Waves. Rocks. Brightly colored leaves.
An experimental photo. I took a long exposure of the stream, and panned the camera along the length of the stream. Anything not changing comes out as a pure streak, while the bubbles and other features that changed over the length of the exposure stand out.
Long weekend in Southeastern Maine! First time exploring the area.
This was tough…wasn’t easy to take photographs I was happy with. Ended up with a lot of longer exposure photos of the waves, the birds, and the waves and birds together. Not sure how good they will look to other people!
Trying to capture the movement of the birds as they swayed up and down the beach with the waves:
A flock of birds in motion:
This lovely Cicindela sexguttata, Six-spotted Tiger Beetle, was waiting to welcome us home when we got back. Definitely has sustained quite a bit of damage, but lovely nonetheless.
Late afternoon, in the late afternoon of the year. Some insects, and a stunning show of light.
“Noctuid moth, Heliothis or relative”
“Anagrapha falcifera”
Fall late afternoon backlighting! Love the light.
Tachinidae, Trichopoda.
Tachinid fly, I think.
Halictus, I believe.
I’m not sure how I got the light in this photo to come out like this!
Alydidae.
Now the Borderland State Park part of the trip.
Such a stunning portrait of a robber fly:
Probably Platygastridae.
Time for the next generation of Leucauge venusta:
Perhaps Diapriidae, according to the lack of venation on the wings.
Psychidid (aka drain fly):
Some insect signs:
Sunset
Platygastridae? Eupelmidae? Pteromalidae? That’s three guesses at the family level, and I’m still probably wrong.
A sawfly, not sure which one.
Perhaps Pimplinae/Pimpla, female?
Love this carpenter bee, Ceratina.
Perhaps Megachile leafcutter bee?
Pamphiliidae sawfly?
Entiminae. Not sure which.
Ceresa palmeri
Dermestid?
Exciting find!
Maybe: Flies (Diptera) » Orthorrhapha » Stratiomyomorpha » Soldier flies (Stratiomyidae) » Sarginae » Ptecticus » Ptecticus trivittatus
Erigoninae?
Neoscona crucifera?
Mecaphesa?
Agelenopsis in Agelenidae:
A bagworm cocoon, Psychidae.
Pill bug, Armadillidium vulgare.
Crickets = Gryllidae. Is this one Nemobius sylvestris?
Pisaurina mira
Poecilus chalcites in Carabidae
Androchirus erythropus in Tenebrionidae? Not great. Capnochroa fuliginosa? Not perfect.
Strongylium tenuicolle or S. terminatum look best.
Xylopinus or Haplandres, Alobates pensylvanicus, less so.
Probably Maladera castanea
Euparthenos nobilis
Looks similar, but not identical, to Agonopterix robiniella, Four-Dotted Agonopterix (a grass miner moth). Less similar to Acleris forskaleana, Hairnet Acleris.
Archaeognatha, probably Trigoniophthalmus alternatus (aka bristletail).
Beautiful Cerambycidae. Eburia, not so common: Water, Rove, Scarab, Long-horned, Leaf and Snout Beetles (Polyphaga) » Series Cucujiformia » Long-horned and Leaf Beetles (Chrysomeloidea) » Long-horned Beetles (Cerambycidae) » Cerambycinae » Eburiini » Eburia
Hahncappsia: Pyralid and Crambid Snout Moths (Pyraloidea) » Crambid Snout Moths (Crambidae) » Pyraustinae » Hahncappsia
Lampyridae.
A caddisfly
Desmia sp.
Similar, but not the same as the Maple Trumpet Skeletonizer, Catastega aceriella.
Green lacewing, Chrysopidae. Not sure which one.
I think Reticulated Fruitworm, Cenopis reticulatana.
Common barklouse, Psocus leidyi. Looks like an android.
Two weeks at Keuka Lake in upstate New York! Pretty much all the photos were taken on the property of the house we stayed in, itself. Some woods, some leafy plants, some flowers.
Beautiful Reduviidae nymph, probably Zelus luridus, and prey.
Woolly aphid, Eriosomatinae, perhaps Eriosoma?
Acanthocephala:
Reduviidae, Phymata pennsylvanicus. And the beetle is Typocerus velutinus.
This has to be the world’s laziest ambush bug, and the world’s most oblivious beetle. They stood there in this proximity for at least ten minutes.
Is it in Carabidae? I don’t see a match.
Is it a Curculionid? The size of the spots on the pronotum don’t seem to match. The antenna is unusual for Curculionidae, but seems to match that best. Cryptorhynchinae? Entiminae?
Maybe something like Otiorhynchus sulcatus? That actually looks perfect, I’m happy with that ID.
Sumitrosis inaequalis
Chrysomelidae, Galerucinae, Trirhabda. Not sure what species.
Cleridae, Enoclerus nigripes.
Syrphidae, Toxomerus geminatus.
Calliphoridae? Wing venation details would be useful, note the straight-ish vein. Maybe Lucilia sp.? I really know so little about Diptera.
I think “Acalyptratae” » Lauxanioidea » Lauxaniidae » Homoneura. But I can’t rule out Rhagoletis basiola in Tephritidae.
Trichopoda, feather legged flies,
Calyptratae » Oestroidea » Parasitic Flies (Tachinidae) » Phasiinae » Gymnosomatini » Feather-legged Flies (Trichopoda) » Subgenus Galactomyia (Trichopoda Subgenus Galactomyia) » Trichopoda pennipes
Dolichopodidae. Condylostylus is the most usual genus to classify them into.
I’m hesitant to even guess Anthyomyiidae, because it’s such a long shot and a I’m not really basing it on anything concrete.
Love these Condylostylus, assuming that’s the correct Dolichopodidae.
Not a clue.
Dolichopodidae.
Ichneumonidae? There are some Pimplinae that look a bit like this.
Encyrtidae, but maybe Eupelmidae instead?
Polistes fuscatus, in Vespidae.
Trypoxylon. Distinguished from Pemphredoninae by the little notch protruding into the eye at the middle level.
Vespidae. Polistes dominula.
Pompilidae? Priocnemis? Auplopos? Both Priocnemis and Auplopus have been suggested by people who know more than I do.
Further Pimplinae?
Halictidae. Augochlora pura?
Halictidae. Looks like Halictus.
Carpenter bee, Ceratina? I would guess subgenus Zadontomerus.
Augochlora pura.
Perhaps Apoidea –> Crabronidae, such as Crabronina –> Ectemnius or Crabro? Alternatively, Crabronidae –> Philanthus (beewolf)? I think Ectemnius or Crabro or something similar are the best match.
Distinguishing Crabro from similar genera (Crossecerus, Ectemnius, and Lestica)(3):
Recurrent vein ending before distal third of submarginal cell
Ocelli forming a low triangle
Lacking orbital foveae (sharp groove along inner eye margin)
Males front tibiae distinctly expanded
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Distinguishing Ectemnius from similar genera (Crabro, Crossecerus, and Lestica)(3):
Recurrent vein ending in distal third of submarginal cell
Ocelli forming a low triangle
Lacking orbital foveae (sharp groove along inner eye margin)
Upper frons evenly punctate
Identified as Cerceris in Solitary Wasps Forum, Facebook
Cerceris in Crabronidae.
Platycryptus undatus, tan jumping spider, Salticidae.
Theridiidae spider, what’s the prey? A robber fly, I believe.
Pisaurina mira
Thomisidae, crab spider. I think Misumenoides formosipes (Whitebanded Crab Spider)
An amazing hike. Ethan Pond to Zeeland Falls, Zeecliff, Thoreau Falls, and more. Three wonderful days, even if one of them was all Tropical Storm Elsa all day all the time. Some photos (without people, as always 🙂 ).
Further adventures with the Laowa 24mm macro probe lens.
Rose thorns:
A beetle in Lycidae. The apposite word is aposematism.
I’ve been posting a *lot* of flowing water photos. This set is a twist on that genre that I’ve never really seen done before.
My issue with a lot of time exposure photos of flowing water is that they’re a long enough exposure to completely smooth out the flow, creating an illusion of utter calmness, but hiding the vitality and boisterousness of the flow. The little droplets playing around are what cause this, but they don’t usually come out in a photo — the eye can register smaller details that hide from most cameras. This has to be recorded by the right shutter time: too slow, as mentioned, smooths everything out, while too fast freezes everything. I want a sort of impressionistic feel to the photos, where you can recognize individual elements but also see that they’re in motion. Showing motion isn’t always easy in a still photo!
As mentioned, I recently bought a Laowa 24mm macro probe lens. This has a few unique properties: it’s a macro lens that can focus with a few millimeters of the subject; it’s very narrow; it’s waterproof. I decided to try to take closeup photos of the stream, and especially places where the smooth, laminar flow becomes chaotic and turbulent. It may be useful (or not) to realize that these are mostly Straight Out Of Camera photos.
In addition, when I take this kind of photo, I especially like to establish an “anchor” in the photo: something that clearly belongs to the solid world, to play off the time exposure, so the photo lands in the zone somewhere between representative and abstract.
There ended up being so many possible photos it was difficult to choose. It seemed almost blasphemous to discard so many, as if rejecting nature’s creativity, but there’s only so much space!
Let’s see if these photos are successful! Let’s start off with a view of the area I took most of the photos, to provide some context while you see the more abstract ones. In that little snap, there lie worlds.
This one was taken completely underwater, of the bubbles in the turbulence under the surface:
