Aiee! Who would have thought that a single caterpillar could be the source of such boundless beauty and fascination*

Jon

*But only should it have the good fortune to be collected and nurtured by a macro-master

Well, if it were left to me I would name them Chris or Alice. Names that when concatenated conveniently create a homophone for chrysalis

Shame, then, that this time round you only had the one larva.

Jon

Yet another corker, Mr Coker

What are you hoping for - a boy or a girl

Too early to solicit suggestions for names?

Jon

Fifth instar now, Roger: 8-9 days further munching before, in the wild, migration and pupation (usually over winter).

An extraordinary sequence which, when completed, deserves wider distribution (local recorder; Butterfly Conservation Org).

Will PM you with the relevant pages from the latest (2019) version of the "Life Cycles of British and Irish Butterflies".

Jon

Terrific shots, Roger, and a wonderful follow-up to the extraordinary egg one.

Looking forward to seeing the shots of the different instar stages.

Jon

Elegance indeed and an order magnitude better than your average swan shot. The chosen crop works really well and the inclusion of the floating feather ahead of the subject really adds to the sense that this is a juvenile swan in the process of developing its adult plumage.

Would love to see an enlargement in order to better appreciate the feather detail

Beautiful colours, detail and bokeh, evincing, if there were any doubt, that 'old' can still be 'gold'

Difficult to ignore the fact that the *istD is sporting what appears to be an FA* lens, but which one :

Just to be absolutely clear, the image of the Brown Hairstreak egg was taken by Gillian Thompson and most definitely not me The full link to the relevant page on the Butterfly Conservation web site is link.

Apologies for my inadvertent oversight in not having made this clear in my original post.

Jon

Super 'micro', Roger, that allows one to appreciate the beauty of a butterfly egg and good on you for finding one in the first place

I help with Brown Hairstreak egg surveys during the winter at a number of sites in North Wiltshire. They are of similar size but pure white in colour and resemble miniature sea urchins skeletons link.

Unlike the adult Orange Tip, the adult Brown Hairstreak spends most of of its life in the treetops and hence population monitoring relies on egg surveys.

Not sure that I understand the practice or real purpose of masking or if it is of any real benefit other than when using vintage (classic?) 35mm SLRs. For what it's worth, here is my first attempt.




All C&C welcome.