Lacewing Eggs on the under surface of Oleander Leaf

I found these strange eggs on the under surface of Oleander (Nerium oleander) leaf next to my house. Each egg was attached to the top of a hair-like filament. I had not seen such an egg laying on filamentous structure and on searching for info I found that it was from Lacewing (Chrysopidae). I used Canon EF 100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM on Canon EOS 5D mark II illuminated using Rayflash on Canon Speedlite 580EX II flash.

In another few days the eggs will hatch and a tiny predatory larva emerges ready to eat the pests in my garden. Lacewing larvae are also known as aphid lions. Oval shaped eggs are laid singly at the end of long silken stalks and are pale green, turning pale gray in several days. The larvae, which are very active, are gray or brownish and alligator-like with well-developed legs and large pincers with which they suck the body fluids from prey. Larvae grow from <1 mm to 6-8 mm.

Lacewing larvae voraciously attack their prey by seizing them with large, sucking jaws and inject a paralyzing venom. The hollow jaws then draw out the body fluids of the pest. Of all available commercial predators, lacewings are the most voracious and has the greatest versatility for pests of field crops, orchards, and greenhouses. They are one of the best biological pesticides for your garden.

Reason for that filamentous structure may be to prevent emerging larva from cannibalizing each other. Each lacewing larva will devour 200 or more pests or pest eggs a week during their two to three week developmental period. After this stage, the larvae pupate by spinning a cocoon with silken thread. Approximately five days later adult lacewings emerge to mate and repeat the life cycle. Depending on climatic conditions, the adult will live about four to six weeks.

Lacewing Eggs

Each adult female may deposit more than 200 eggs. For best results, habitats should be provided that encourage the adults to remain and reproduce in the release area. Nectar, pollen, and honeydew stimulate their reproductive process. If these food sources are not available, adults may disperse.

Lacewing larvae feed on many different pest insects. In general, they attack the eggs and the immature stages of most soft-bodied pests such as: aphids, thrips, spider mites, sweet potato & greenhouse whitefly, mealybugs, leafhoppers, and the eggs and caterpillars of most moths.

Adult green lacewings are pale green, about 12-20 mm long, with long antennae and bright, golden eyes. They have large, transparent, pale green wings and a delicate body. Adults are active fliers, particularly during the evening and night and have a characteristic, fluttering flight.

Daphnis minima

My daughter called me that day to photograph a moth which she thought was Oleander Hawk-moth(Daphnis nerii). When I went close to take photograph I realized that it was not Daphnis nerii. It was looking very similar to Daphnis nerii, but was brownish all over instead of the bright camouflage green Oleander Hawk-moth had. You can see Oleander Hawk-moth here as well as in my Macro Stitching a Moth post. You can also see its caterpillar at Metamorphosis.

I photographed this moth using my Canon EF 100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM on Canon EOS 5D mark II with Rayflash fitted to Canon Speedlite 580EXII Flash. All photos were taken hand held at an awkward angle perching on a wooden stool as the moth was sitting close to fluorescent tube light outside my house. Ant which passed by during the shoot gave nice dimension of scale to the photograph.

Daphnis minima

Later going through identification I found that it did not even resemble another likely candidate Daphnis hypothous. Later at Indian Moths Yahoo Group I found out that it is Daphnis minima. This species is endemic to the Western Ghats and Sri Lanka. I thank Dr Ian J. Kitching and Roger C. Kendrick For helping me out in identification.

For more details on Daphnis minima check this link.

I am Hungry

hi, I am a Blue-tailed Bee-eater. They call me scientifically Merops philippinus. I belong to great bee-eater family called Meropidae. We bee-eaters rank among the most delightful birds on Earth and possess startling grace and beauty.

Yummy Nice Bee

My species very similar and is sometimes considered to be conspecific with the Blue-cheeked Bee-eater (Merops persicus). We live throughout South East Asia. We are strongly migratory.

Let me remove his sting

Like other bee-eaters, I am a richly-colored, slender bird with predominantly green; my face has a narrow blue patch with a black eye stripe, and a yellow and brown throat; the tail is blue and the beak is black. I can grow to a length of 23-26 cm, including the two elongated central tail feathers. Even though we have confusion in our sexes as both sexes are alike we manage to breed along.

Wow that was delightful

We love to breed in sub-tropical open country, such as farmland, parks or rice fields. My favorite spots are near large water bodies. Like other bee-eaters our main food are insects. I love bees, wasps and hornets. I enjoy catching them in the air by sorties from an open perch. I like to eat bees and dragonflies in roughly equal numbers. The insects that are caught needs to be beaten on the perch to kill and break their exoskeleton.

Ugh here comes my bee snatcher

We bee-eaters are gregarious, make nesting colonially in sandy banks or open flat areas. A relatively long tunnel in which the 5 to 7 spherical white eggs are laid. Both the male and the female take care of the eggs. We also feed and roost communally.

My photographs were taken with Canon EOS 7D and Canon EF 300mm f/4.0 L IS USM lens. If you liked my story please send me your comments.

White-cheeked Barbet

The sun was very high on the sky on that day. Light was too harsh for photography. Summer was trying push away those few days we call here as winter. My daughter wanted to play and asked me to come under the shade of this huge mango tree (Mangifera indica). It was a nice respite from the afternoon heat. As we went closer to the tree we saw two different barbets on different branches. I initially thought this one was a Juvenile Coppersmith Barbet (Megalaima haemacephala) but on closer inspection I found out it is White-cheeked Barbet (Megalaima viridis). Barbets are always heard in India, but seldom seen as they camouflage well under the leaves.

I had my trusty Canon EF 300mm f/4.0 L IS USM on not so trusty Canon EOS 7D. I would have loved to have Canon EOS 5D mark II which would have coped with harsh contrast better than Canon EOS 7D. But the 1.6x crop factor of the Canon EOS 7D was the bonus. Even tough I was using 300 mm lens, because of this crop factor I was really shooting with effective focal length of 480mm in 35mm terms. This had advantage in the “shoot the bird” territory. Also the superior focusing ability of 7d, I was able to capture these birds sharply.

Afternoon sunlight produces dark shadows and bright highlights thus producing a contrasty situation. Getting a right exposure without having these distracting elements inside the picture is many time impossible. I have seen many photographers who hate to go out when it is cloudy, during early morning or late evening. They are under an impression that you need to have bright light for good photograph. But the truth is just the opposite. They don’t know what they are really missing. So called “golden hours” of morning and evening are the best times of the day when the light is directional and soft thus creating much pleasing texture as well as depth which transforms your ordinary shot into a great picture. Cloudy day is also best time to shoot as cloud acts as large soft-box diffusing light.

To lessen the effect of contrast of the afternoon harsh sun I chose a vantage point which had much lesser sunshine. Even then the branch where the bird was sitting was unevenly lit and caused lot of distraction.

The White-cheeked Barbet or Small Green Barbet (Megalaima viridis) is a species of barbet found in southern India. It is very similar to the more widespread Brown-headed Barbet (or Large Green Barbet) (Megalaima zeylanica) but this species has a distinctive supercilium and a broad white cheek stripe below the eye and is endemic to the forest areas of the Western Ghats and adjoining hills. Like all other Asian barbets they are mainly frugivorous although they may sometimes eat insects and they use their bills to excavate nest cavities in trees.

Like many other barbets these are green and sit upright and still on a tree perch making them difficult to spot. During the breeding season at the start of summer their calls are loud and constant. The call, a monotonous Kot-roo … Kotroo... starting with an explosive trrr is not easily differentiated from that of the Brown-headed Barbet. During hot afternoons, they may also utter a single note wut not unlike the call of Collared Scops Owl (Otus lettia) or Coppersmith Barbet(Megalaima haemacephala).

Coppersmith Barbet

The Coppersmith Barbet, Crimson-breasted Barbet or Coppersmith (Megalaima haemacephala), is a bird with crimson forehead and throat which is best known for its metronomic call that has been likened to a coppersmith striking metal with a hammer. It is a resident found in South Asia and parts of Southeast Asia. They are mainly fruit eating but will take insects. As you can see this barbet had its mouth fully stuffed with seeds probably it was carrying to its nest. They are frugivorous like rest of barbets.

This species of barbet is found to overlap in range with larger barbets in most of South Asia. In the Western Ghats, it also overlaps with the Malabar Barbet (Megalaima malabarica) which has a very similar size and a more rapid call. The red forehead, yellow eye-ring and throat patch with streaked underside and green upperparts, it is fairly distinctive. Juveniles are duller and lack the red patches. The sexes are alike. This is the Megalaima haemacephala indica subspecies (Latham, 1790) that is found in the Indian Subcontinent from northeastern Pakistan and extends into Sri Lanka and Vietnam. The Sri Lankan form has more black on the face, more red on the breast and darker streaks on the underside.

Keeps solitary, pairs, or small groups; larger parties occasionally on abundantly fruiting Ficus trees. Fond of sunning themselves in the morning on bare top branches of tall trees, often flitting about to sit next to each other. The flight is straight, with rapid flaps.They compete with other cavity nesting birds and frugivores. Blue-throated Barbet (Megalaima asiatica) have been noted to evict them from their nest holes, while Red-vented Bulbuls (Pycnonotus cafer) have been seen to indulge in kleptoparasitism, pirating berries that the males bring to the female at the nest.

The nest holes are also used for roosting and some birds roost alone in cavities and these often roost during part of the day. Immatures will roost with the parents but often return to roost early so as not to be prevented by the parents from entering the roost cavity. The call is a loud rather metallic tuk…tuk…tuk, reminiscent of a copper sheet being beaten, giving the bird its name. Repeated monotonously for long periods, starting with a subdued tuk and building up to an even volume and tempo, the latter varying from 1.5 to 2 per second. The beak remains shut during each call – a patch of bare skin on both sides of the throat inflates and collapses with each tuk like a rubber bulb, with much body and tail shaking. Not very vocal in cold weather – a spell of rain or cold immediately silences them, but it is one of India’s most familiar sounds in the hot season.

Male Black-hooded Oriole

The Black-hooded Oriole, Oriolus xanthornus, is a member of the Oriolidae family of passerine Old world Oriole birds. It is a resident breeder in tropical southern Asia from India and Sri Lanka east to Indonesia. The New World orioles even though similar in appearance to the Oriolidae, belong Icteridae family and are unrelated to the Old World orioles.

It is a bird of open woodland and cultivation. The nest is built in a tree, and contains two eggs. The food is insects and fruit, especially figs, found in the tree canopies where the orioles spend much of their time.

The male is striking, with the typical oriole black and yellow coloration. The plumage is predominantly yellow, with a solid black hood, and black also in the wings and tail centre.

Male Black-hooded Oriole

The female Black-hooded Oriole is a drabber bird with greenish underparts, but still has the black hood. Young birds are like the female, but have dark streaking on the underparts, and their hood is not solidly black, especially on the throat.

The black head of this species is an obvious distinction from Golden Oriole, Oriolus oriolus, which is a summer visitor to northern India. Orioles can be shy, and even the male may be difficult to see in the dappled yellow and green leaves of the canopy.

The Black-hooded Oriole’s flight is somewhat like a thrush, strong and direct with some shallow dips over longer distances.

Indian Palm Squirrel

The Indian Palm Squirrel (Funambulus palmarum) also known as Three-Striped Palm Squirrel, is a species of rodent in the Sciuridae family. It is found abundantly in Indian subcontinent. More recently, the it was accidentally introduced into Western Australia where it has become a minor pest that is actively eradicated due to its lack of natural predators.

Palm squirrels are about the size of rats with a bushy tail which is slightly shorter than their body. Their back is a grizzled grey-brown colour with five conspicuous white stripes, three of which run from head to tail. The two outer stripes run from the forelegs to the hind legs only. They have a creamy white belly and a tail covered with interspersed long black and white hairs. Their ears are small and triangular.

Indian Palm Squirrel

Gestation period is 34 days. Litter size averages 2.75 (viviparous). Breeding takes place in grass nests during autumn. Litters of two or three are common. The young are weaned after about ten weeks and are sexually mature at nine months.

Indian Palm Squirrel

These squirrels eat mainly nuts and fruits. They are fairly vocal, with a cry that sounds like “chip chip chip” when danger is present. They are opportunists in urban areas, and can be easily domesticated and trained to accept food from humans. Naturally active, their activity reaches levels of frenzy during the mating season.

Yakshagana by Diji (www.dijisworld.com)

As you have seen in this article on copyright infringement, I decided to implement watermarking of all my images which are larger than 500 pixels. I felt the watermarking is justified to solve similar copyright infringement in future. Friend of mine Dijiraj has experienced a bizarre twist on this scenario. A few days ago he was visiting the Chitra Santhe at Bangalore and came across a stand of paintings, being sold as original work of art. The only problem was that the painter had made “faithful” (but unattributed) reproduction in paint of Diji’s photographic image which is shown above. If you have a facebook account you can check the photo of the painting taken at Chitrasanthe by Smrithi Kangovi here. Now image resolution or a watermark wouldn’t make much difference here, a painter could nick a photo at screen resolution. The painter had “stolen” friend’s intellectual property and made it his own by interpreting it in paint. The law apparently sees no problem with this.

The rights of copyright holders need to be protected, but some draconian remedies that have been suggested would create more problems than they would solve.
- Patrick Leahy

By definition a written quote is attributed and hence a context. If it’s not attributed then it’s just theft. Whereas a copied photograph from the net rarely, if ever, attributed properly. We obviously haven’t the time, or the capability, to study all the works of art in the world to check whether this is in fact true so a percentage of people will get away with making rip-offs without being caught.

Philosophically, originality is linked to free will. If we are all beavering away in our own corners, minding our own business, creating for ourselves, then anything we haven’t done personally before, is original. And then there is no reason not to do something that someone else has already done. If however, we are all in it together, then originality is defined with respect to the community. And then, it is up to the individual to be fully aware of what everyone else has ever done.

I fully accept that the theft of images from the net does take place. However there is always the risk that whenever you put your images out there that they might be stolen. Does this mean that we should never show our images on the net or in print? No, of course it doesn’t! What’s the point in making images if we don’t share them? Life is full of risks and this is just one of them. One just needs to take the precautions one sees fit – as long as they fall short of paranoia!

For me, My photograph’s purpose should be (amongst other things!) to uplift, inspire, evoke and enlighten – not simply to make money. Though I do need to pay that bill… So I prefer to have my images without watermarks. So what do you think? Should I keep them or remove them? I want your opinion in this regards before I take a decision regarding watermark.

Grey-breasted Prinia

I photographed this Grey-breasted Prinia, Prinia hodgsonii using Canon EOS 7D with Canon EF 300mm f/4.0 L IS USM lens. This skulking passerine warbler is typically found in open woodland, scrub jungle, and other open areas with some grass. This prinia is a resident breeder in the Indian subcontinent, Sri Lanka and southeast Asia.

These 11-to-13-centimetre (4 to 5 in) long warblers have short rounded wings, a longish tail, strong legs and a short black bill. In breeding plumage, adults are grey-brown above, with no supercilium, a black eye stripe and orange eyering. They have a rufous wing panel. Grey-breasted Prinia’s underparts are white with a grey breast band. The sexes are identical.

Grey-breasted Prinia

Non-breeding birds have browner upperpart plumage and a white supercilium, but lack the breast band. Young birds are like non-breeding adults but more rufous above. There are a number of subspecies. The distinctive greyer endemic race in Sri Lanka, Prinia hodgsonii leggei, retains summer-type plumage all year round.

Grey-breasted Prinia

Like most warblers, Grey-breasted Prinia is insectivorous. The song is a repetitive chiwee-chiwee-chiwee-chip-chip-chip.

Watermark

I was shocked to see that one of my photograph was displayed as a hoarding at the entrance of an exhibition, without my permission. As this was copyrighted image and the person(s) who were exhibiting this did not take any permission whatsoever from me and have displayed it without even informing me. The photo was obviously taken from my web page as I had not distributed the original elsewhere. They had cleverly cropped out my copyright info at the bottom left corner. Blown it up using software and then printed on a 15×20 feet sized large format print.

I was able to find out the copyright violators and asked them to comply to my term of copyright or face legal actions. They realized their mistake and readily agreed to my terms. So the whole matter was settled amicably. But the question that remains at large is that my pictures are source of attraction for others to steal. What should I do to safeguard them? I was thinking of several solutions which are possible.

Let us examine different methods to prevent such copyright infringement of photographs which are published on the website like this one.

• Reduce size of images I can show only preview of my images which are 500 pixel in size which can be easily copied but since it is so small it will be useless for anything but a preview.
• Reduce quality of images This will result in ugly preview of my images. Reducing quality of images is not a good idea. Why put ugly photos on photography site which will show me in a bad light.
• Use javascript to disable right click and save Not fool proof. It will not stop web page saving and making screen shots. Does not work on the Mac OS. But it is a smart way of telling people the images are copyrighted.
• Adding a transparent gif over the top of your image in a web page. This is what Flickr does. You can show original images. Gives the wrong image when saving by right mouse click. But does not stop screen capture programs and saving web page.
• Adding visible watermarks to images Big non transparent watermarks do not allow restore original images. But small watermark can be easily cropped out . Transparent watermark can be repainted or cloned out (but the work is very difficult). Often people do not care who owns the image. This is the most popular way to protect images. Use several big transparent watermarks for improving protection quality. The image will look uglier than the pristine original.
• Digital watermarking adding invisible watermarks Hidden, so thief will not know it is there. You can prove your copyright. But since it is hidden, how do people know it is copyrighted? Finding stolen pictures is dependent on the thief actually posting the image online AND getting that page indexed at the search engines. Newer services like TinEye help to find such stolen pictures without having to resort to digital watermarking
• Making images into Flash or Shockwave objects No right click, no drag and drop, no web-page saving. But it does not protect against screen capture. Flash is not universally accepted format and is a time consuming way.
• Making pictures Java Applets
  You can show original image or part of your image as you want. No right click, no drag and drop, no print, no web-page saving. But does not stop screen capture programs. Mobile devices may not show image. Java is not as good as it could be. It also slows the web page rendering somewhat.
• Last but the best one is not to show your images at all Nothing lost or gained

I usually downsize my image to maximum of 1200 pixel at 100 dpi. I found that even using simple image viewing software like irfanview or FastStoneViewer this JPEG file can be blown up easily to 5 times its original size without drastic change in quality. Modern algorithms of resizing make this easy. If you use dedicated softwares which can enlarge photos like onOne Genuine fractals 6 or Alien Skin Blowup 2 you can get very large format picture with fantastic quality.

Till now I was publishing such photos without watermark. I felt that my pictures need to be enjoyed without the blemish of ugly watermark in the background. From now on I’ll be putting watermark at the center of the picture so as to prevent people from stealing my work without crediting me. I know this will look ugly, but leaves me with no choice. If you notice all my photos in the blog have gained watermark by now. I will be using watermark only in the larger version and smaller version will still be watermark free.

Long Horned Beetle Nymph

Chimping refers to the act of shooting a photo, then immediately hitting the preview button on your camera to see the how it came out on the camera’s LCD screen. Much like a curious chimpanzee will hold and examine any new object. The term was coined by USA Today shooter Robert Deutsch in a story for the website SportsShooter.com. As defined by the Urban Dictionary: ‘What one does after taking a picture with a digital camera and looking at the result.’ Derived from the words they speak when chimping: “Ooo-oo-oo!”

Wikipedia adds, “the sounds and actions some make while reviewing images and those of an excited primate (Oooh! Oooh! Aaah!), or when a photographer is completely absorbed in the act of analyzing, admiring or proudly displaying a shot to others.” A wasteful ritual? Just a bad habit? Perhaps, but luckily shared it’s shared by many of our photo brethren be they professional or amateur.

You may be wondering why all this introduction about chimping and what that got to do with this photograph of young longhorned beetle. Please read further.

It was early morning of Wednesday. Coffee had not yet reached my bloodstream to wake me up, but I was greeted by the news that ootheca laid by some unknown praying mantis on the widow glass has hatched. I rushed with my trusty Canon 5D Mark II & Canon EF 100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM along with Rayflash on my Canon Speedlite 580EX II to get the glimpse of these newly hatched mantids.

The ootheca was laid high up on the window glass pane and I was able reach there only with a help of large wooden stool. All around the ootheca the newly hatched mantids were gathering. Previous day it had rained and the ground was unstable. I tried taking photographs so as not to disturb mantids away from the ripped egg sac. The glass of the window pane was not helpful as it was reflecting my flash light emitted from Rayflash. I took few unsatisfactory shots and was thinking of setting up a nice lightbox around the ootheca so that I could capture mantids on all their glory.

Just Hatched Mantids

Just then I noticed a very young long horned beetle on the window frame. I was able to get a beautiful closeup from the elevated vantage point I was in. Wooden background helped to highlight this little beetle. I was curious to see how well I did in focusing, and as a usual practice I started chimping at the preview. I was so engrossed in appreciating the shot at the back of my camera, that I did not realize that the stool underneath me sank in the soft mud and was tilting. Next thing I knew that I was out of balance and was rushing towards ground. I was able to save my camera and the rig from harms way but got few bruises along the hand and shin. My dream of capturing young praying mantids in light box went down with pain and agony.

So even though chimping is good to improve your photography skills it is bad for your health. Have a safe chimping.