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For those who are fascinated by insects

Started May 15, 2017 | Discussions thread
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Isabel Cutler
Isabel Cutler Forum Pro • Posts: 19,189
For those who are fascinated by insects
5

What's that orange thing on my black swallowtail butterfly caterpillar?

Larval stages of insects are fun to photograph because they stay put - and it's fun to capture their progress from day to day. One of my most fascinating adventures was capturing the opening of a praying mantis ooetheca and watching the mosquito-like nymphs develop. Sadly, however, I wasn't prepared with enough food - flightless fruit flies that you culture with a special medium - and the aphids which might have substituted were scarce that year - so they cannibalized each other.

Antennae on a caterpillar? I was perplexed and Google "orange antennae on caterpillar" and learned that this structure is called an "osmenterium" and is something the caterpillar projects when it feels threatened.
Capturing it was difficult because it almost instantaneously contracts it and I really could have used a third hand to poke around it to make it come out, so I put my camera on a tripod and hoped to click at the right moment.
Here's more about the osmenterium: http://outlawgarden.com/2012/05/22/please-dont-tease-the-parsley-worm/

By the way - I chose to use the GX7, rather than my EM10 II on the trip with my Manfrotto ballhead and quick connect attachment because I could open up the card compartment while the quick connect plate was still on the camera - I would have had to separate it from the EM10 II.

Isabel

 Isabel Cutler's gear list:Isabel Cutler's gear list
Sony RX10 IV Canon EOS 7D Panasonic Lumix DMC-GX7 Olympus OM-D E-M10 II Sony a7 III +2 more
Olympus OM-D E-M10 II Panasonic Lumix DMC-GX7
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