Study in brown and shiny (images added)

[rjlittlefield]

This is a puzzle piece. I'm not going to tell you anything about it except that it attracted my attention from 50 feet away and I went to see what it was.

Any guesses?

--Rik

[Saul]

icicle with thread inside

[Cyclops]

Frozen fishing line?
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Canon 30D | Canon IXUS 265HS | Cosina 100mm f3.5 macro | EF 75-300 f4.5-5.6 USM III | EF 50 f1.8 II | Slik 88 tripod | Apex Practicioner monocular microscope

[dbur]

Spider web after freezing rain.

[DQE]

It sure looks VERY hard to illuminate without getting buried by specular reflections!

No real clue as to what it is, though. I've always found macro ID puzzles to be enjoyable. I recall showing macro photos of everyday things to my then young children and they really enjoyed trying to ID the scene or object. Even something as simple as a few mm or cm of dirt would throw almost anyone.
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-Phil

"Diffraction never sleeps"

[rjlittlefield]

You guys are good! Dbur is very close, not quite dead on.

--Rik

[Saul]

...more exact-icicle on the web thread, created by freezing-unfreezing cycle

[rjlittlefield]

That's even closer, but perhaps you're being misled by my subtle hint about the size.

What you're looking at here is a 42% crop from an MP-E 65 at 5X on a Canon T1i camera. The total frame width shown here is only 1.85 mm, and the average width of the structure is less than 0.5 mm.

Does that help?

--Rik

[dbur]

And you saw that from 50 ft away?

[rjlittlefield]

Yep. Consider what lighting conditions would make that possible, and you might get some additional ideas about the structure itself.

--Rik

[Harold Gough]

I'm intrigued by the hook-like structures above the long axis.

Harold
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My images are a medium for sharing some of my experiences: they are not me.

[ChrisR]

Perfectly simple. Rik can't see 2mm from 50 feet. If it's icy, all manner of things glint from that distance with the sun on/behind them.

So this was attached to a larger object, of which the strand is a small part.
The strand looks pale, and is bifurcated perhaps. Obviously a hair from a blonde head, so likely a girl.
A hairbrush wouldn't "do it" from 50 feet. So Rik found a girl who doesn't look after her split ends, who'd spent all night outside for this to happen to it.
Perfectly natural that his first thought would be to take a photograph. I understand, I'm about the same age.
I can remember parties where all that would have been normal.

[DQE]

Hairspray applied to a human or perhaps animal hair?

Lots of luck with this guess being right...this is more of a Rorschach test than anything else!!
_________________
-Phil

"Diffraction never sleeps"

[Harold Gough]

Barbed wire?

Harold
_________________
My images are a medium for sharing some of my experiences: they are not me.

[Cyclops]

OK I'm thinking its an animal hair on farmland, say a sheep or a horses hair, caught on barbed wire.
_________________
Canon 30D | Canon IXUS 265HS | Cosina 100mm f3.5 macro | EF 75-300 f4.5-5.6 USM III | EF 50 f1.8 II | Slik 88 tripod | Apex Practicioner monocular microscope