Afternoon Walk At Venus Drive (22 Oct 2016)

It has been a long while that I did my macro-photography session in the afternoon and so I decided to go to Venus Drive, knowing that the chances of finding beetles in the afternoon will be much higher than other locations.

Here's an interesting photograph of a patch of small fungus growing on the underside of a dead tree.The fungus reminded me of ice cream popsicle.

The first beetle for the trip was a Pintail Beetle. I was fortunate as it remained motionless despite the constant flashing from my speedlite.

Near to the Pintail Beetle was a small patch of huge Elephant Ear plant where several of this Ant-like Flower Beetles were found on the underside of a leaf.

The sky was overcast with thunder rumbling continuously and it seemed like it will rain any time. Just at this moment, I saw a white dot flew under a leaf and immediately I know what it was - one of my favorite beetle, a white Ladybird Beetle. The distinctive feature for this beetle is its lovely greenish-blue eyes.

Under a leaf of a plant near by, I spotted a similar White Ladybird Beetle but noticed that it has black eyes instead of the greenish-blue eyes. Not sure if it is a mutation as it seemed to be less sensitive to my camera flashes.

 As expected, it was only a while of walking before I found this large group of Tumbling Flower Beetle (Glipa malaccana).

Next to the Tumbling Flower Beetle was a small 5 mm Leaf Beetle (Graphops curtipennis) on a leaf.

More walking before I spotted this Leaf Beetle (Argopus brevis).

On a tree nearby was this resting Darkling Beetle in a crevice of a small tree.

Coming to a fallen tree, I was glad to find several of this Fungus Beetle on it.

On the same tree trunk were several of this lovely Net-winged Beetle.

More walking without finding any beetles until I noticed this 7 mm Weevil Beetle flew in front of me and landed on a leaf.

The rumbling of thunders above continues and I decided to pick up my paces before it rain.  When I was almost at the exit, I found several of this small 2 mm Darkling Beetles on a large tree.

On the same tree was a tiny 4 mm Fungus Weevil.

On a small tree nearby, I was glad to see several of this beetle larvae.

Just a stone's throw away from the beetle larvae was this tiny 4 mm fist-time-encountered Fungus Weevil (Apolecta transversa).

I was surprised to see that the antennae of the beetle was almost 7 times its body length.

The last beetle for the trip was a big surprise - it was a 4 mm first-time-encountered Fungus Weevil resting on the side of a tree. It was very skittish and flew off after one photograph.

This was an interesting trip and I am glad that the decision to do an afternoon walk was a right one, despite the mosquitoes and heat. Finding two first-time-encountered beetles was a real bonus for the trip.

Short Night Walk Along Pasir Ris Road (14 Oct 2016)

It has been raining on Friday nights for the past few weeks and hence I was not able to go for my usual night macro photography session. It once again rained in the morning but the weather looked fine in the evening, and so I decided to check out a stretch of road along Pasir Ris Road that I found on Google Map previously.

An interesting encounter when I first reached the place was this group of wild boars foraging at an open area near to the main road. It was a rather big group with about 20 of them, big and small. In order not to startle them, I decided not to use any camera flash to photograph them.

The first beetle I found at the place was a commonly encountered Chafer Beetle (Adoretus compressus). There were many of this Chafer Beetle along the road.

Near to the Adoretus compressus Chafer Beetle was another Chafer Beetle (Apogonia expeditionis). This is another type of Chafer Beetle that can be found all over Singapore.

Near to the a group of the Adoretus compressus Chafer Beetle was another commonly encountered Chafer Beetle. I used to think that this Chafer Beetle is the female of the Adoretus compressus Chafer Beetle, but started to think otherwise when I saw a mating pair of the beetle during one of my walks.

There were no other type of beetle encountered (apart from the Adoretus compressus Chafer Beetle) when I walked along the path until this lone orange Leaf Beetle was found under a blade of grass.

It was just about now that the sky started to thunder and tiny rain droplets started to fall. Sadly, the light drizzle turned into a heavy thunder storm and thus bringing my night walk to a sudden end. Hopefully the weather next week will be better.