Recent Peak into the Micro World

Recently I had some time at the weekends to go looking for the tiny micro creatures that can be found under our feet.  Most of the following ( with the exceptions of the woodlouse and beetle ) are hard to spot with the naked eye.  However a bit of looking and sometimes searching around with the magnification lens that is the Canon MPE-65mm ( it reproduces from life size to 5x lifesize on the cameras sensor ) these tiny things can be seen and photographed.  Well photographed if they don’t run or ping away!

Here is a fairly large selection of photographs from my three most recent outings to find them at Ramsdown Nature Reserve, near Hurn, Christchurch.

First up a tiny mite ( about the size of a pin head – as are the later globular springtails )

This Woodlouse was co-operative, allowing me to take a couple of high magnification focus stacked shots, which I merged together in Photoshop CC.

I feel this Elongated-bodied springtail has a fairly sinister look to it.

Whereas this globular was almost attacking the diffuser on my flashgun, leading to a couple of amusing poses.

This springtail below has fairly short antennae for an Elongated bodied one.

I had fun following this Globular springtail up and down the stem of a small rotten leaf.

As far as I can recall this next springtail is the smallest I have taken.  This is an uncropped image of a around 3x magnification.

One thing that is interesting to me, when getting a detailed view on the small world, is how hairy some of these things are..

I was pleased to get the following shot of this dark springtail, they appear almost black to the naked eye, and are among the quickest to run off if disturbed.

Tiny is the word again for this small Globular springtail, it was about 1/4 the size of the other globular springtails shown in this post.

This Dicyrtoma fusca globular springtail also got annoyed with my lens being close and pulled some interesting poses before bouncing off.

I have yet to id the blue springtail in the next two images – some scale being given by the tiny pinhead sized mite that appeared briefly by it.  These images are at 4x magnification.

And from the tiny – to the small – a beetle.  Even though it is not big, it is much more easy to spot.

Finally a selection of springtails, the last of which I think looks a like it wants to pounce out at you.

All images taken on Canon 5D mark IV, with Canon MPE-65mm Macro Lens, and lit by Canon MT-24ex Twin flash with home made diffusers.