Leighton Photography & Imaging

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  • Close-up shot of a freshly-molted captive rose hair tarantula.
    Rose Hair Tarantula
  • Close-up detail of Lupinus sericeus, the silky lupine. Notice the fine, soft hairs on the back of the flowers - that's where it gets it's name. Sericeus is Latin for "silky".
    Silky Lupine
  • Just about to bloom! This beautiful lupine is only recognizable from the many other lupines that grow in the area by its silvery-green, fuzzy stems and leaves. When the flowers show themselves, the colors will range from a dark pink, soft lilac or a bright purple. Lots of variation in colors of the same species often make lupines very frustrating and difficult to identify. This one was growing in a small open patch next to Umtanum Creek in Kittitas County, WA.
    Silky Lupine
  • One of my favorite sagebrush-steppe native wildflowers, this silky lupine is growing straight and tall in the late afternoon, late springtime sunlight in Washington's Cowiche Canyon.
    Silky Lupine
  • Backlit silky lupine flowers in the later afternoon in Cowiche Canyon, just west of Yakima, WA. These flowers were quite a bit more purple than the nearby blue-flowered lupines, but they are all the same species.
    Silky Lupine
  • This beautiful native member of the pea family has an interesting story. Like all lupines, they have toxic properties, that vary from species to species. The silky lupine is highly toxic to sheep, and moderately toxic to cattle and horses. That said, bighorn sheep rely on it heavily as a food source, as do white-tailed deer, Columbia ground squirrels and other birds, mammals and insects. It seems that while it is toxic to imported domesticated non-native animals, it is completely safe and nutritious for native wildlife that has evolved alongside it.
    Silky Lupine
  • Common in many types of dry habitats in the western United States, silky lupine is a blooms in a variety of colors, usually blue to purple, they can sometimes be found in pink, yellow or creamy white. This large specimen was found in abundance in Central Washington's Cowiche Canyon.
    Silky Lupine
  • Closeup of salal flowers next to Deep Lake near Enumclaw, WA. Found in many places across the Pacific Northwest, this common native woody shrub is found in forests and woodlands and is of great historical importance to the native tribes who have inhabited the region for thousands of years. The delicious, intensely sweet edible berries that will come later in the summer were used to make dried cakes that would provide nourishment throughout the winter. It is said that cakes of pure salal were reserved solely for the chiefs to eat, and anyone else had to have theirs mixed with other local berries, such as huckleberries or elderberries as was the custom.
    Salal
  • One of the great adaptations the silky lupine has evolved is to grow in places where the soil has a very low fertility. Its nitrogen-fixing ability not only allows it to grow in large colonies in the most arid of dry steppes, it actually improves soil quality allowing new species of plants to come in, take seed and grow.
    Silky Lupine
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  • Abstractions in nature: jerking the camera with a long shutterspeed.
    Tresses of Pure Light.jpg
  • A mixed bumblebee (Bombus mixtus) is busily feeding on the nectar of wild purple sage in the sagebrush steppe of White Pass, a dry desert-like canyon west of Yakima, Washington.
    Mixed Bumblebee
  • This really fuzzy bumblebee was found quite by accident on the back of a currant leaf in Mercer Slough in Bellevue, WA. This Pacific Northwest native bumblebee is found from California to British Columbia, and occasionally in Alberta, Canada.
    Mixed Bumblebee
  • The little bear beetle is a type of scarab beetle associated with apple and pear orchards in the dry parts of Washington, Oregon and California. This one rests in an antelope bitterbrush bush in the sagebrush desert in Central Washington.
    Little Bear Beetle
  • The metalic green underside of a little bear beetle in sagebrush country near the Columbia River in Kittitas County, Washington.
    Little Bear Beetle
  • A hairy pair of little bear beetles rest in an antelope bitterbrush bush in the sagebrush desert in Central Washington.
    Little Bear Beetles
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  • Boy on the Beach
    Boy on the Beach
  • White fox squirrel photographed in Tallahassee, Florida. Its white fur is a leucistic trait - the hair is actually white, not colorless - so it's not an albino. Most (up to 80%) of the fox squirrels in this area have this trait, which is unusual compared to their typical dark gray to jet black coloring.
    White Fox Squirrel
  • Found all over western North America plus Michigan and West Virginia, this native flax is found as far north as Alaska and the Northwest Territories in Canada, all the way south to Mexico's Baja California. It prefers dry climates in open grasslands, sagebrush steppes and both ponderosa pine and Douglas-fir forests. It has been recorded that the Nlaka'pamux Indians of Southern British Columbia and Northern Washington State used to boil parts of this plant to make a hair and scalp tonic. This one was found in growing along the side of Umtanum Creek below the Cascade Mountains north of Yakima, Washington.
    Western Blue Flax
  • Common in lower elevations of western/southwestern Texas and much of Mexico's Chihuahuan Desert, this is the only native prickly pear in the region without long spines. Instead, brown hair-like glochids grow in the areoles, which if touched, can be quite painful and difficult to remove. This one was  photographed just north and below the Chisos Mountains in Big Bend National Park in Brewster County, Texas.
    Blind Prickly Pear
  • Common in lower elevations of western/southwestern Texas and much of Mexico's Chihuahuan Desert, this is the only native prickly pear in the region without long spines. Instead, brown hair-like glochids grow in the areoles, which if touched, can be quite painful and difficult to remove. This one was  photographed just north and below the Chisos Mountains in Big Bend National Park in Brewster County, Texas.
    Blind Prickly Pear
  • Found only in North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida, the hooded pitcher plant is one of the smaller of our native pitcher plants found at the edges of bogs and wet pinelands. Like all carnivorous plants, nectar glands inside the "hood" attract insects where a series of hairs inside the pitcher (a modified leaf) encourages the insect downward into the tube until it cannot turn around and escape. These insects will in turn be dissolved and deliver the essential nutrients that are needed in such a plant that grows in such nutrient-poor soils. This is the blossoming flower that is ironically also pollinated by flying insects. This one was found and photographed during the summer rains in the Osceola National Forest in North Florida.
    Hooded Pitcher Plant
  • Found only in North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida, the hooded pitcher plant is one of the smaller of our native pitcher plants found at the edges of bogs and wet pinelands. Like all carnivorous plants, nectar glands inside the hood and white translucent "windows" attract insects where a series of hairs inside the pitcher (a modified leaf) encourages the insect downward into the tube until it cannot turn around and escape. These insects will in turn be dissolved and deliver the essential nutrients that are needed in such a plant that grows in such nutrient-poor soils. This one was found and photographed during the summer rains in the Osceola National Forest in North Florida.
    Hooded Pitcher Plant
  • These beautifully bright red woolly Indian paintbrushes were found growing in the desert at the base of the Chiricahua Mountains in Southeastern Arizona near the Mexican border. Easily identified by the short dense hairs on the leaves and stem, this semi-parasitic native wildlflower gains supplimental nutrients from neighboring plants.
    Woolly Indian Paintbrush
  • A very common find in some of the seepage bogs of the Apalachicola National Forest, the leaves of these beautifully colored butterworts are covered in tiny sticky hairs that trap and digest unsuspecting insects.
    Chapman's Butterwort (Pinguicula pla..lia)
  • Close-up of a single pitcher - which is a actually modified leaf. Chemical attractants lure unsuspecting insects, and the downward pointing hairs  on the "ramp" lead them into the trap. Here enzymes within the collected rainwater will digest its prey and provide the necessary nutrients needed for growth and propagation.
    Gulf Purple Pitcher Plant (Sarraceni..sea)
  • These modified leaves emit a sweet attractant complete with red color that insects cannot resist. Once the sensitive hairs within the "trap" sense an insect (or photographer's finger) the trap will slam shut.
    Venus Flytrap (Dionaea muscipula)
  • A chapman's butterwort growing in Liberty County, Florida alongside another unidentified butterwort - perhaps the green form of the same species. In this photo, you can see the fine short hairs on the greasy leaves that attract and trap flying insects.
    Chapman's Butterwort (Pinguicula pla..lia)
  • The beautiful and prickly tread softly growing in rural Polk County, Florida. Be careful with this one ... these spiky hairs can cause severe discomfort in some people.
    Tread Softly
  • Found only in North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida, the hooded pitcher plant is one of the smaller of our native pitcher plants found at the edges of bogs and wet pinelands. Like all carnivorous plants, red coloration and sweet nectar glands inside the "hood" attract insects where a series of hairs inside the pitcher (a modified leaf) encourages the insect downward into the tube until it cannot turn around and escape. These insects will in turn be dissolved and deliver the essential nutrients that are needed in such a plant that grows in such nutrient-poor soils. This one was found and photographed during the summer rains in the Osceola National Forest in North Florida.
    Hooded Pitcher Plant
  • This tiny daisy grows in many of the hottest, most arid deserts of the American Southwest in sand, gravel and scattered rocks. Easily identified by both it's dimunitative size and choice of habitat, close inspection of the foliage reveals a very wooly, hairy hovering of silvery hairs on the leaves and stem. This was one of many found in an open area in the Mojave Desert in Southern California.
    Wallace's Woolly Daisy
  • Close-up of the hairs underneath the "umbrella" part of the pitcher plant that guide the unsuspecting insects into the trap, or pitcher. Look closely and you can see the 13-14 gnats tangled among these hairs.
    White-topped Pitcher Plant (Sarracen..lla)
  • Close-up view of the hundreds of shiny, sticky hairs that attract and entrap insects. Doomed insects will then be digested with powerful enzymes and absorbed by the plant. This enables the Tracy's sundew to thrive in areas where the soil is very poor in nutrients and highly acidic.
    Threadleaf Sundew (Drosera tracyi)
  • The submerged leaves of the purple bladderwort have small, basket-like bladders with sensitive hairs around a closed trap door. When small swimming animals make contact with one of these hairs, the bladder sharply expands, sucking the prey inside where it will be digested slowly.
    Purple Bladderwort (Utricularia purp..rea)