked almost monochromatic in the gray light, but will post some of those images when I return home from the trip.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Blue Dasher on red leaf
Posted in Dragonflies, Flowers, Gardening, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, Portraits, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Blue Dasher, Blue Dasher dragonfly, Canon 50D, dragonfly, Huntley Meadows Park, Pachydiplax longipennis, Tamron 180mm macro lens on September 14, 2013| 3 Comments »
I love the mix of colors that resulted when a male Blue Dasher dragonfly (Pachydiplax longipennis) that I was observing chose to perch on a plant with red leaves.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Milkweed bug nymphs
Posted in Bugs, Flowers, Gardening, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, Huntley Meadows Park, large milkweed bugs, Tamron 180mm macro lens on September 14, 2013| 3 Comments »
I continue to be fascinated by the metamorphosis of bugs and was happy to spot these familiar bright red milkweed bug nymphs recently at my local marshland.
Last year, I closely followed the development of Large Milkweed Bugs (Oncopeltus fasciatus) and documented my observations in a posting called Life Phases of the Large Milkweed Bug. I was a bit surprised when that posting turned out to be my fourth most visited posting of the year (it was since slipped to number six on the charts), because it was as much an educational posting as one to highlight my photos.
When I spotted these bugs, there were several clusters of them and the individuals seemed to be gradually separating as they sought out food. The bugs go through five phases (instars) as nymphs before they become adults and these look to be in one of the middle phases of development, judging from the size of the “wings.”
In case someone is not familiar with these bugs, I am attaching a photo from last year of adult milkweed bugs to give an idea of what these nymphs will eventually become.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
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Mike Powell 