Leighton Photography & Imaging

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  • While mostly harmless to humans (they might bite is self-preservation), robber flies are fierce ambush predators that wait perch patiently for a flying insect to fly by, then launch into the air, overpower then dispatch their prey mid-flight. They hunt grasshoppers, bees, wasps, butterflies and even other flies! This one was found hunting in the Oak Creek State Wildlife Area, just outside of Yakima, Washington on a hot, late-spring day.
    Robber Fly (Efferia sp.)
  • If a stink bug can ever be called "pretty" then this is probably one of the only candidates. This significantly troublesome agricultural pest attacks young tender shoots and leaves of many of our crop plants by puncturing these parts with a straw-like mouthpart and drinking the nutritious juices out of the plant, often causing injury or opening it up for diseases. When it feels threatened, it emits a terrible odor which gives the stink bug its name. This one was found near an apple orchard and wine vineyard just outside of Yakima, Washington.
    Green Stink Bug (Chinavia hilaris)
  • This large, extremely active and fast-moving wasp is best known for it's parenting behavior. At about two-inches in length, this nectar and small insect-eating burrowing predator will search for a large caterpillar which it will sting it with just enough venom to incapacitate it, but keep it alive. It will then pull, fly or drag it into its burrow, then lay a single egg on the paralyzed caterpillar. When the egg hatches, the larvae will consume the still-living caterpillar for days until it pupates then emerges from the ground as an adult and flies away to start the next cycle. While not aggressive towards humans, it can deliver a nasty sting if provoked. This one was found in the sagebrush desert near Naches, Washington just west of Yakima.
    Common Thread-waisted Wasp (Ammophil..era)
  • This extremely common grasshopper is found nearly everywhere in North America where there is sand or disturbed areas like empty property lots or roadsides, and is often seen as it does a "buzzy" flight away from intruders with what almost looks like yellowish butterfly wings, then seems to disappear due to its excellent natural camouflage. While usually harmless and unimportant agriculturally, it has occasionally been cause of concern for some crops such as wheat or tobacco. This one was found near Naches, Washington on a hot summer day.
    Carolina Grasshopper
  • If a stink bug can ever be called "pretty" then this is probably one of the only candidates. This significantly troublesome agricultural pest attacks young tender shoots and leaves of many of our crop plants by puncturing these parts with a straw-like mouthpart and drinking the nutritious juices out of the plant, often causing injury or opening it up for diseases. When it feels threatened, it emits a terrible odor which gives the stink bug its name. This one was found near an apple orchard and wine vineyard just outside of Yakima, Washington.
    Green Stink Bug (Chinavia hilaris)
  • Scolopocryptops spinicaudus is one of the many species of small-to-medium-sized bark centipedes found in the Scolopocryptopidae family that set themselves apart from other centipede families by having 23 pairs of legs instead of 21. They live in the Pacific Northwest from Northern California to Southern Alaska, where they hunt for small insects and other arthropods under rocks, dead wood and the on forest floor. This one was found scurrying across an open area next to the Carbon River near Carbonado, Washington - about 15 miles northwest of Mount Rainier.
    Bark Centipede (Scolopocryptops spin..dus)
  • Wind scorpions get their name because they are "fast like the wind". While related to scorpions, they fit into their own category or arachnids which also includes spiders. These highly aggressive solitary predators live in very dry, arid habitats where they hunt at night by actively zigzagging across across the ground or sand until they encounter and overpower an unfortunate insect, spider, scorpion or even the occasional lizard. Once pinned down with the two large front legs (pedipalps), the wind scorpion doesn't even wait to kill its prey. It will immediately start tearing into its meal with the two dark pincers near the mouth (they look like fangs) and devour it as quickly as possible, before the wind scorpion might in turn become the prey of some even larger predator. This one was stalked/chased and photographed in rural Cibola County, New Mexico, about 70 miles west of Albuquerque.
    Pale Windscorpion
  • Wind scorpions get their name because they are "fast like the wind". While related to scorpions, they fit into their own category or arachnids which also includes spiders. These highly aggressive solitary predators live in very dry, arid habitats where they hunt at night by actively zigzagging across across the ground or sand until they encounter and overpower an unfortunate insect, spider, scorpion or even the occasional lizard. Once pinned down with the two large front legs (pedipalps), the wind scorpion doesn't even wait to kill its prey. It will immediately start tearing into its meal with the two dark pincers near the mouth (they look like fangs) and devour it as quickly as possible, before the wind scorpion might in turn become the prey of some even larger predator. This one was stalked/chased and photographed in rural Cibola County, New Mexico, about 70 miles west of Albuquerque.
    Pale Windscorpion
  • This attractive little autumnal moth was found on the side of a moss-covered tree stump in Bellevue, Washington on a fall afternoon. Very common, all in North America and Europe, it is highly variable in color and pattern and is associated with birch trees.
    Autumnal Moth (Epirrita autumnata)
  • This stunningly red relative of the firefly, the bloody net-winged beetle uses aposematic coloration (warning colors) to its advantage. The bright red and black coloration/pattern is a strong warning to others that might want to eat it that it is toxic to eat and best left alone. This one was photographed just as it landed on a desert shrub below the Chisos Mountains in West Texas, near the Rio Grande River.
    Bloody Net-winged Beetle
  • Quite a lucky find! While flipping over rocks searching for scorpions in northwestern Texas I chanced upon a (possibly brand new) desert subterranean termite colony. Normally found deep underground, under the rock I found the big queen termite, the king termite similar-looking but much smaller, and a number of worker termites. Hazarding a somewhat educated guess I'm going to say that these belong to the native Reticulitermes genus - a beneficial species that takes the role of fungus and algae in breaking down plant and wood material in the most arid of deserts where fungi and algae can't survive.
    Desert Subterranean Termites
  • A southeastern lubber grasshopper in the Fakahatchee Strand (in the northwestern part of the Florida Everglades) does what grasshoppers do best - eat vegetation!
    Southeastern Lubber Grasshopper
  • Honey bee gathering pollen from wildflowers - in this case, common beggar-ticks.
    Honey Bee
  • This great find in a purplish prickly pear cactus flower (Opuntia azurea) in Big Bend National Park in West Texas was an exciting one for me. This bee assassin bug is a clever hunter of bees and other pollinating insects found throughout much of North America. It is most often found inside flowers waiting to stab the unsuspecting insect attracted to the flower's sweet nectar with its sharp proboscis, where it will literally drink its prey dry. Even though this one is covered in pollen, you can still see the warning colors of black and red (aposematic coloration) warning birds and other predators that this bug is not safe to eat or hunt.
    Bee Assassin on Purplish Prickly Pear
  • An unidentified member of the assassin bug family (Reduviidae) tumbles and rolls along on a strong wind through the White Sands dunes of Southern New Mexico.
    Assassin Bug
  • 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
  • A beautiful specimen of an adult northern scorpion sits on a rock covered with brilliant teal-colored lichens in Central Washington State. This inch-and-a-quarter beauty is the most northern species of scorpion and is the only one found in the upper Pacific Northwest. Completely harmless to humans, the sting will burn and cause numbness, so caution is advised.
    Adult Northern Scorpion (Paruroctonu..eus)
  • A tiny northern scorpion is discovered under a small rock in Central Washington State. Probably only a second or third instar, this almost half-inch fat little arachnid is just about ready to molt, judging by the darkening skin along its sides. When it does molt, it will shed its skin and a fresh, slightly larger scorpion will emerge.
    Baby Northern Scorpion (Paruroctonus..eus)
  • Busy as a honeybee! Macro shot in my front yard, with my out of focus white car in the background making a perfect backdrop!
    Honey Bee
  • This amazing member of the arachnid family is related to spiders and true scorpions, but is in a class of its own. I found this small yet vicious solifugid hiding under a rock in rural Clark County, Nevada about an hour east of Las Vegas.
    Pale Windscorpion
  • A single lotus flower on a hot summer morning.  Most interesting about these flowers are the leaves, which will not get wet, but instead repel waterdrops in such a way that they just form "beads" on top of the pad-like structure. Lots of fun to play with when the fish aren't biting!
    American Lotus
  • A quick stop for a rest and bite to eat on their way to their summer breeding grounds in Alaska and the Canadian Arctic, this migrating  pair of greater white-fronted geese wade in the wetlands in the Nisqually River Delta near Olympia, WA where there are plenty of aquatic plants and insects.
    Greater White-fronted Geese
  • One of my favorite snakes to be found in the wilderness of the American Southeast is the Florida yellow rat snake. This very long, mustard-yellow colored subspecies of the western rat snake is not very common, like most gray or near-black rat snakes found in the wild, but it is one of the coolest. I have an affinity for this type of snake and once had one as a pet in captivity for years until I decided to let it go free and "go forth and propagate". These non-venomous constrictors primarily feed on rats and birds, although their habit of sneaking into barns and eating eggs has also earned them the nickname of "chicken snake". This one was found by surprise on accident (as most snakes are usually encountered) as I was walking through the edge of the woods in the Ocala National Forest  in Juniper Springs when the tree limb I grabbed suddenly moved in my hand and tried to bite me. I pulled this beauty out into the open for this shot and let it go. It was just about four feet in length and was fat and healthy!
    Florida Yellow Rat Snake
  • Huge fishing spider carefully photographed in the Fakahatchee Strand. These guys can get aggressive and do bite hard!
    Fishing Spider
  • Found throughout much of the American Southwest, rattlesnake weed is a member of the spurge family. Like all species of the Euphorbia genus, oozes a milky white sticky sap when damaged, and be careful because the sap of this particular species is poisonous. It gets its name from the erroneous fact that it was once believed that mashing this plant into a poultice would cure a rattlesnake bite. This one was photographed in Southern California's Mojave Desert.
    Rattlesnake Weed
  • Great clouds of mist rise like smoke over the Bow River on a bitingly cold winter morning in Alberta's Banff National Park, the first established national park in Canada, and third in the world.
    Bow River, Banff National Park #3
  • Great clouds of mist rise like smoke over the Bow River on a bitingly cold winter morning in Alberta's Banff National Park, the first established national park in Canada, and third in the world.
    Bow River, Banff National Park #2
  • Great clouds of mist rise like smoke over the Bow River on a bitingly cold winter morning in Alberta's Banff National Park, the first established national park in Canada, and third in the world.
    Bow River, Banff National Park #1
  • American beautyberry is a very common and beautiful shrub in the verbena family found all over the Southeastern United States. It has been used extensively for making medicine, tea, wine, dye, fish poison and the crushed berries can be used to relieve mosquito bites. It has also been known to be a great repellant of flies and fire ants. This super-hardy plant can tolerate drought, heat, floods and can be found growing in many different environments, and is an important food source for wildlife.
    Beautyberry