does it illustrate any nature or science concepts that I can use as a ‘teachable moment’ on my blog?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\nIf the photo accomplishes even one of those goals I’m often more than satisfied. A single photo almost never meets all of them but I think this one does, even though it isn’t perfect.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/white-lined-sphinx-moth-8248b-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"white-lined-sphinx-moth-8248b-ron-dudley\\"")
<\/p>\n
1\/2000, f\/5.6, ISO 1250, Canon 7D Mark II, Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM + EF 1.4 III Extender<\/em><\/p>\nThree days ago on Antelope Island I spent most of my time trying to get decent photos of Rufous Hummingbirds and White-lined Sphinx moths in flight as they were nectaring on Rocky Mountain Bee Plant (Cleome serrulata<\/em>). The wildfire smoke was simply awful so it wasn’t easy. Focusing was difficult and I had to use higher ISO settings than I prefer in order to get barely sufficient shutter speed.<\/p>\nBut I managed to get some photos I like, including this one, and I like it more every time I look at it. Let’s see how many of my goals it meets.<\/p>\n
\n- Depending on tastes visual appeal is an individual thing but I think it’s a very attractive photo. Then the photo becomes even more interesting when the viewer notices the ants on the flower cluster in the lower right quadrant.<\/li>\n
- The moth, the flower cluster and the ants are sharp where they need to be and in my view the composition works quite well.<\/li>\n
- The moth and the ants feeding on nectar check off the interesting behaviors documented in the photo.<\/li>\n
- The nectar that the moth and the ants are after is produced at the base of the flower stamens. Evolution has provided extremely long stamens that the moth and most other pollinators have no choice but to brush against as they’re collecting nectar so pollen collects on them to be transferred to the next flowers they feed on (the ants, being very small, do little if any pollinating). Evolution has also provided the extremely long proboscis of the moth which is capable of reaching the nectar at the base of the stamens. Nature and science concepts for a teachable moment – check.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Is the photo perfect? Of course not. Among other (minor) things the right wing of the moth is soft. It would have been better if it had been the left wing that was soft since that wing isn’t between the moth’s body and the viewer. Ideally both wings would be sharp.<\/p>\n
But it’s almost unheard of for me to get this many of my preferences checked off in a single photo so I decided to share.<\/p>\n
Ron<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Only rarely does a single photo of mine have so many positive attributes.<\/p>\n
Continue reading<\/span><\/i><\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":101934,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3,8,392,3508],"tags":[31,2091,5906,127,2171,5900,1679,311,2170],"class_list":["post-101930","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-antelope-island","category-ecology-and-environment","category-feeding-bird-behaviors","category-white-lined-sphinx-moths","tag-antelope-island-2","tag-ants","tag-cleome-serrulata","tag-evolution","tag-hyles-lineata","tag-nectaring","tag-rocky-mountain-bee-plant","tag-utah-2","tag-white-lined-sphinx-moth"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/white-lined-sphinx-moth-8248b-ron-dudley.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1zzJh-qw2","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101930","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=101930"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101930\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":101959,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101930\/revisions\/101959"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/101934"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=101930"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=101930"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=101930"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}