Mom made me do it
Saturday June 30, 2007 at 6:51 pm
Mom dragged me out to the nether regions of the family farm one fine day in late May as she needed help learning how to take macro shots with her camera. There, upon the dead remains of the underground house once envisioned as the xenogere family homestead for years to come, we chanced upon a bit of native flora, one lively plant called sensitive brier (a.k.a catclaw brier, sensitive vine littleleaf mimosa, native mimosa; Mimosa nuttallii, or sometimes Mimosa microphylla).
I first introduced you to this plant with the last photo shown in this post. Here are a few others.
Yet something continually drew me back to that original photo. My eyes wanted to see something more clearly which I had not seen before, at least not with any degree of clarity.
So I went back to that image. Sure enough, hidden inconspicuously in one tiny spot I stumbled upon this small creature.
And as I studied the remaining images, I finally reveled in the discovery of one clear picture that showed precisely what the camera had seen but that my eyes had completely missed.
Without any hesitation, I recognized immediately the tiny syrphid who’d been busy with its own business while I ignorantly photographed it as though it didn’t exist. This, poppets, is a fly. More specifically, and despite its attempt to conceal itself beneath the camouflage of a predator, you’re looking at an example of Toxomerus marginatus.
These wee and winged beings are difficult to catch with the naked eye simply because they’re so small. Too often, and certainly as was the case with me, they flit about effortlessly in our field of vision, yet they do so almost invisibly.
jason
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