We watched the ducks for about a half hour.  I didn’t get any shots that I am particularly crazy about, but it was interesting watching them.

From watching them I learned that each pair of ducks seems to have a territory.  Generally the territory is defined by some natural obstacles – such as a fallen tree or some branches.  When another duck (particularly a male) enters this territory the other male will slowly glide towards it.  Most of the time, the intruder responds by backing off and leaving the duck’s territory.  However, once in awhile they start fighting.

In this shot, I tried playing with the reflection of the bird.  I did this in a number of shots, but none of them came out as well as I hoped, which is OK.  After watching the ducks for awhile and failing to get a shot whenever they took off or started fighting, I took out the macro lens and looked around for what I could find.

  I found this harvestman on a leaf and discussed it in an earlier post.  Harvestmen are always great to photograph as they sit still for the camera.  What many people do not know about them is they are not spiders.  While they are arachnids, they are in a different order than spiders – kind of like scorpions.

While finding things for another macro photographer to shoot, I came across this woodlouse and couldn’t resist taking a few shots of it.  They are one of the easiest subjects to find and many of them are also very patient for the camera.  Other names for the woodlouse include roly-poly, pillbug, and sowbug.  This is actually a sowbug I believe, as it did not roll into a ball as pillbugs do.

One of my favorite subjects by far to photograph is the springtail.  Tey are so tiny that few people know what they look like up close and they are often very interesting insects to look at.  I recently found a used book at the bookstore with a first chapter on springtails.  I hope to have time to read it soon so I can blog more about the collembola family soon.

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I also learned a new trick.  One thing to make sure to not do when photographing flies is to get in their light.  I played around with this one to see how much it does truly matter.  Sure enough, whenever I stood in its light, the fly took off.  Therefore I approached from a direction such that my lens would not cast a shadow on the fly.

However, I found that it wasn’t in a very good position to get a shot.  So I leaned a bit to the side in order to cast a shadow just to the edge of the fly.  Sure enough, it moved a little bit and turned to get this shot.

Also that day, I found a cool looking springtail.  I’m not sure the name of it, though it shouldn’t be too hard to look up given the interesting markings.  I found it on our shed while looking at midges.

I also found this on the composting bin.  It looks like another midge, though the legs appear longer than the ones I normally see.  Perhaps it had to spread them out longer due to the material.

I also found my friend, the six legged spider, in her normal location.  I took a few shots, but none came out this time.  All in all, things are speeding up right now and I have a feeling there will be more and more interesting things outside!

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It certainly looks like a springtail, but I couldn’t find any pictures resembling it on the identification site for springtails.  (Update: after posting this shot on Flickr I have found out that it is not a springtail but a juvenile Hemiptera) Speaking of the patio furniture, I find it quite interesting that it’s so popular with insects.  I would be curious to know what they find so interesting with patio furniture covers.  I just hope when the weather gets better they still find the patio furniture itself to be interesting – as right now it is one of the best places in my yard to find things.

Here’s one that I know is a springtail.

This appears to be a Salina mulcahyae.  Unfortunately the site doesn’t mention many details about it.  Of course, there are quite a few springtails that look similar so I could be mistaken.

Back to the mysterious springtail/springtail imposter, here’s a shot of it from the front.

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However, I felt the need to be stubborn and spent some time on Friday in my backyard, where I have a better sense of where to find certain insects.  Still, I found it very difficult to find much of interest to photograph.  I eventually decided to cool looking for insects and photographed a dandelion that was ready to burst.

Generally I have found that when I have difficulty finding something, turn to a different subject and your original subject will eventually capture your eye.  Shortly after playing with the dandelion, this turned out to be true once again.

The first thing I came across was this small spider.

From the arrangement of the eyes, this appears to be a ground spider of family Gnaphosidae.  I found it on a piece of wood that I turned over.  The picture is nothing extraordinary, but I find it amazing the number of species of spider that live in my backyard.  At first look this seemed like one of the sac spiders that are very common in my backyard, but the eyes are obviously different.

When the going gets tough, go looking for springtails is what I always say.  These are by far the easiest insects to find if you know what to look for.  There are myriad species of them, but in general the easiest way to find them is to either dig through relatively dry soil (wet soil is much harder) or look on the leaves of plants such as camellia or rhododendrons.  The ground was wet, so I didn’t bother to look there but after looking for a few minutes on my camellia I found this globular springtail.

When my wife saw this shot, she remarked “what a cute little spider!”.  Nope, not a spider but a springtail.  For more information about these little guys, see my previous post on them. 

I then gave up looking for insects and played with some of the drops on my Japanese maple bushes, which are great drop generators.  I picked a small flower and played with the reflection of the flower in the drop.

Like the other shots that day it was nothing much to write home about, but it was still nevertheless fun getting some shots.  However at this point my hands – holding a camera with a metal L bracket attached – were getting rather cold and it had started to rain again, so I went back inside glad that I had the chance to take some pictures.  Luckily, over the weekend nature gave me a much better chance to get some shots.

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However, I felt the need to be stubborn and spent some time on Friday in my backyard, where I have a better sense of where to find certain insects.  Still, I found it very difficult to find much of interest to photograph.  I eventually decided to cool looking for insects and photographed a dandelion that was ready to burst.

Generally I have found that when I have difficulty finding something, turn to a different subject and your original subject will eventually capture your eye.  Shortly after playing with the dandelion, this turned out to be true once again.

The first thing I came across was this small spider.

From the arrangement of the eyes, this appears to be a ground spider of family Gnaphosidae.  I found it on a piece of wood that I turned over.  The picture is nothing extraordinary, but I find it amazing the number of species of spider that live in my backyard.  At first look this seemed like one of the sac spiders that are very common in my backyard, but the eyes are obviously different.

When the going gets tough, go looking for springtails is what I always say.  These are by far the easiest insects to find if you know what to look for.  There are myriad species of them, but in general the easiest way to find them is to either dig through relatively dry soil (wet soil is much harder) or look on the leaves of plants such as camellia or rhododendrons.  The ground was wet, so I didn’t bother to look there but after looking for a few minutes on my camellia I found this globular springtail.

When my wife saw this shot, she remarked “what a cute little spider!”.  Nope, not a spider but a springtail.  For more information about these little guys, see my previous post on them. 

I then gave up looking for insects and played with some of the drops on my Japanese maple bushes, which are great drop generators.  I picked a small flower and played with the reflection of the flower in the drop.

Like the other shots that day it was nothing much to write home about, but it was still nevertheless fun getting some shots.  However at this point my hands – holding a camera with a metal L bracket attached – were getting rather cold and it had started to rain again, so I went back inside glad that I had the chance to take some pictures.  Luckily, over the weekend nature gave me a much better chance to get some shots.

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Still, I was a bit bored of the usual places, so I decided to pick some place new.  On the side of our house, in a spot where we rarely go, we have a giant camellia that has grown taller than our house.  I decided to crawl under the lower limbs and found a spot in a pile of leaf litter near an old fountain that is no longer in operation.  I then started going through the leaves to see what I could find.

In some respect, I was a bit disappointed by the day because I was really hoping to find a beetle.  While I did not find a beetle during the hour I spent outside, I learned that there are a number of springtails that occupy our backyard.  A lot of the smaller creatures were difficult to photograph and often wound up disappearing on me.  I only managed to get two shots of this springtail before it disappeared.

What interested me most about this shot is this is not the typical globular springtail I normally find in the garden.  Upon looking at my insect book, this appears to be an Orchesella villosa, a species that is originally from the British isles but has since migrated over here.  Of course, given the huge number of springtail species out there, there exists a high probability that I am wrong.  However, the picture in my book certainly looks similar.  I found a number of these, but this was the only one I managed to get a picture of.  OK, at least I think I saw a number of them – as with the naked eye they just look like a speck.  Usually I am forced to take all of my springtail shots at 5x.

Seeing so many springtails in the leaf litter reinforces to me the fact that they are instrumental in the creation of soil.  Also, they were incredibly numerous, though it took some patience to get one into view.  They can be quite frustrating to find in the viewfinder, especially when they are moving (which was the case with this one).  I have come up with a new technique with the MP-E 65 though that has been bringing me some success.  I start at 1x or 2x and once I have the subject in focus I slowly zoom to 5x.  I have found success in this method even when the insect is mobile.

This springtail was much more patient with me.

This is the standard globular springtail that I normally see around the garden, though I suspect it may be a slightly different species than the one I normally find.  For reference, here’s the kind I normally see.

The new springtail differs from this one in several remarks.

1) It is “hairier”

2) It is bigger – both shots were at 5x.

3) This one was found in rather wet wood, while the other is almost always found on leaves.

Therefore I suspect that these are both different species of globular springtails, but I have no idea which ones.  I did manage to find springtail site, from someone who obviously knows a lot more about springtails than I do.

The final springtail I took for the day was on my kids’ slide, a location where I almost always find something.  Unfortunately by that time the batteries in my MT-24EX had already died.  I currently power my MT-24EX with 4 Eneloop batteries, combined with a CP-E3 with eight more Eneloops.  While the CP-E3 still had power, the lamps on the MT-24EX can only be powered by its batteries, so my flash worked but the lamps did not.

This appears to be another Orchesella springtail, but a different species than the first one.  From the pictures on the site above, this may be an Orchesella cincta, but again that is only a guess.  It’s fascinating what you can find when you just look a little harder.  What seems like a lifeless, cold place becomes a thriving metropolis of creatures when you begin to look closer.

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Springtails are among the most numerous and important bugs on earth. They live everywhere on earth and have one of the highest concentrations of any non-microscopic creature. In some areas they average 100,000 per square meter of soil! In fact, springtails are one of the primary drivers behind soil. They chew down different fungi and their excretions make up an important element of soil. So yes, the next time you crawl in the dirt you are really crawling in springtail poop. J They are also extremely important as prey for a number of other insects. So without further ado, here is the springtail.

You may not agree, but I think they are cute little buggers. Actually, there is a growing consensus that springtails are not insects at all, but they are considered to have different evolutionary development than the rest of insects, according to the Wikipedia article. The scientific name for springtail is the order collembola. This particular springtail is called a “globular springtail” and is in the suborder symphpleona.

Photographing springtails can be quite a challenge because they are so small. I have to use 5x for all springtails and I really wish that I could get above 5x for many of them. Many of them are quite patient for photographing, but it can be challenging getting them in the viewfinder. The following is a recent shot I did.

I suspect that these varieties are not the ones so prevalent in the soil. I am currently unsure what their exact diet is, though I suspect it is also different types of fungi. I really wish I knew more about these particular springtails, so if anyone has more information it would be appreciated.

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