Tag Archives: Macro

Moving forward sideways

A Pallid Ghost Crab on the sand in Hawaii — On the lookout.

I was walking the beach at Pelekane Bay one morning, when I realized there was a lot of movement on the sand. A bit of quiet observation revealed crabs everywhere. They skittered back and forth, but if I moved, they zipped back to the edge of their holes or disappeared into them.

I picked a spot where I could observe a good number of them and spent about 40 minutes there, kneeling in the sand, moving minimally, while the crabs went about their work. The ones in these photos are Pallid Ghost Crabs.

Posted for Becky’s Squares: Move Forward, Reconstruct, Renew, and/or are Burgeoning. See more responses here.

Autograph collectors

Bees on an Autograph Tree flower in Hawaii

I was at Spencer Beach Park when I heard bees. Looking up, I saw them all over an open flower on one of the trees. I’ve never seen so many bees on the same flower at the same time. As they left, others would be moving forward to join the party.

The tree was an Autograph Tree (Clusia rosea), which is native to the Caribbean and is something of an invasive species here. It gets its name from its thick leaves with a thin green covering. Kids scratch their names into the leaves and watch as they grow with the leaves!

Posted for Becky’s Squares: Move Forward, Reconstruct, Renew, and/or are Burgeoning. See more responses here.

The Numbers Game #19

A Helicopter taking off from a ranch on Kohala Mountain, Hawaii — The photo number isn’t 140, but this still works. Watch out for that tub!

A Striped Lynx spider in Hawaii — An itsy bitsy, teeny weeny Striped Lynx Spider.

The idea of The Numbers Game is to enter a number into the search bar of your computer and then post a selection of the photos that turn up. This week’s number is 140. Captions are on the photos.

You can see more responses here.

An endangered Palila, a bird found only on the Big Island, Hawaii.

Rainbow off North Kohala — Rainbow over North Kohala.

Little fish and Padina japonica seaweed in a tide pool in Hawaii — Rainbow over North Kohala.

Chrysobothris octocola beetle

A Chrysobothris octocola (Buprestidae) beetle in Hawaii

I saw this beetle on a tree I was cutting up. It was shiny, which always gets my attention. It’s a metallic wood-boring beetle, and this one is relatively plain compared to some of its more flamboyant relatives.

Frass

A monarch butterfly caterpillar and its poops in Hawaii

This Monarch Butterfly caterpillar was busy munching its way through an Hawaiian Crown Flower plant. But all that eating means it poops a lot. That poop, politely known as frass, is what those greenish nuggets on the left are. My first thought when I saw them was, ‘those are big poops!’

The Numbers Game #17

A Pallid Ghost crab blends int o the beach in Hawaii — A Pallid Ghost Crab on the beach.

The idea of The Numbers Game is to enter a number into the search bar of your computer and then post a selection of the photos that turn up. The top photo was one of these and I thought, I must have run this before, but I hadn’t. It turned out to be a photo I’d processed, but neglected to move from my originals folder. Without The Numbers Game, I would never have found this!

This week’s number is 138. Captions are on the photos. You can see more responses here.

A green turtle swims in the waters off Hawaii — A Hawaiian Green Turtle swimming.

Crocodile Needlefish swim just below the surface in Hawaii — A Hawaiian Green Turtle swimming.

The Numbers Game #11

A distant view of Pu'u O'o vent from the Napau Trail at Hawaii Volcanoes National Park — A view of Pu’u O’o vent, when it was erupting, from the Napau Trail in Hawaii Volcanoes National Park.

The idea of The Numbers Game is to enter a number into the search bar of your computer and then post a selection of the photos that turn up. This week’s number is 132.

You can see more responses here.

A parachuting clown hangs from a tree. — A flying clown. That’s all the world needs!

A grasshopper on a curved stem — A flying clown. That’s all the world needs!

Post office boxes in Hawaii — Couldn’t resist taking this one at my local post office. I can run this several times!

Long-tailed Blue Butterfly

A Long-tailed Blue Butterfly on what I think is a rattlepod, one of the Crotileria family. The Long-tailed Blue is common in Hawaii having been accidentally introduced back in the 1880s.

Graham's Island

Life on the Big Island of Hawaii