Eastern tiger swallowtail on Vervain

Nikon D850, Nikkor 105mm micro lens, 1/250 sec, f/13, ISO 400

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Eastern Tiger Swallowtail

Eastern Tiger Swallowtail (Papilio glaucus)

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Tiger on a tiger: Eastern Tiger swallowtail on Tiger lily

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Re-post: Eastern Tiger Swallowtail on Zinnia ‘Zowie’

Temps have been in the 30s and 40s here in (usually sunny) Texas, with murky gray skies almost every day. I’m in need of some color!

Originally posted July 27, 2010

Overcast and very pleasant day, perfect for a quick (and fruitful) lunchtime shoot at Green Spring Gardens. This is an Eastern Tiger Swallowtail on a ‘Zowie’ Zinnia.

Note: I was actually trying to get a shot (with the tripod in place) of just the two Zinnias when the Swallowtail landed on one of the flowers. I held my breath and got just two shots before it flew off. I live for moments (and wild color) like this!

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Eastern Tiger Swallowtail on Orange Tiger Lily

Eastern Tiger Swallowtail (Papilio glaucus) on Orange Tiger Lily (Tigrinum Splendens),

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Re-post: Eastern Tiger Swallowtail on ‘Zowie’ Zinnia

Originally posted July 27, 2010

Overcast and very pleasant day, perfect for a quick (and fruitful) lunchtime shoot at Green Spring Gardens. This is an Eastern Tiger Swallowtail on a ‘Zowie’ Zinnia.

Note: I was actually trying to get a shot (with the tripod in place) of just the two Zinnias when the Swallowtail landed on one of the flowers. I held my breath and got just two shots before it flew off. I live for moments (and wild color) like this!

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Eastern Tiger swallowtail on ‘Zowie’ zinnia

Eastern Tiger swallowtail (Papilio glaucus) on ‘Zowie’ zinnia (Zinnia elegans)

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Eye candy, batch #2

Pulled from the archives of my personal refrigerator magnet poetry, I give to you my handcrafted attempt #1:

January snow blanket melts
cold February moon gone
March winds a memory
a luscious light envelopes
tiny crocus petals whisper spring
most delicate green grass emerges
rain sweetens the earth
bird song filters down
from the impossibly blue blue sky
warm breezes weave through
a gorgeous tapestry of color

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Same time, last year: Eastern Tiger Swallowtail on ‘Zowie’ Zinnia

Originally posted July 27, 2010

Overcast and very pleasant day, perfect for a quick (and fruitful) lunchtime shoot at Green Spring Gardens. This is an Eastern Tiger Swallowtail on a ‘Zowie’ Zinnia.

Note: I was actually trying to get a shot (with the tripod in place) of just the two Zinnias when the Swallowtail landed on one of the flowers. I held my breath and got just two shots before it flew off. I live for moments (and wild color) like this!

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Eastern Tiger Swallowtail

An Eastern Tiger Swallowtail (Papilio glaucus) dines on a Stoke’s Aster (Stokesia laevis) against a backdrop of Purple Coneflowers (Echinacea purpurea)

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Eastern Tiger Swallowtail on Stoke’s Aster

Eastern Tiger Swallowtail (Papilio glaucus) on Stoke’s Aster (Stokesia laevis)

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

How many more days until spring?

These images were all shot in one my most favorite photography spots in the world—Green Spring Gardens in Alexandria, Virginia. When things are in bloom, I escape to this place as fast and as often as I can, even if it’s just for a half hour of shooting. It is my respite, my calm, my own private paradise…just me with my camera, surrounded by bountiful blooms and bustling bugs under a balmy blue sky. It is where I go to think, to dream, to regroup, to create. Spring can’t come soon enough for me!

See more images shot at Green Spring Gardens here.

© Cindy Dyer. All right reserved.

Eastern Tiger Swallowtail

GREAT PHOTO TIP! Here’s a butterfly photography trick I learned from my friend Mary Ellen a few years ago. Wait until the butterfly has it proboscis inserted into a flower and it becomes completely distracted by the task at hand—then move in closer, staying as still as possible.

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Eastern Tiger Swallowtail

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Zowie!

Overcast and very pleasant day, perfect for a quick (and fruitful) lunchtime shoot at Green Spring Gardens. This is an Eastern Tiger Swallowtail on a ‘Zowie’ Zinnia. I wish the edge of the right wing was a tad sharper, but I had to move quickly to even get this shot! Stay tuned, more images to come.

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Queen Anne’s Lace (Daucus carota)

Some of you may have noticed that my photographic style is very graphic and sometimes minimalist—clean lines, stark composition, judicious use of light, pops of color, selective depth of field, and employing varying degrees of bokeh. Well, capturing a “plant portrait” of Queen Anne’s Lace (which I have avoided until now, believe it or not), isn’t easy—and it’s a hard flower to fit into my more graphic style. It’s a very delicate flower with hundreds of little flowering brachts spread over a wide, curving surface—making it hard to control the depth of field across the entire flower. I hung in there yesterday and experimented with it—resulting in a shot that I rather like—and that still suits my photographic bent!

Queen Anne’s Lace is sometimes called Wild Carrot—in fact, the carrots we eat were once cultivated from this plant. Lacy, flat-topped clusters bloom from May through October. It is a biennial plant, meaning it lives for just two years. Although many people consider it an invasive weed, many insects benefit from this wildflower—caterpillars of the Eastern Black Swallowtail butterfly (at right) eat the leaves, bees and other insects are drawn to the nectar, and other insects feed on the aphids that inhabit the flowers.

Photos © Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.