Baby Jumping Spider drains Hydei!

[Precarious]

I've been keeping this tiny jumping spider I found in my room. Fed it some Hydei today and took some photos.

I never knew that the fruit flies' eyes are full of fluid. Check it out...

They start out bright red.

Here you can see they are empty with a little fluid clinging to the insides of the lenses. Anyone have a guess why the 3 ocelli eyes up top prolapse into a bright red sack??? :huh:

Leftovers...

Bonus points:

Find the mite on the fruit fly.

 

[gripen]

great pics! the mite is on the top of the head :blink:

 

[itzjustjeff]

The middle left leg? Geez Precarious...you take the nicest pictures.

 

[CoolMantid]

The mite is hiding behind the closest middle leg! Jeez. I need a camera like that!!

 

[Precarious]

The middle left leg? Geez Precarious...you take the nicest pictures.

The mite is hiding behind the closest middle leg! Jeez. I need a camera like that!!

You got it! Hitching a ride on the leg. What most people don't realize is there are mites everywhere. If you have fruitflies, crickets or roaches you also have mites. No way around it. Good thing they aren't harmful.

Thanks! I'm still learning. Just got this lens last week.

 

[CoolMantid]

I love it! Where do you take these pics. Do you put the camera in the cage?

 

[Precarious]

I love it! Where do you take these pics. Do you put the camera in the cage?

No, I only have it in a 16 oz. deli cup. I put some Hydei in and he grabbed one immediately. I nudged him out of the cup and he sat on the side eating, which was perfect because then I could turn the cup as needed.

 

[Precarious]

Here he is on my thumb for size reference...

 

[CoolMantid]

Thats tiny!

 

[mantidsaresweet]

Unbelievable and Amazing!!! Keep them coming man!

 

[Psychobunny]

Precarious's pics always look great because he uses the best macro lens that Canon sells.

It magnifies X5 and you can get stunning pics (cant wait until I can buy one)!!

I have these little jumping spiders in my house that look the same.

They are actualy quite people friendly.

Mostly they are tiny, but I have seen them in my house that were almost dime size.

They are very cool and fun to play with

 

[patrickfraser]

My guess on the prolapse is the possibility that the 3 ocelli eyes are on a separate "system" and therefore can't be sucked dry. Retaining their fluid and the rest of the fluid being drained would cause shrinkage in the body, thus popping the full, fluid rich eyes out. Just a guess or should I say hypothesis? :lol:

 

[Psychobunny]

Sounds good to me.

Looks kinda strange though!!

 

[itzjustjeff]

How much did you pay for your lens Precarious?

 

[Precarious]

How much did you pay for your lens Precarious?

Let me clear a few things up...

I only got this new lens less than a week ago! Everything up to now was shot using the Canon Telephoto EF 100mm f/2.8 USM Macro Lens ($499), which only goes down to 1:1 (1x, actual size). I used add-on magnifying diopter filters and sometimes 65mm of extension tubes to go closer than 1:1. That's when things start to take on distortion and light dispersion.

The new lens is the Canon MP-E 65mm ($886). It goes all the way down to 5x and remains crystal clear! However, it is only worth using for 2x and beyond, because it only goes as high as 16f (very shallow depth of field), whereas the 100mm goes up to 32f. I just checked using a calculator and that is double the f! :wacko: And you lose the sharp edges if you go above 10f on the MP-E, while I generally shoot at 22f with the 100mm (i.e. more of the bug in focus).

So hellz yeah, MP-E 65mm is the schiznits! But all it does for me is make my images 2x or closer more crisp. Like these. They would have been less crisp with my other setup because I'd have to use diopters and extension tubes to get this close. (Even still, I had to stack 2 images to get decent depth of field.) But I still use the 100mm for anything 1x or bigger, because it has better depth of field and because the MP-E only goes up to 1x. In other words, the MP-E is ONLY good for macro and then only macro 2x or beyond.

Hope that makes sense even to non-photographers.

I'd also like to thank everyone who bought bugs from me over the last year because that's what allows me to buy photography gear. That paid for the MP-E 65mm. I'm unemployed and couldn't do it otherwise so THANK YOU! If I get good hatches from the Orchid ooths I may make enough to upgrade the camera body for even higher resolution images! It's win-win because you all get new pets AND nicer photos to look at.

Here are some super closeups using the old gear. Expect ever better ones with the new lens...

 

[kunturman]

WOW! super pics, and a true blood sucker Draculean saltidae.

Mas fotos porfavor!

 

[dlemmings]

as always...very great pics

I want to add orchids to my collection and thus will likely help fund more equipment in the future

 

[hibiscusmile]

wonderful pictures, I see 3 mites !

 

[crucis]

wow precarious is a macro lord...

those pics really made my day. especially the craneflies (dunno why)