January 13, 2007: The curiosity of many things small
The time stamp is EST - not Singapore time - I was out at 1:45 pm -
but that is 12:45 am in Charleston - and maybe even Durham and
Chapel Hill.
I can't let Sparky and Mickey get ahead of me. After the T-1 implosion,
how was I going to top that - so I decided, in spite of the rain
and drizzle, to look around the neighborhood for some small insects.
I was not disappointed.
Today the weather was so-so. Maybe rain, maybe drizzle, maybe nothing - so
I ventured out as far as the Queenstown MRT station - and slightly beyone. Well
the virtue of sticking close to home is that you don't know what you'll find.
And in this case, walking past Fair Price - there were some bushes of these
orange flowering things - and there was a bee. The goal was to practice
focusing. I read somewhere that it was useful to use manual focus,
and then take a sequence of photos so that maybe one was focused as an
old man stands steady - but actually moves about quite a bit.
Here is the bee
This is the same little guy - just a different angle and trying to
maintain good focus
The head is not well focused here - but check out the wings
The bee and an ant
Same bee, same ant - but not in focus
Better focus of the bee head
Better focus on the bee thorax
Poor bee focus, better ant focus
A pink flower
Further studies of a bee - got the focus right this time
Thorax focus not so good
A small improvement
Getting better
From the side - check out the horseshoe-like tips on the front legs
Looking eye to eye
From the back
A purple flower
A butterfly hanging upside down - and hiding
Another flower
An ant
This is for Valentin Krinsky - the spiral world of inside a banana leaf
I thought this was a red ant
But was wrong - after getting home, I found this was a spider. So the
lesson learned from today - is that maybe this type of spide likes to build
web amongst the leaf stuff
This appears as if she is now behind her web
Here is a pretty good view of spider and web - I think she is under her
web
Yes - clearly she has moved from being on top of the web to hiding under it
And then a small small grasshopper - just chillin' on a leaf of grass
Look at the length of the antennae
A better focus
This guy - just never could get a good view of
But the butterfly - without words with the wings partially open
again - but wings closing
closer
another view
and a pink flower
and two ants
and a lonely ant
and a closer view of the lonely ant
and ants racing around this orange plant thing
climbing around some more