Creepy Crawlies

Just in time for Halloween.  Ha!  Sometimes procrastination makes you timely, after all.

I've had such a hard time processing the plethora of nature photos I've taken since we moved in.  Some might say that I take too many pictures.  But they would be wrong, of course.  There's just way too many cool things to photograph.  It fascinates me.  I have to give J the credit for finding about half of the specimens I take pictures of.  The other half I find all on my own.

Which is probably the thing that is most surprising to me about living here.  I certainly didn't expect to find myself sitting/laying on the ground quite so often to get the right angle on these creepy crawlies.  Although I am not all that surprised at how much I truly enjoy it.  I've always loved the challenge aspect of photography.  When you have to work to get a great shot, it's all the sweeter.

I also find myself feeling grateful for my telephoto lens.  Because sometimes these subjects are very creepy and I'm glad the photo can look like they were very close, when in fact they were not.  I would like to avoid the possibility of one of these spiders crawling onto my lens because I don't think my camera would fare very well if I tossed it in an attempt to rid myself of the spider.  My camera is very dear to me.

These were among my early attempts to photograph spider webs.  It's really tricky to get the camera to focus just right which is why these are a little blurry.

As time went by, I got a little better at capturing what I wanted.

This beautifully colored spider was pretty huge.  That's a large moth it has trapped in its web.  I was really thankful for my zoom lens for this one.  It was the biggest spider I had ever seen that wasn't behind glass.

Until I spotted this monster who had dropped by my front porch one morning.  That's a full sized brick he's sitting on.  Creepy, huh?

I was a little jumpy when I maneuvered the camera directly below him to get this shot.  Understandably, I think.  And I find myself really wishing that I knew more about these creatures.  It might be useful to know which ones are, say, poisonous.  I'll put that on my "needs to be researched" list.

We found this shed exoskeleton out by the chicken coop.  Maybe from the same kind of giant monster spider.

These long legged creepies are all over.  But somehow they don't bother me all that much.

This bumblebee hung out on our daffodils for many weeks.  J says that it must be a queen because they are the only ones who survive once the weather turns colder.  All the others die off.  Must make for a lonely winter.

I enjoyed this crazy looking little guy.  Even though he was decidedly uncooperative for photos.  He kept running off just when I finally got the focus just right.

And he nearly walked off the edge of the world before he thought better of it and turned around again.

J finds what he calls pipe cleaner caterpillars all the time.

They sometimes get a little adventurous in where they climb.

Nice Halloween colors on Mr. Spiky, huh?

I don't even know what to say about this odd-looking fellow.  I have no idea what those little white things are.

And cicadas always look mildly alien-esque to me.  Creeeeepy!

But, I admit, their wings really are beautiful.

I think this flutterby must have been injured because it just stayed in the grass as I moved around it taking pictures.  Looks like that left wing had a rough ride.

These not-so-nice things are stink bugs.  Somebody brought them from Asia a few years ago and their population has exploded around here.  They fly.  And when they find a nice spot, they send out a smell-o-gram inviting all their friends to join them.  And the worst part is that if you smush them, they stink to high heaven.  Hence the name.  We're counting our lucky stars that they haven't been all that populous around our house so far.

I like grasshoppers.  Even though Disney's Bug's Life did their best to malign them.  I think they're really cool looking.  And they come in all shapes and colors and sizes.

This guy came to visit on my back patio.  And he was the most cooperative subject.  And B, who is almost always my trusty nature exploring side-kick, adored him.

I mean, really, what's a girl to do when she gets so many uninvited guests around her house.  Have her mom shoot them, naturally.

B did her best to catch this cricket (?), but he was a very quick jumper.  We followed him around the backyard for a good half hour.  Ah, country pleasures!

And to J's great delight, we have walking sticks around here.  They seem to like the siding on our house.

And they really are hard to spot when they're in the grass.  I don't know how many times we had to re-find this guy in order to study him.

I'm not sure how long it will be before I get around to sprucing up J's room.  But when I get to it, he's going to have one wicked awesome nature photo display.  That's for sure!