Be sure to send in your good wildlife photos; the tank is running a bit low. Today’s photos come from Tony Eales in Australia, whose notes are indented:
I went to my favourite little national park near my house on the first official day of spring in Australia looking for ground orchids to photograph. Seems I’m still a little early for that but the conditions on the day made for some lovely shots of dewdrops on flowers and arthropods.
First is a common native flower of grassy alluvial soils, Australian Milkmaids, Burchardia umbellata.
Next I found a Percher (Diplacodes sp.) Dragonfly, completely inactive in the cool of the morning so covered in dew that at first glance I thought it was a grey seed pod that looked like a dragonfly.
Another native flower that was open everywhere in the park was Hibbertia vestita the Hairy Guinea Flower.
I also found a completely inert crab spider (Lehtinelagia sp.) dangling from a single thread, probably a way to spend the night safe from predators. It made him easy to rest on a leaf for the photo and then leave him suspended where he was.
While searching around for midge orchids I found this tiny little flowering plant which I think is Mitrasacme sp. They seem to be fairly common but so small and hard to notice I can’t find a common name for it.
I have a nice little Twitter series and photos of wasps if you are interested. They are still busy. I don’t see where to submit.
Up at the top right corner of the page you will find a link to Jerry’s “Research Interests”; the prof’s email address is revealed on that page.
That dragonfly pic is one of the coolest pics I’ve ever seen!
Agree completely. It’s fantastic! Thanks for sharing.
Here in South Australia, we have many terrestrial orchids flowering. On 29 August I saw Pterostylis sp., Caladenia spp., and several others. Unfortunately my photos were not up to the required standard. I love the photo of the dragon fly! Thank you for sharing.
I’m really going to try and make it a bit of a mission to find terrestrial orchids this year. I really hope to see Caleana ssp. and Caladenia ssp. in the wild.
I love those jeweled dragonflies!!
Yes, they are enchanting.
Beautiful shots. Great idea to pick up the dew.
Totally cool! And I suppose the cool weather down there is warming, while we, sadly, are going in the opposite direction.
Especially like the dragonfly.
Living jewels!
Sooo many awesome pics! Congrats are due to everyone. Great post
Great images…as others have noted, that bejeweled dragonfly is fantastic.
Love the dragonfly pictures!