Butterflies and Dragonflies Article in Digital SLR Magazine

I'm pleased to have a 5 page article on dragonfly and butterfly photography in the latest issue of Digital SLR magazine (Issue 81, July). The article is aimed at beginners and covers when and where to look for butterflies and dragonflies, the kit you need and various techniques.

The first 3 images below are the page proofs before the captions had been added (hence the red lines through previous captions).

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This issue of the magazine also contains an extra supplement (downloadable from the Digital SLR website) which has my Common Blue image on the front cover:

More Damselflies

After a very slow start to the 'macro season' this year things are picking up and I now have my usual processing backlog.

Here are a few more Large Red Damselflies, all taken in a single session last month.

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First, here's an adult damselfly next to the exuvia from which it has emerged. It's hard to believe that it fitted in that! The adult emerged an hour or so before this image was taken and its colours have started to develop.

Now a wider angle image showing a freshly emerged damselfly within its habitat.

...and an image of a damselfly midway through the emergence process. I think it's spotted me.

and finally another wideangle image.

I still have some video to process which I'll hopefully get around to soon.

Tawny Mining Bees

One of the things I like about the 'Meet Your Neighbours' style of images is the ease with which it is possible to make composite images. Last year I photographed an attractive female Tawny Mining Bee and was keen to show it in comparison to the less striking male. This year I photographed the male and so I am now able to put them together into a single image.

The smaller male is on the left, the female on the right.

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Emerging Damselflies

Most years I normally manage to find some emerging Large Red Damselflies in late April/early May at one of my local nature reserves. It started off being more luck than judgement but in the last 2-3 years I think I have developed a better understanding of exactly which part of the reserve they prefer to emerge in and when they are most likely to do it. Last week I spent a very enjoyable couple of hours trying to spot them shortly after they climb out of the water while trying to distinguish them from the exuvia (larval cases) of the damselflies that had already emerged. Once I had 'got my eye in' I did manage to find 2 or 3 of the still wet nymphs as they sat on a reed prior to their emergence as adult damselflies.

Here are a couple of images for starters, no doubt more will follow and also some video.

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In case anyone reading this is not familiar with Large Red Damselflies, here is an adult once its wings have hardened and its colours have developed (photographed in a previous year).

Double Page Spread in BBC Wildlife Magazine

I'm always very pleased to have my images published in BBC Wildlife magazine as it's a magazine I've read on a regular basis since my teens. Back then I remember looking at the photography in the magazine with a mixture of awe and admiration, never did I imagine that one day I would see my own images published in the magazine.

Anyway, I'm particularly pleased to have achieved my first double page spread in BBC Wildlife magazine. It's an image I took last year of a newly emerged Four-Spotted Chaser dragonfly. I took it with my 35mm macro lens which is what gives the image the unusual combination of close-focus and (relatively) wide angle background. It's one of my favourite images and so I'm particularly pleased that they chose this one. They've cropped the image slightly and flipped it horizontally but it still looks very nice in my humble opinion (although the image below is just a quick snap of the magazine so doesn't look great).

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They also published my image of a mating pair of Common Frogs in the Q&A section. I did well this month!

Bumble Bees

After this year's prolonged winter it's interesting to see the insects start to emerge and to assess how they have fared over those cold months. One casualty appears to be the Seven Spot Ladybird, I've only found one or two in my garden over the last few weeks compared to literally dozens in recent years. Thankfully bee numbers appear to be healthy, the flowering currant bush in my garden is being visited by lots of bumble bees and I'm now seeing quite a few different miner bees as well.

Here are a couple of springtime images of a White-Tailed Bumble Bee (Bombus lucorum) feeding on the flowering currant.

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Zebra Spider

Now that spring has finally arrived a growing number of invertebrates are starting to appear in my garden. One of the first was the Zebra Spider (Salticus scenicus), a tiny jumping spider that can often be found on rocks and walls warming itself in the sun. On one particular day a couple of weeks ago I found 3 different individuals, including this one who was exploring some moss on top of a rock.

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Zebra Spiders' eyes make them very photogenic, dare I say it almost cute? :)