Ants on peonies

paddler4

Around here, it's time for ants to eat the outer membrane of peonies. Here are a few I did handheld, with a Canon EF-S 60mm macro. Next time, with a monopod...

Lord Vetinari

Interesting behaviour you captured
You either have very large ants or these must be crops ? mind you thinking about it what are they stripping the membranes off - can't be flower buds ?

Brian V.

paddler4

Brian,

The ants are not all that large--most considerably smaller than, say, carpenter ants. The photos are crops, some pretty extreme. I shot these with a Canon 50D, and while there is a lot of concern that the images in general would be better if Canon had stopped at 12 MP, one advantage of the 15 MP is that you can crop more before losing detail.

These are buds of peony flowers. They are always covered with ants when they open. I never knew why until I looked at these and saw an ant stripping off the outer membrane.

BTW, the shots you post are really remarkable.

Dan

Lord Vetinari wrote:

Interesting behaviour you captured
You either have very large ants or these must be crops ? mind you thinking about it what are they stripping the membranes off - can't be flower buds ?

Brian V.