A Blast …
… from the past.
A few pictures from earlier this year, since there has been so few to shoot lately with the advanced cold of our winter.
*Click the pictures for a closer view.
The way to view these pictures is not to name but to sense, then go do it in the garden, if you want a sense of peace.
These images are representative of something else that, when duly attended, echoes colourfully in the mind.
© Mark Berkery ……. Click on those pictures for a closer look
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Introducing …
… variations in form, of one life.
Wild, instinctive little biological robots at work and play, or just being what they are.
Jumping Spider sitting on bamboo stake, overseeing …
*Click the pictures for a better view.
Chafer – Flower – Beetle, belatedly found the one piece of banana in the garden.
Weevil on the orange, on a bamboo stake.
Tiny female Fly laying into the ageing lemon on a stake.
Daisies, a popular roost for flies at night. This one preening after a good poo, like people do.
Tiny Bee roosting on the aromatic dried out Basil.
Injured or deformed Hopper, same spot for a week. The one on the left is how they look normally.
And not one problem between them … evidently.
© Mark Berkery ……. Click on those pictures for a closer look
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Travelling Ant
Out on my wandering in the local byways I often come across something unique, that I only ever see once.
As I was crossing this fallen – with a little help – fence I noticed there was an occupant of unusual character.
The ant, a kind I haven’t seen before, was using the fence line as a highway across the otherwise difficult terrain and appeared in no hurry.
It had been dry for a few days so I wet the line where the ant would pass and when they met it stopped to take a sip. Free moisture can be a rarity in the wild.
An ant might travel the equivalent of many miles for a drink, but not today. Manna from the sky, and it clearly enjoyed it, stopping to sip a while before resuming its journey.
I could wonder where that ant was going but I know already. It’s going home, if it’s not already there.
Small, instinctive, non self reflective mind.
© Mark Berkery ……. Click on those pictures for a closer look
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All Sorts …
… from the garden and beyond. Some creatures are only ever seen once, or stop only long enough for one shot. These are a few of those.
If you’re into macro it pays to let the garden manage itself as much as possible. It may take time but it takes time for life cycles to establish and creatures to emerge, whatever the season.
Plant them, feed them, prune them, move them but otherwise let things be as much as possible – whatever you do don’t poison them, if you can help it. Works for me.
Creature of the darkness … Longhorn beetle, favoured the dried out stems for a few nights.
*Click the pictures for a bigger version – the better to see them.
Ant takes time out of its solitary patrol to preen. A few seconds and it was on its way again.
Assassin Bug nymph, shelters under the red flower during the day and hunts at night – lately.
Plant Hopper, looks all bent but it may be moulting – a long time at it.
Click Beetle up on a leaf in the dead of night, shows up once in a blue moon.
Male Lynx spider, caught a fruit-fly meal on a decaying lemon staked in the garden.
Teddy Bear Weevil? Soft and gentle looking. On a post in the car park of the local rainforest remnant.
Bluebottle in the garden, they don’t stop long at all for a shot.
© Mark Berkery ……. Click on those pictures for a closer look
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Life On A Lemon
Him – with the longest front legs, on a lemon.
*Click the pictures for a bigger version.
Her, on an orange.
It on my finger. Every time I tried from the side it turned away.
She is actually laying beneath the skin here. He appears to be guarding, attending her.
It got crowded on the lemon after a while.
Alone at last.
Oh, oh … here comes trouble.
Two males fighting over a female, antennae and legs flailing. Not the best but the only shot.
For a change, she appears to seek him out.
These little things, about a centimetre long, are living out their lives on an ageing lemon in the garden, on a bamboo stake. They are attracted to something about the decaying fruit, mold, fungus or/and other qualities not discernible to me.
They live on similarly decaying oranges, and the occasional banana – I have a veritable orchard staked in the garden, all good fun – just to attract the faeries from the bottom of the garden.
Did you know the faeries are insects? Yes, that’s the form they take. And some take no sensible form, preferring the fleetness and relative safety of the insubstantial. Each has its advantages.
The point is though, these creatures of story are in your garden too, if only you look to see, and not to judge. No need for any psychic nonsense either, they are detectable by the senses.
And the wonder of it is sense makes more sense, no nonsense.
© Mark Berkery ……. Click on those pictures for a closer look
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The Last Bee
Before : resting undisturbed.
Click on the pix …
Bigger than she looks.
Not a comfortable mouthful for a night-time predator.
And after : back to sleep.
Definitely the last Blue Banded Bee for this year. I have been trying to provide enough for her to survive but I think the cold may get her in the end. I even have a white bowl out with a blue sponge in the middle of it soaked in sugar solution, like a giant flower, so she doesn’t have to fly far first thing on a cold morning to fuel up – haven’t seen her take it yet.
The shots were taken in the dead of a cold night with a reflector under her, so there was less shadow below. It was just a piece of paper attached to the lens by elastic, a bit clumsy really but it worked to a point. I bumped her with it and she protested by spreading her legs that way, as if to say ‘I’m a bigger mouthful than I first looked, and you could choke on my sharp pointy bits’.
They do that when disturbed at night, if it’s cold enough that they don’t fly off to the light, make themselves look bigger. Many creatures do it, cause themselves to appear bigger than they are, or an uncomfortable mouthful, until the threat is gone.
It’s a working strategy people also employ when feeling threatened. Nature … it’s our nature after all.
© Mark Berkery ……. Click on those pictures for a closer look
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Rare Visitor …
… to my garden. The Neon Cuckoo Bee lays her egg in a Blue Banded Bee’s nest and the BBB provisions it for the NCB. This may account for an apparently hostile relationship when both approach the same roost at sundown, maybe not. Maybe they just squabble over top spot on the grass stem, as the BBB seem to do amongst themselves.
Either way she is a real beauty, black and blue set against the yellow flowers. No complete body shots, she was too busy feasting, but nevertheless a treat for the observer that sees, that resonates in a place in the uncontaminated psyche where nature comes from.
A pleasure to me.
© Mark Berkery ……. Click those pictures for a closer look
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Macro Walkabout …
Of course macro is fun and interesting and I get to meet people I otherwise wouldn’t but it’s not the most important thing I’m doing right now. Something else comes first.
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The first two pictures are from the garden before Andrew arrived and the rest are from the surrounds of the local water treatment plant, bordering remnant rainforest and extensive mangrove swamp. On the edge of the wilds you could say.
There were more creatures to be found in a couple hours than I had thought possible given the wild weather we have been getting lately, so wet and windy. But that’s nature, you never know what amazing little form of life is coming up next.
These are all native insects that have a function in the essential nature on our doorstep. The nature can’t do without them and we can’t do without it, we are it.
Native bee foraging in the flower and keeping out of the wind for a while.
Patterned Flower Beetle looking for somewhere safe. I helped her to a flower where she loved some nectar.
Botany Bay Weevil sitting out the storm and unconcerned by the flash.
Little Red Beetle and Plant Hopper passing.
Passed … There’s fire in those eyes.
Assassin Bug, a juvenile I believe. Hunters all …
Bug on a Seedpod.
An older version perhaps, on an older Seedpod.
Jewel Bug against the sky. Lively little things.
Sandpaper Fig Beetle found only on the Sandpaper Fig tree.
Tiny Black Jumping Spider. Excitable little fellow, he’s a male.
Golden Spiny Ant, a Queen I believe. You can see where her wings have recently dropped from.
Colourful Leaf Beetle taking its time …
© Mark Berkery ……. Click those pictures for a closer look
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And Then There Were …
The Botany Bay Weevil didn’t notice Xmas coming and going. It was all just time passing, the sun rose and set and in between they did what they do.
Feeding, flying, f…… and posing for photos when the cameraman comes along. Can’t keep a good weevil down. But no, no personality involved at all, of the Weevils.
To capture two together is a rare event, signifying … only that they do …
That’s the fact.
© Mark Berkery ……. Click those pictures for a closer look
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Nature's Place 
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