ccasionally when I am outside looking for bugs to photograph, I will notice tiny yellow specks moving around on the ground. Last week, I found several concentrated around some pollen that had fallen from an iris flower, so I took the opportunity to get a closer look at these creatures with some macro photographs. I believe they are a kind of spider mite (Tetranychidae family), but that’s as much as I know so far.
This mite is about 1 mm big.
A speck of pollen must be a feast for a mite.
Some of the mites had lighter-colored bodies.
Sometimes they would chase each other away, but here there are two next to each other.
I’m not sure if these mites have eyes, but those red dots look like a pair of eyes.
For some extreme magnification, I held a reversed 20mm lens in front of a 200mm lens. It was a challenge to even locate the mite in the viewfinder.
A spider mite on a penny. To get this shot, I set the penny on the ground where several mites were running around and waited for one to run onto it. A few did run across, but my reaction time was way too slow. After about ten minutes, I got lucky; one ran across, and from the time it took me to depress the shutter button and for the camera to take the photo, the mite had left the frame, turned around, run back onto the penny, and paused for a split second.
Do you know what the fastest land animal is in the world, relative to body size? Yes, it’s a mite (Paratarsotomus macropalpis)! I have no idea if the mites in my backyard are this exact species, but they are incredibly fast for their size. Here is a short video clip I shot of them last year:
I really want to know how they are able to accelerate so quickly. They would be extraordinary athletes if they were humans!
4 Responses
Barb
That is crazy! I can’t believe how fast they are & the fact they look translucent & have red eyes! Yukk! I hope they aren’t anywhere near me! You’d never know, really??? 🙁
Mark HortonAuthor
Maybe not this particular kind, but mites are practically everywhere. I don’t think this one does anything to humans.
Lynn
All I can say is WOW, that you got these great photos … they don’t look like they sit still for too long, so you did amazing capturing these microscopic creatures!!! Good job!
Mark HortonAuthor
They seem to be as busy as bees most of the time. When they were eating the pollen was the first time I’d ever seen them sitting still for longer than a few seconds.
That is crazy! I can’t believe how fast they are & the fact they look translucent & have red eyes! Yukk! I hope they aren’t anywhere near me! You’d never know, really??? 🙁
Maybe not this particular kind, but mites are practically everywhere. I don’t think this one does anything to humans.
All I can say is WOW, that you got these great photos … they don’t look like they sit still for too long, so you did amazing capturing these microscopic creatures!!! Good job!
They seem to be as busy as bees most of the time. When they were eating the pollen was the first time I’d ever seen them sitting still for longer than a few seconds.