Subscribe
RSS
Archive
January February March April May June July (1) August (1) September (1) October (1) November (1) December (1)
January February March April (2) May June July August September (1) October (1) November December
January February March (1) April May June July August September October November December
January February March April May June July August September October November December
January February March April May June July August September October November December
January February March April May June July August September October November December
January February March April May June July August September October November December
January February March April May June July August September October November December
January February March April May June July August September October November December

Eat, PREY, Love

August 21, 2013  •  1 Comment

The more time you spend watching wild life, sooner or later you're going to see animals doing things they need to do in order to survive: eat, hunt, and mate.  So eventually you'll witness animals not only in the throes of copulation, but also in the throes of capturing and killing prey.  Usually the latter evokes awe, fascination, even respect especially when it comes to watching a raptor swoop down on its prey with great precision and speed. 

The other day I was in a lovely garden in Concord, MA photographing insects. Suddenly I saw a large robber fly fast approaching a leaf. I saw an abdomen flexing, and watched the robber fly land in the grass where I photographed this: the robber fly killing his prey, a lovely damselfly. 

Actually I wasn't sure what the robber fly had caught until I downloaded the pictures onto my computer.  I could hardly believe my eyes.  I was caught between congratulating myself for getting at least one terrific photograph of the event (below) and the horror of the damselfly's doom :

A sad, brutal ending for the damselfly. I swear I heard it scream.
 


Comments

Hanie(non-registered)
More exquisit photographs.... thank you! I wish you could have been around to photograph a preying mantis that resided on "Sunset Blvd.," a beautiful rose bush on my balcony. When she arrived, she was all green. By the end of the first week of her ten-day sojourn, she had become a beautiful tan color--the result of ingesting aphids, which had been dining on bright saffron-colored roses. Just a guess.... There was no other reason for her to have turned tan, as all of the foliage is green. What say you, my naturalist friend?
No comments posted.
Loading...