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Female Salticid with Prey

This female salticid was avoiding the advances of this male Habronattus coecatus on a pile of logs. She had caught a small fly but his advances were aggressive enough she dropped it to avoid him.

All photos taken with a Canon 5d Mark 2, Canon Mp-e 65mm lens, and a diffused Canon mt-24ex flash.

And here is another rather unique looking spider I found on the same woodpile.

Tags: 5d mark II, Chesapeake, jumping spider, macro, mp-e 65, mt-24 ex

A Weekend of Crab Spiders (Part 2)

This is part two of a previous post, A Weekend of Crab Spiders (Part 1), a post containing a good amount of crab spiders. I forgot about posting these, thus the two month delay.

All photos taken with a Canon 5d Mark 2, Canon mp-e 65mm lens, and the Canon mt-24ex twin flashes, heavily diffused. From the Norfolk Botanical Garden’s Wildflower field.

Note the prey in her mouth.

Here is a photo of the above spider, compared to my thumb.

Tags: 5d mark II, crab spider, macro, mp-e 65, mt-24 ex, norfolk botanical gardens, spider

First attempt at astrophotography

I finally got the focuser working on my 8″ newtonian scope with my 5d mark 2. Saturday night I attempted to photograph M31, the Andromeda Galaxy with it. The scope was mounted on a Celestron Cg-5 EQ mount.

Click a photo to see it in a lager size.

This is one single 2 minute exposure, taken at iso 1000.

M31, M32, M110

This is a stack of three 2 minute exposures. I converted it to black and white to reduce the pink haze.

M31, M32, M110

Tags: andromeda galaxy, astronomy, Astrophotography, m110, m31, m32

Spiders & More from the East Coast Star Party

Had one very successful day with Mark and Ian hunting for bugs down at the Hampton Lodge Campground in Coinjock, NC. We were there for the East Coast Star Party, which keeps us busy during the nights, but leaves us to our own entertainment while the sun is up. Mark and I have a good history of finding interesting critters, specifically jumping spiders. This year they were in full swing.

All photos were taken with my Canon 5d Mark II, Canom mp-e 65mm f/2.8 lens, and the mt-24ex twin flashes, heavily diffused. Click any photo for a larger version. For use rights or any questions, please email keegan at keeganm dot com.

Since I had such a great time and found quite a few interesting things, I’ll be commenting throughout the post. Starting with this one. This is a female Salticid of some sort, not sure of the species exactly. She was incredibly shy, it took 20 minutes of patiently waiting to snap this photo. Every time I moved, she would duck back in her little house. I ended up setting my tripod right in front of it, setting the focus, and using a remote trigger to capture this photo.

We found one tree in particular which was covered in life. Ants, flies, spiders, critters everywhere. One unique event was happening, something I have never seen before. I have seen jumping spiders catch and eat ants, but never the opposite. A large group of ants were going in and out of a hole in this tree, many carrying food. This one was carrying a still alive jumping spider.

This is not a crop

Hentz jumper

This photo below is of a ladybug larva (black thing on the right) eating another insect. I’ve seen ladybug larvae plenty of times, but never with prey.

Tags: 5d mark II, coinjock, crab spider, hentz jumper, Hentzia palmarum, jumping spider, macro, mp-e 65, mt-24 ex, photography

A Weekend of Crab Spiders (Part 1)

I didn’t see much in terms of my usual jumping spiders this weekend, but I did see a whole bunch of crab spiders. This is one of two posts I will be making, I found so many of these critters.

All photos taken with a Canon 5d Mark 2, Canon mp-e 65mm lens, and the Canon mt-24ex twin flashes, heavily diffused. From the Norfolk Botanical Garden’s Wildflower field.