Dogwood Bloom with a Thrip

[Ken Ramos]

It is a rainy day here in Western North Carolina and would you not know, I have the day off. So trying to make the most of the day, I snatched a frost bitten bloom from the dogwood in my front yard and put it beneath the objectives of the Meiji stereomicroscope just for a look.



If you look closely towards the top and just off center to the left, you might notice a small Thrip, I believe, giving me a hateful look as I scanned the bloom using the microscope. I suppose the bright light of the illuminator and the 50W halogen flood light did not agree with it. As my grandmother used to say, "Don't give me that hateful look, I'll smack that look right off that face." She would too!





Here in the last image is a better look at the hateful little thing. Not much detail to be seen since I can only digicam my images or what is known as eyepiece shooting. For those of you who may not have a wide screen monitor, these are as you can see 640 pixel images, so you don't have to scroll the page. I rather like using this format since I keep a digital journal and the images fit better on the pages. These are a bit grainy, I just noticed, because I shot them in the Auto Mode of the camera, a Sony DSC-W5 and the ISO is at 200. Normally I shoot in the Program Mode and the ISO is set at 100, I need to remember that I guess

[rjlittlefield]

Cute little guy! I saw him right off in the first image, but I still haven't found 'im in that second one.

By the way, it's "thrips" even in the singular, as in "one thrips, two thrips". Kinda like sheep or fish, but in reverse.

--Rik

[Ken Ramos]

Oh, it is not in the second one there Rik, just an extra image. It's been a very long day Thanks Rik