Posted in Dragonflies, dragonfly, Humor, Insects, Macro Photography, Photography, Summer, wildlife, tagged Canon 50D, Great Blue Skimmer, Great Blue Skimmer dragonfly, Libellula vibrans, Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge, Tamron 180mm, Woodbridge VA on June 26, 2020| 16 Comments »
Can dragonflies smile? It sure looked like this male Great Blue Skimmer dragonfly (Libellula vibrans) was flashing me a toothy grin when I spotted him last Friday at Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge. Perhaps it was just my imagination, running away with me.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Birds, Nature, Photography, Summer, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, green spring gardens, Mimus polyglottos, mockingbird, Northern Mockingbird, Tamron 180mm on June 25, 2020| 9 Comments »
During a brief visit to Green Spring Gardens on Monday with fellow photographer Cindy Dyer, I was thrilled when this Northern Mockingbird (Mimus polyglottos) landed close to me on an evergreen tree and I was able to capture this shot with my macro lens. I was focusing primarily on flowers and bugs, as one tends to do when visiting a garden, and simply reacted when this unexpected opportunity presented itself.
One of my goals in spending so much time in the field is to become so familiar with my camera gear that I can instinctively capture an image like this without having to think consciously about my camera. It is hard to explain, but it was one of those magical moments when I felt at one with my camera. Yeah, that sounds a little weird, but it is hard to put into words.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Dragonflies, dragonfly, Insects, Nature, Photography, Summer, wildlife, tagged Calico Pennant, Calico Pennant dragonfly, Canon 50D, Celithemis elisa, Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge, Tamron 180mm, Woodb on June 24, 2020| 19 Comments »
Although Calico Pennant dragonflies (Celithemis elisa) are quite small, about 1.3 inches (33 mm) in length, they pack a lot of color into their tiny bodies and wings. Adult females have bright yellow markings, as shown in the first photo, and wonderful designs on their wings that appear to be outlined in gold when the sun hits them from the right angle. Adult males have bright red markings that look almost like little hearts and have similarly detailed patches on their wings, although the pattern and colors are different from those of the females.
What about the dragonfly in the third photo? Its coloration is similar to that of the adult female, but it is in fact a juvenile male that will eventually turn red. How can I tell it is a male? If you look closely at the tips of the abdomen (the “tail”) in all three images, you will note that the terminal appendages are similar in the final two photos and are different from those in the first photo. Normally I will try to rely on those anatomical features when trying to tell the gender of a subject, because in quite a large number of dragonfly species, juvenile males and females have the same coloration.
I spotted all three of these Calico Pennant dragonflies during a visit last Friday to Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge, one of my favorite places to spend time with my camera. This refuge was one of the few facilities in our area to remain open during the stay-home period and got a bit too crowded for my taste. Now that other parks have reopened, the number of visitors has dropped to much lower levels and I am able to enjoy the solitude of nature once again.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Art, Flowers, Nature, Photography, Summer, tagged Canon 50D, Claude Monet, Nymphéas, Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge, Tamron 180mm, water lilies, water lily, Woodbridge VA on June 23, 2020| 11 Comments »
There was only a single water lily in bloom at a pond at Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge last week, but its beauty brightened the entire area and brought a smile to my face. Water lilies are one of the reasons why Claude Monet is one of my favorite painters.
Monet did some 250 oil paintings of water lilies (“Nymphéas” in French), many depicting the garden at his home in Giverny, and they were the main focus of his artistic production during the last thirty years of his like, according to Wikipedia.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in damselfly, Nature, Photography, Summer, wildlife, tagged Calopteryx maculata, Canon 50D, Ebony Jewelwing, Ebony Jewelwing damselfly, Fairfax County Virginia, mating ebony jewelwings, sidewards heart, Tamron 180mm on June 23, 2020| 11 Comments »
Ebony Jewelwings (Calopteryx maculata) are everywhere in some of the forest streams I like to explore at this time of the year. Still, I love when I can get a good angle on these beautiful damselflies when they are in wheel position and forming a sidewards heart, as was the case with this pair that I spotted last Thursday in Fairfax County.
Yes, as some of you already know, the damselflies are in the process of mating, with the male on the right and the female on the left.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Flowers, Gardening, Photography, Summer, tagged Canon 50D, Canon 60mm, Cindy Dyer, daffodil, Hymenocallis narcissiflora, Hymenocallis x festalis, Peruvian Daffodil on June 22, 2020| 14 Comments »
When I spotted this strange-looking flower yesterday in the garden of my photography mentor and neighbor Cindy Dyer, I had no idea what it was—she informed me that it was a Peruvian Daffodil (Hymenocallis narcissiflora). This flower, according to information at gardeningknowhow.com, is native to the Andes of Peru and is a member of the daffodil and amaryllis family, Amaryllidaceae. Its flowers resemble a “spidery” version of these flowers, as you can see in my photos. The elongated, sometimes curved, petals have led to the plant’s alternate common names, “spider lily” and “basket flower.”
Further exploration on the internet led me to wonder if this is actually the hybrid version known as Hymenocallis x festalis, a hybrid of the aforementioned Peruvian Daffodil as the female parent and the Hymenocallis. longipetala, another Peruvian flower, as the male parent, as detailed in an article by the University of Arkansas Division of Agriculture. Fearing that I would get sucked deeper into the world of plant ancestry, I stopped my research there.
Personally, I think that the name “spider lily” fits best and maybe that that is the name I will use in the future to refer to this crazy-looking flower.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Butterflies, Flowers, Nature, Photography, Summer, tagged black-eyed susan, Canon 50D, Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge, Rudbeckia hirta, skipper, skipper butterfly, Tamron 180mm, Woodbridge VA on June 22, 2020| 4 Comments »
Skipper butterflies are common and Black-eyed Susans (Rudbeckia hirta) are common too, but what a lovely combination they made when I spotted them together on Friday at Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Dragonflies, dragonfly, Insects, Nature, Photography, Summer, wildlife, tagged Arigomphus villosipes, Canon 50D, chasing unicorns, Fairfax County Virginia, female Unicorn Clubtail, Tamron 180mm, Unicorn Clubtail, Unicorn Clubtail dragonfly on June 21, 2020| 6 Comments »
Do you believe in unicorns? I am always happy when I manage to spot a Unicorn Clubtail (Arigomphus villosipes), a beautiful dragonfly species in which both sexes have a small hornlike projection between their eyes that gives rise to their common name. I recently spotted the dragonflies in this posting while exploring a small pond in Fairfax County, where I live.
This is the only clubtail species in our area that prefers ponds and marshes over streams and rivers, according to the Dragonflies of Northern Virginia website. It is fairly easy to identify this species, because of the rusty-edged club at the bottom portion of the dragonfly’s abdomen and the very visible bright tip. Male Unicorn Clubtails tend to fly short patrols and perch quite often on low vegetation, so it is not hard for me to spot them if I am in the appropriate environment. The third photo below shows a male in a typical perching pose.
Female Unicorn Clubtails, on the other hand, are hard to find—I do not know where they hang out, but it seems that they come to the water only when they are ready to mate. The only two times that I have ever seen a female Unicorn Clubtail dragonfly was when when she was ovipositing, like this one in the first two photos that I spotted this past Thursday. I captured these shots as she hovered momentarily in the air, getting ready to tap the water again with the tip of her abdomen to release more eggs.
Chasing unicorns? Yes, that is how I enjoy spending my time in the wild.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Dragonflies, dragonfly, Insects, Nature, Photography, Summer, wildlife, tagged bee, bee lunch, Canon 50D, Epiaeschna heros, Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge, Swamp Darner, Swamp Darner dragonfly, Tamron 180mm, Woodbridge VA on June 20, 2020| 15 Comments »
I was really happy that I was able to track this Swamp Darner dragonfly (Epiaeschna heros) after it zoomed by me yesterday afternoon at Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge. When I finally caught up to it, the large dragonfly was hanging vertically, high in a tree among the leaves, leisurely munching on its bee lunch in the shade.
Yes, I recognize that bees play an important role as pollinators and highlighted that in yesterday’s posting. Bees, however, also serve as a food source for other creatures higher up on the food chain—they are all part of the circle of life.
Swamp Darners are among the largest dragonflies in our area, about 3.4 inches (86 mm) in length. I really like the description that Kevin Munroe provided of Swamp Darners on the wonderful Dragonflies of Northern Virginia website. “I often tell people on dragonfly walks that if they see a rhino with wings, it’s a swamp darner. Slight exaggeration, perhaps, but they are pretty impressive. June is their month and the best time to see them, as they cruise, slow and purposefully, over shallow, swampy pools, or hunt high over nearby meadows.”
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Birds, Nature, Photography, Summer, wildlife, tagged baby eagle, Bald Eagle, Canon 50D, eaglet, Haliaeetus leucocephalus, Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge, Tamron 180mm, Woodbridge VA on June 20, 2020| 19 Comments »
It has been a month since I visited the Bald Eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus) nest at Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge, where I spotted an eaglet on 19 May and wrote a posting entitled “One little eaglet.” Yesterday I traveled to the refuge to check on the baby eagle and was a little surprised to find that the authorities had removed the barriers that had blocked access to the nesting area, which is adjacent to a trail. Did this mean that the eaglet had fledged and the family had left the nest?
I was happy to discover that the eaglet was still there, has grown considerably in size over the past month, and was sitting tall at one edge of the nest. The leaf coverage has also grown, making it pretty tough to get an unobstructed view of the little eagle. The vegetation also hid the presence of one of the parent eagles that flew away to a nearby grove of trees when I approached.
It is somehow reassuring to see that the cycle of life has continued undisturbed as our lives have been turned upside down by the global pandemic. I celebrate the new life of this young eagle and all of the other creatures who have begun their lives this spring and wish them success as they learn to navigate the challenges of their lives.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Bees, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, Summer, tagged Alexandria VA, bee, Canon 50D, Cindy Dyer, Eastern Carpenter Bee, globe thistle, lamb's ear, lavender, Runnymeade, Tamron 180mm, Xylocopa virginica on June 19, 2020| 26 Comments »
I love bees and spent quite a while on Monday in the garden of my friend and neighbor Cindy Dyer observing them and trying to photograph them. I had no idea that lamb’s ear plants produce flowers, but the bee in the first photo certainly was aware of that fact when I spotted it busily at work. The bee in the second shot decided to try an acrobatic move to gain access to the nectar in the lavender plant that swung wildly each time the bee landed on it. In the final shot, I captured the bee as it was crawling all over a flower of a cool-looking globe thistle plant.
I am not very good at identifying bees, but I think these bees are all Eastern Carpenter Bees (Xylocopa virginica). Unlike bumblebees that have fuzzy abdomens, carpenter bees have shiny, relatively hairless abdomens.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Dragonflies, dragonfly, Nature, Photography, Summer, wildlife, tagged Arrowhead Spiketail, Arrowhead Spiketail dragonfly, Canon 50D, Cordulegaster obliqua, Fairfax County Virginia, male Arrowhead Spiketail, Rolling Stones, Tamron 180mm on June 17, 2020| 21 Comments »
In an ideal world, I would be able to photograph a dragonfly up close and from multiple angles. My close-up shots of a Gray Petaltail dragonfly in yesterday’s posting were the result of almost perfect circumstances. Real life, alas, is rarely that perfect. My entire life, it seems, I have heard the words of the Rolling Stones, reminding me that “You can’t always get what you want, but if you try sometimes, you might find you get what you need.”
Last week I spent almost an entire day with fellow dragonfly enthusiast and blogger Walter Sanford searching for dragonflies in a variety of habitats. It was a long, grueling effort, conducted often in the hot direct sunlight and sometime involving wading through waist-high vegetation. Walter and I have worked together often enough over the years that we have developed some routines. Most of the time we try to stay in sight of each other, so if one of us spooks a dragonfly, the other has a chance of being able to track it to its next perch.
Towards the end of day, we had wandered a little farther apart than usual when I heard Walter tell me emphatically to stop—he had spotted a dragonfly. I was in an awkward position when I stopped and I could barely see the dragonfly through the lens of the camera. It was hanging vertically from a thin stalk of vegetation that was swaying vigorously back and forth in a breeze that had suddenly kicked up. My heart started to beat a bit faster when Walter told me that it looked to be a male Arrowhead Spiketail dragonfly (Cordulegaster obliqua), an uncommon species that I have seen only a few times.
So there I was, frozen in place far from my subject, trying desperately to focus manually on my moving subject that I knew might take off at any moment. I tried to pay attention to the background as I composed my shots, bending my body and flexing my knees to get some minor variations in my angle of view. What you see below are three of those variations. I like the way that they captured the Arrowhead Spiketail in the environment in which we found it—I may not have gotten what I wanted, but perhaps I got what I needed, i.e. I got some decent shots of my subject.
Walter observed this dragonfly from an entirely different angle of view and, as always, approaches things from a different perspective. I encourage you to check out his blog posting today “Arrowhead Spiketail dragonfly (male)” to see his photos and to read about his reactions to seeing this uncommon dragonfly in an environment that was not “according to the book.”
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Dragonflies, dragonfly, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, Summer, wildlife, tagged Canon 50D, Fairfax County Virginia, Gray Petaltail, Gray Petaltail dragonfly, Gray Petaltail eyes, Tachopteryx thoreyi, Tamron 180mm on June 16, 2020| 14 Comments »
Gray Petaltail dragonflies (Tachopteryx thoreyi) are one of the friendliest and tamest dragonfly species that I have encountered. If you hang around with them often enough, they are almost certain to land on you, particularly if you are wearing gray clothing that somehow reminds them of a tree. It is a little hard not to flinch when one of these relatively large dragonflies (3 inches (75 mm) in length) perches on your head or shoulder.
Gray Petaltails will also let you get pretty close to them when they are perched on trees. Quite frequently, though, they are perched above eye level, so being that close does not allow you to capture close-up images. This past Saturday when I was hunting for dragonflies with my friend Walter Sanford, we spotted a Gray Petaltail perched on a fallen branch that was at knee level. After we had both taken some shots, Walter challenged me to see how close I could get to the dragonfly to capture images with my macro lens.
The first shot shows one of my attempts to get a head-on shot. It is very cool to look another creature straight in the eyes, but it is rare that one will permit you to do so, especially at such close range. It seemed clear to me that the dragonfly was quite aware of my presence, but did not consider me to be a threat.
I took the second shot from the side as I moved even closer to my subject. I was trying my best to capture some of the details of the dragonfly’s eye that was nearest to me and was not concerned that most of the rest of its head was out of focus. If you double-click on the image, you can see some of the ommatidia, the individual optical units that make up a dragonfly’s amazing multi-faceted compound eyes.
If you want to learn more about dragonfly eyes, check out a wonderful article at medium.com entitled “30,000 Facets Give Dragonflies A Different Perspective: The Big Compound Eye In The Sky“. Scientists, for example, know that the thousands of ommatidia produce a mosaic of “pictures,” but how exactly this visual mosaic is integrated in the insect brain is still not known.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Dragonflies, dragonfly, Insects, Nature, Photography, Summer, wildlife, tagged Black Saddlebags, Black Saddlebags dragonfly, Canon 50D, Fairfax County Virginia, ovipositing, Tamron 180mm, tandem position, Tramea lacerata on June 15, 2020| 15 Comments »
Yesterday I posted a photo of a male Common Whitetail dragonfly that was hovering in the air to fight off rivals and protect the female with which he had mated as she deposited her eggs in the water, a practice know as hover guarding. In some dragonfly species, the male will remain attached to the female throughout the entire process of oviposition, a process known as contact guarding. In other dragonfly species, the female is entirely on her own to deposit the eggs.
Black Saddlebags dragonflies (Tramea lacerata) use a different technique for guarding that I like to call “release and catch.” After mating is completed, the male and female Black Saddlebags fly together over the water in a tandem position, with the male in the front. At certain moments, for reasons that I cannot determine, the male releases the female and she drops down to the water and taps it to release one or more eggs. As she rises up out of the water, the male catches the female and reattaches the tip of his abdomen to the back of her head. They continue to fly in tandem and repeat this cycle multiple times.
On Saturday I was fortunate to be able to capture this sequence of shots that documents the entire process. Most of the time these dragonflies chose spots that were too far away for me to photograph them, but in this case they flew a bit closer to the edge of the pond where I was standing. As you probably suspect, I had to crop in a good amount to highlight the action for you, given that I was shooting with my trusty 180mm macro lens, which has a more limited reach than the lens that I use when photographing birds.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Nature, Photography, Reptiles, snake, Summer, wildlife, tagged Canon 50D, Fairfax County Virginia, Nerodia sipedon, Northern Water Snake, Northern Watersnake, Tamron 180mm on June 14, 2020| 7 Comments »
When you are walking near the edge of the water, it is good to look down from time to time. Sharp-eyed Walter Sanford, a fellow dragonfly fanatic, spotted this Northern Water Snake (Nerodia sipedon) as we were searching for dragonflies in Fairfax County, Virginia last Monday. This is a non-poisonous snake, but I have read that it will bite and the wound may bleed a lot, because its saliva contains a mild anticoagulant.
Three years ago I had an encounter with a similar snake and watched it capture and devour a catfish. If you missed that posting, click on this link and check out “Snake captures catfish“—if you are like me, you will be fascinated and slightly horrified by the encounter and may avoid wading in the water at the edge of rivers for a time.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Dragonflies, dragonfly, Nature, Photography, Summer, wildlife, tagged Canon 50D, Common Whitetail, Common Whitetail dragonfly, Fairfax County Virginia, Plathemis lydia, Tamron 180mm on June 14, 2020| 11 Comments »
What is the most common dragonfly where you live? Over the last few weeks I have noticed more and more dragonflies at the ponds and marshes that I visit, an indication that many of the summer dragonfly species have emerged. Here in Northern Virginia, the most common dragonfly is probably the appropriately named Common Whitetail dragonfly (Plathemis lydia). This species is one of the first to appear in the spring and one of the last to disappear in the fall. They are easy to identify and are such habitat generalists that they can be found almost anywhere.
Many of you know that I will often spend lots of time looking for rare dragonfly species, but I try not to take for granted the more common ones that many people (and photographers) ignore. The first image shows a male Common Whitetail that was hovering for a moment as he kept watch over a female as she deposited eggs in the water.
The second image is a portrait of a male Common Whitetail as he perched on some vegetation overhanging the water. If you look at the angle at which I took the shot, you can probably guess that I was at risk of falling into the water when I took the shot. The final shot is a portrait of a beautiful female Common Whitetail. When they are young, males have a similar coloration on their bodies as the females, but the wing patterns are different. You can also tell the genders apart by looking at the tip of the abdomen (the “tail”) where the terminal appendages are sexually differentiated.
As is often the case for species saddled with the name “common,” Common Whitetail dragonflies are uncommonly beautiful.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in damselfly, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, Summer, wildlife, tagged Argia apicalis, Argia fumipennis, Argia fumipennis violacea, Argia moesta, Blue-fronted Dancer, Blue-fronted Dancer damselfly, Canon 50D, Powdered Dancer, Powdered Dancer damselfly, Tamron 180mm, Variable Dancer, Variable Dancer damselfly on June 12, 2020| 20 Comments »
The genus Argia, commonly known as dancers, is a large New World group of damselflies. Although the genus name Argia, αργία in Ancient Greek, is translated as “idleness,” dancers are quite active and alert damselflies, according to Wikipedia. Why are they called “dancers?” They are known as dancers “because of the distinctive jerky form of flight they use which contrasts with the straightforward direct flight of bluets, forktails, and other pond damselflies.” I wonder if I am part damselfly, because “distinctive” and “jerky” are definitely adjectives that could be used to describe my attempts at dancing.
This past week, I have seen three different species of dancers. The first one, the Variable Dancer (Argia fumipennis violacea) has perhaps the most strikingly beautiful color of any of the dragonflies and damselflies that I have seen—I love that shade of violet. Some of my longtime readers may have noted that a photo of a Variable Dancer has been the banner image for this blog for many years.
The damselfly in the second image is a Blue-fronted Dancer (Argia apicalis). The thorax of the males of this species are almost completely blue, with only hairline stripes in the middle of their backs and shoulders.
The final damselfly is a Powdered Dancer (Argia moesta), our only mostly white damselfly. As you can see in the photo, members of this species often like to perch on stones at the edge of the water. I chose to leave this image mostly uncropped, because of the way that it shows the water moving around the stone and the submerged stones on the stream bottom in the background.
All of this talk of dancers brings to mind a country music song that I really like by Lee Ann Womack called “I Hope You Dance.” I am really touched by the basic message of the song—when you get the choice to sit it out or dance, I hope you dance.
Here is the first verse of the song, just in case you have never heard it:
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in damselfly, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, Summer, wildlife, tagged American Rubyspot, American Rubyspot damselfly, Canon 50D, Fairfax County Virginia, Hetaerina americana, Tamron 180mm on June 11, 2020| 20 Comments »
I was really excited to spot this male American Rubyspot damselfly (Hetaerina americana) on Monday while exploring in Fairfax County, Virginia with my good friend and fellow dragonfly enthusiast Walter Sanford. I have seen this species only a few times before, but had no trouble identifying it, thanks to the distinctive “rubyspot” on its wings.
The first image gives you the best view of this gorgeous little damselfly, but the second shot is my favorite. I love to look straight into the eyes of dragonflies and damselflies—they have an almost hypnotic effect on me. Whenever I get the chance, I try to get a close-up shot of the eyes of these acrobatic insects that fascinate and delight me endlessly.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Nature, Photography, Reptiles, Summer, wildlife, tagged Broad-headed Skink, Canon 50D, Lorton VA, Occoquan Regional Park, Plestiodon laticeps, skink, Tamron 180mm on June 10, 2020| 16 Comments »
I usually try to fill the frame as much as possible when I photograph wildlife, but it is equally cool sometimes to take a wider shot that shows the subject’s environment. That was the case with this photo of a Broad-headed Skink (Plestiodon laticeps) that I took last Friday at Occoquan Regional Park. As many of you know, during this time of the year I shoot most often with a macro lens that does not zoom. When I spotted this skink from a distance, I took this shot, suspecting that the skink would scamper away if I got any closer. As soon as I took one more step, the skink disappeared under the tree.
I love the contrast between the bright orange head of the skink and the vibrant green moss on the trunk of the fallen tree. This is probably a male skink, given that the head in males becomes bright orange, as in the photo, during the mating season (spring) but fades and reduces in size in other times of the year.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Art, Flowers, Gardening, Nature, Photography, Summer, tagged Alexandria VA, Asiatic lily, Canon 50D, Canon 60mm, Cindy Dyer, lily, Runnymeade on June 10, 2020| 7 Comments »
It is lily season now in the garden of my neighbor and photography mentor Cindy Dyer. Here are a few photos that I took yesterday morning of some of the lilies blooming in her beautiful garden. It is always reassuring to know that I do not have to travel far to find colorful subjects to photograph—as a photographer and graphic designer, Cindy chooses flowers to plant that she know are photogenic.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Art, Dragonflies, dragonfly, Nature, Photography, Summer, wildlife, tagged Canon 50D, Eastern Amberwing, Eastern Amberwing dragonfly, Fort Belvoir VA, Jackson Miles Abbott Wetland Refuge, Perithemis tenera, Tamron 180mm on June 9, 2020| 10 Comments »
Every year I enjoy taking photos of dragonflies perching on a piece of rusted rebar that sticks a few inches out of the water of a small pond at Jackson Miles Abbott Wetland Refuge. I have seen dragonflies of several species use this particular perch, but photographically speaking my favorite is probably a male Eastern Amberwing dragonfly (Perithemis tenera) like the one in this photo from last Friday—the orange-rust colors of the dragonfly and its perch are complementary and soften what might otherwise be a jarring juxtaposition of the natural and man-made worlds.
You can’t see it really well, but there is a spider, probably a long-jawed spider, visible onthe lower portion of the rebar. I don’t know for sure if that spider could capture the dragonfly, but it is a potentially dangerous situation for the dragonfly and in the past I have photographed several dragonflies that had fallen prey to spiders.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Butterflies, Insects, Nature, Photography, Summer, wildlife, tagged Canon 50D, Fort Belvoir VA, Jackson Miles Abbott Wetland Refuge, Papilio troilus, Spicebush Swallowtail, Spicebush Swallowtail butterfly, Tamron 180mm on June 8, 2020| 11 Comments »
We have a number of different dark swallowtail butterflies in the area in which I live, which can make identification a little tricky. I spotted this beautiful butterfly last Friday at Jackson Miles Abbott Wetland Refuge and believe that it is a Spicebush Swallowtail butterfly (Papilio troilus). The perfect condition of its wings suggest to me that it has emerged quite recently—as we move deeper into summer, I often spot butterflies with tattered wings.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Dragonflies, dragonfly, Insects, Nature, Photography, Summer, wildlife, tagged Canon 50D, Eastern Amberwing, Eastern Amberwing dragonfly, Fort Belvoir VA, Jackson Miles Abbott Wetland Refuge, Perithemis tenera, Tamron 180mm macro on June 6, 2020| 11 Comments »
Last week I spotted my first Eastern Amberwing dragonflies (Perithemis tenera) of the season at Jackson Miles Abbott Wetland Refuge. These distinctively colored dragonflies are a frequent sight throughout the summer as they buzz about over the waters of ponds. Eastern Amberwings are small, even by dragonfly standards, with a total length of less than an inch (25 mm) and are considered to be a wasp mimic. According to Wikipedia, “The Eastern Amberwing dragonfly is one of the only types of dragonfly that actively mimics a wasp. The yellow and brown stripes on its abdomen encourage predators to stay away. When perched, they will wiggle their abdomen and wings in a wasp-like fashion to deter other animals from eating it.”
My second and third shots are portraits of perched male Eastern Amberwing dragonflies that were carefully composed and sharp, but my favorite image of the day is the dynamic shot of two dragonflies in flight. It may not be obvious what is going on in the photo, so let me explain. After mating, the female in the upper left corner is getting ready to deposit her eggs in the water, while the male in the lower right corner hovers in the air, ready to keep any rivals from interfering with the process.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Flowers, Nature, Photography, Summer, tagged Canon 50D, lotus, lotus bud, lotus seed pod, Meadowlark Botanical Gardens, Tamron 180mm, Vienna VA on September 13, 2019| 10 Comments »
I thought it was too late in the season for lotuses, so I was thrilled to see them at Meadowlark Botanical Gardens earlier this week in bloom, as seed pods. and most surprisingly as buds.
I am fascinated by lotuses in all of their stages. I love the three-dimensional quality of the flowers and the way that you can look into the center of them. Lotus seed pods are a little creepy—from certain angles they look like a cluster of eyeballs that follow you around. By contrast, I always feel a sense of calm when I am enjoying the simple beauty of the lotus buds.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in damselfly, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, Summer, wildlife, tagged Big Bluet, Big Bluet damselfly, Canon 50D, Enallagma durum, female big bluet, Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge, Tamron 180mm, Woodbridge VA on September 6, 2019| 5 Comments »
With a name that includes the word “bluet,” you might expect that this female Big Bluet damselfly (Enallagma durum) would be blue, but obviously that is not the case here. There is a blue female variant in this species, but this one appears to be the olive variant. Damselfly identification is difficult under the best of circumstances, because so many of them share the same colors—only the patterns help you distinguish among them. In this case, size helps a bit too, because Big Bluets are in fact larger than many other damselflies.
As I was exploring Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge a few days, I was fortunate that this damselfly chose to perch at almost eye level on a stalk of Eastern Gamagrass, which let me get a clear shot with the sky in the background. Most of the time damselflies like this perch lower to the ground in areas with denser vegetation.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Art, Dragonflies, dragonfly, Insects, Nature, Photography, Summer, wildlife, tagged Canon 50D, Eastern Amberwing, Eastern Amberwing dragonfly, Fort Belvoir VA, Jackson Miles Abbott Wetland Refuge, male Eastern Amberwing, Perithemis tenera, Tamron 180mm on September 5, 2019| 8 Comments »
I guess that the main subject of this image is the tiny male Eastern Amberwing dragonfly (Perithemis tenera), but I must confess that I was equally drawn to the curving shapes of the branches sticking out of the water during my recent trip to Jackson Miles Abbott Wetland Refuge. Normally I try to fill as much of my frame with my primary subject by using a zoom lens or by moving closer, but in this case I actually moved back in order to be able to capture more of the vegetation.
I really like the way that the warm amber color of the aptly named Eastern Amberwing stands out against the muted tones of the rest of the image. The style of this image is different from most of my shots (assuming that I have an identifiable style), but I enjoy mixing it up from time to time by shooting from different angle or distances.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, Summer, tagged Alexandria VA, aphids, Canon 50D, green spring gardens, ladybug, Tamron 180mm on September 4, 2019| 3 Comments »
The milkweed plants were dirty and dried up, but I knew from past experience that there might be ladybugs crawling around on them. The first two plants that I checked were full of aphids, a favorite food of ladybugs, but I did not see any ladybugs at all. As I approached a third plant, I saw a flash of red and spotted a small ladybug crawling quickly down the stem of the plant. I was not as close as I could have like to have been, but managed to capture some images before the ladybug disappeared from sight.
I like the way that this shot turned out because the reddish-orange of the ladybug really stands out against the blues and greens in the rest of the photos. In case you are curious, the little specks of yellow are aphids. In this case, the aphids were safe, for this ladybug seemed to be in too much of a hurry to stop for a snack.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Art, Butterflies, Nature, Photography, Summer, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, Danaus plexippus, green spring gardens, lantana, Monarch, monarch butterfly, Tamron 180mm on September 3, 2019| 12 Comments »
Monarch butterflies (Danaus plexippus) are beautiful in any situation, but when you surround them with red, orange, and yellow flowers, they absolutely explode with color. I was thrilled when I spotted this Monarch during a short visit to Green Spring Gardens this past Saturday morning. The butterfly was initially quite skittish and flew all around before finally settling on what I believe to be some kind of lantana flower. I had to maneuver around to try to get a good shooting position, but the butterfly stayed put for a minute and accommodated me. I was super happy when I managed to include some of the colorful flowers in the background and I just love the way that the colors work so well together.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Butterflies, Flowers, Insects, Nature, Photography, Summer, tagged Alexandria VA, American Lady butterfly, American Painted Lady butterfly, Canon 50D, green spring gardens, Tamron 180mm, Vanessa virginiensis on September 2, 2019| 12 Comments »
I spotted this beautiful American Lady butterfly (Vanessa virginiensis) during a quick visit this past Saturday morning to Green Spring Gardens, a county-run historic garden not far from where I live. A lot of butterflies were active that day, but my eyes were immediately drawn to this American Lady, a species that I do not see very often. I had to chase it a bit before it stopped to feed on this flower, which was so popular that the American Lady had to share it with a much smaller skipper butterfly. The flower was growing near a fenced in area of public plots where people grow vegetables and the fence caused the striped effect in the background.
Although I spend most of my time photographing subjects in the wild, it was nice to visit a more cultivated place that was still ablaze with summer colors. I am quite conscious of the fact that the summer is slowly slipping away.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in damselfly, Insects, Nature, Photography, Summer, wildlife, tagged Argia moesta, Canon 50D, Fairfax County Virginia, Powdered Dancer, Powdered Dancer damselfly, stream, Tamron 180mm on September 1, 2019| 10 Comments »
What do you see first when you look at this image? Do you see the beautiful colors, textures, and shapes of the rock that makes up both the foreground and the background? Are you drawn to the lines and somber coloration of the Powdered Dancer damselfly (Argia moesta) and its shadow? Do you focus on the damselfly’s brightly shining gray eye?
I spotted this little damselfly this past week while exploring a creek in Fairfax County with fellow dragonfly enthusiast Walter Sanford. There is a simplicity to this image that I find really appealing. I especially like the limited color palette and the sense of harmony in the way that the colors work together.
What do you think?
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Posted in Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, Summer, wildlife, tagged Canon 50D, Fairfax County Virginia, horsefly, Tamron 180mm on August 31, 2019| 9 Comments »
Really, an image of a horsefly? That sentence fragment was part of an internal dialogue that I had with myself when considering whether to post this image. I know that most people find flies to be fairly disgusting. However, I was really taken with the details that I managed to capture when this enormous horsefly—it looked to be about 2 inches (50 mm) in length—perched in front of me earlier this week as I was resting alongside a rocky creek.
The fly’s eyes seem to have multiple colors and its body has several wonderful patterns. It is not all beauty, though, and I find those sharp points protruding from the face to be menacing, an impression enhanced by the enlarged shadow that cast by the fly.
I have to admit that I was fascinated by this giant horsefly and that fascination prompted me to post the photo despite my initial inhibitions. What do you think?
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Mike Powell 