Elegant Visitor
If existence is a mirror what could this little beauty symbolise …
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This little beauty, feeding on another beauty. There is beauty in and behind this fly. It is seen …
… inside. This is a wonderful intricately designed living thing, god made. Just looking to see …
To think there could be the one without the other, the mechanical without the spirit behind …
The whole, of every thing, exists in the space I see it in. Could the space represent a greater reality?
Could it be that simple? Well, I’ll go with simple any day. Though it’s not easy.
Simple is focus on the sensation inside. See how easy that is …
Life comes in all shapes and colours, form. This Drone Fly is one of the more elegant ones. He only comes once a year, early summer, and stays a couple weeks.
I have to be in the garden waiting before he will show up, he only comes if I call him … believe that if you will. He is fearless among his kind.
His way of flying is particular, has a certain quality of control other flies don’t. Beautifully quiet and deliberate.
His colourful dress and sleek form mark him out, uncommon. Particular work goes into his making.
A messenger of high regard amongst the gods, and wears the badge aproud.
If you see him on your travels say hello, he might be there for you.
© Mark Berkery ……. Click on those pictures for a closer look
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Helmed Warrior
Proud little thing. Holding on to a blade of grass as he surveys the terrain, what he senses.
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And on my hand for a while, while I got the blade of grass ready for his consideration.
Up and down the blade he went, undecided on a course or direction. Wonderful coloured helmet.
What goes on in his tiny mind, is it really that small … He doesn’t need much inner space for his functioning.
Pointed little fella. Represented in his horned helm of green. Casting about for indications, of what is important …
While I was inspecting the tree with all the christmas beetles this little fella landed at my feet and proceeded on his (or her) mission, to travel, to feed, to mate and die under the sun and moon.
What we all do in one way or another. And along the way if we get to actually enjoy doing it all, just being here, how lucky is that, and a bit of work.
What a wonderful world … or earth, the simple things being, being simple.
© Mark Berkery ……. Click on those pictures for a closer look
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Jacaranda & Co
Wings still unfolded, he was content to wait out on the end of a projection. Safer that way.
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There’s only one direction danger can come from, behind. As long as you don’t fall off in the darkness.
Wave … They often make strange gestures when quiet and alone, exercising their limbs, no doubt.
Here you can see one of its other handicaps, missing lower legs. Who knows how …
And from below … Wing trailing like a cloak for this well dressed beetle.
Eyes feel the need for cleaning. Nature’s creatures spend a lot of time preening, keeping in top condition.
Clearly incapacitated, with no sign of self consideration. We can learn from the fact of nature.
The rain came and soaked the ground, the garden sang out green, and the little creatures came out to play – what they do.
Though there was barely a leaf on the jacaranda tree after a long dry winter it was only a week or so after the rain started it was covered in flowers, famously.
One rainy night I made the most of some christmas beetles knocked to the ground by the force of wind and falling water, some just couldn’t hold on.
Colour and contrast, some of the little beauties in a small patch of nature in the garden.
© Mark Berkery ……. Click on those pictures for a closer look
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Bug Rain …
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It has rained for a week, or more … a tree fell across the drive, revealing rot enough three more have to come down, before they fall.
And on the way down it took the top off another healthy tree, full of bugs, that made its way to a bucket of water, to keep it alive while they …
One day there was nothing but the spider to shoot, who is now running out of flowers to hunt on. The next there was more than I could tell.
Ripples in the pond, a drop wets everything it touches.
© Mark Berkery ……. Click on those pictures for a closer look
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Mother … Again
… and again.
Up close, without the personal … this spider doesn’t rationalise or emotionalise her situation. She is … the act of sitting. Knowing …
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Sitting in expectation, without a thought, as instinct informs her being something will come to this also active living flower.
Infinite variations in posture, in readiness for that something when it comes. An almost meditative occupation, why not … instinctively.
‘What’s that I see above me, come into my arms, let me show you the way of spider dear. A one way exercise, have no fear.’
Oops! No crack in this hard shelled ladybug, to slip in a pointed lesson in survival, not yours. And ladybug went on her way.
No mercy for the unwary though. She came for food for the hive and became food for the spider. Such is life to one, death to another.
And flies do join the banquet, never far from a feast. No more than providing for young yet … to be … you might think her a beast.
Being dead, no good for a bee. Or is death something else than a little body bent to spider queen. Coup de grâce complete.
… and again.
She stayed the life of the flower, then moved on to the next one. Pretty soon she was in food again, the more abundant honey bee attending.
I helper her along, so she didn’t have to move far, or rely on wind for direction – casting a thread to the currents is how she travels.
She will probably stay on this one for a while, it having multiple heads still to open. Then the butterfly bush should be in bloom.
We’ll see, nothing is sure but the rising and setting of the sun, as long as there is witness to it.
© Mark Berkery ……. Click on those pictures for a closer look
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Mother’s Return …
First sighting was on the butterfly bush. She had tacked a few leaves together to form a shelter from which to survey.
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I am always careful not to disturb these small creatures too much but she wasn’t concerned at all, shifting only slightly.
And then I pushed in for a closer shot. Gotta take what is available, she may not be there for what is wanted. Things change.
At some point she climbed onto the sunflower and pulled a few petals over her, to guard her from the world of birds and things.
Upside-down doesn’t seem to bother her, she is just as agile as long as her feet touch something solid and her web holds.
She has no interest in those tiny creatures, hardly worth the effort to capture it seems. Waiting for the prize, a honeybee perhaps.
But not today, that I saw anyway. No doubt she will catch a meal to suit her needs, or she dies. It’s only a matter of nature.
She came with the rain, probably not the same one as – BEFORE.
Out of nowhere she appeared, on a butterfly bush that is two or more weeks from flowering, after a long slow spring.
I noticed her only because of the crumpled looking leaves. How she got there, and so big already, I don’t know. Abseiled in perhaps?
Then, next day, six feet distant, I found her on the sunflowers, where there would be more opportunity to exercise those fine tuned survival instincts.
© Mark Berkery ……. Click on those pictures for a closer look
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Characters …
Each a unique expression of one life with one purpose.
To live just as they are.
Three stingless bees evicting another from the hive they attacked. This mop-up went on for months after the raid – https://beingmark.com/2017/06/16/a-crooked-dozen/ They probably defended the honey hoard or the queen, ’til death.
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Not a tasty looking morsel, to me anyway. Fiery red assassin bug in one of its early forms, the wing ‘buds’ give it away.
Katydid prowling the flowers at night. They don’t eat as much as their larger cousins, grasshoppers, so I leave them to the tender mercies of the other night stalkers. Who lives and who dies … who knows.
Tree blood, from the same one the red assassin bug is on above. Delicious … colour.
This moth ran into me one night in the garden, then stopped in front of the lens. Interesting ‘head’ gear, the fringe on top.
What can I say … a bug on a branch doing what it does, balanced with a drop of moisture. Everything has its place.
If you look carefully – click it – you will see this fly is depositing eggs on larva on the leaf above its head. A leaf from the same tree the recent sawfly and larva were found, here – https://beingmark.com/2017/06/09/a-dozen-of/
A leaf beetle. rounded, colourful and I’ve never seen it eat another creature except leaves. Maybe that’s its gentle nature.
And in the end … walking on the edge of the world. Precarious positioning. Don’t fall off …
© Mark Berkery ……. Click on those pictures for a closer look
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Space Bugs
On parade … in their space suits.
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© Mark Berkery ……. Click on those pictures for a closer look
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Beez …
… in the bush.
From the morning glory days, a male I think. Relishing a dose of nectar at the mouth of the mind altering flower.
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He took his time enjoying the liquid pleasure. A rare enough visitor, we being surrounded by desert dry gardens.
And more recently, a female I think. Taking a break from collecting pollen for the nest, there’s more to life than young.
And another break, or another bee, on my dry hand. Preening time, best to last a little longer in a wearing world.
Making the most of one native flower in the garden. It’s almost summer conditions here now, not yet though.
Another flower from the local bush, seeds collected and sown for the garden to give life to. She seems to enjoy it.
And all is well … naturally.
© Mark Berkery ……. Click on those pictures for a closer look
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Nature's Place 
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