Fotos

After yesterday's thrill of seeing for the first time darters freshly out of their larvae shells, I realized that where one bunch was developping one day, another bunch might well be coming out the day after - only earlier in the day. Now, getting up early is definitely not my idea of a lark, but what won't we do for a good picture, so at 6 this morning my alarm clock called me into the world of the living. The met office had promised a day of sun and warmth, but at 6 this wasn't visible yet - the clouds were still obscuring the sun. I thought about turning onto the other side, but eventually decided against it, and by 7 Milloup and I were at the water hole once more.
At first I checked around where I found the others yesterday, but I didn't see any little larvaes climbing onto straws. A bit further on, however, I found this chap, and I could see him wriggle his legs, so I was in no doubt that this was indeed a live larvae, not a shell from yesterday's feast. Well, the short version is that I spent the next 3 hours watching this one and other darters coming out of their shells, and it was a great experience. It was also a back-breaking one, as most of the action took place about 10-20 cm above the water. I'm still working on straightening my back after the exertion ;-))
I don't know if this one is the best of the 200 photo haul, but it's part of a sequence showing the first stages of the darter coming out. If you'd like to see the whole performance, go to this page to see the entire first stage, a total of 15 photos. It'll probably take a while to load if you're on a slow connection.
Treatment: Crop, brightness +5, saturation +10, Contrast +10, USM and resize.