Living Dangerously

[Steve Maxson]

A small, but beautiful, metallic green bee (Family Halictidae, tribe Augochlorini) is foraging on and pollinating tiny Spikenard flowers. The bee is seemingly unaware of the young Goldenrod Crab Spider waiting with open arms. At this point, life or death for the bee is a matter of only a few millimeters. This time - the bee escaped unscathed before the spider could pounce. Nikon D850, Sigma 150mm macro, 1/250, f/16, ISO 500, Venus Optics KX-800 macro twin lite, manual 1/16, diffused, HH. Cropped for comp. Photoshop, NIK, Topaz Denoise AI.

[Jonathan Ashton]

A fine shot Steve well exposed and good detail. The spider and bee are very well shown and the overall composition is appealing.
I quite like the darker green on the RHS, it reflects the colour of the bee to some extent, I and just wondering if you had used a slower shutter speed if it would have blended slightly better and not been quite so dark?
I don't think the highlights on the floret tips are blown, nor is the back of the spider but I would have been tempted to lower the brightness a tad in an attempt to show a tad more detail there.

These crab spiders are everywhere but they can be really tricky to spot, I am always on the look out for them but not having much luck at present.

[John Mack]

A beauty of a frame here. Killer detail and a nice interaction. Love that color on the bee. The square crop works very well.

[Steve Maxson]

Jon and John - Thank you for your thoughtful comments.

[Krishna Prasad kotti]

Beautiful Shots. I saw this image in my mobile and it was not appealing but when I looked at in my home monitor, I loved it.

I think part of the reason being the spider and plant are almost on the same color.

TFS

[Arthur Morris]

This is superb a presented. I did not even see the spider until I read the post -- talk about great camp!

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[Ravi Hirekatur]

Wow! The bee doesn't seem to be aware of the lurking predator, which has camouflaged well. Great find and one picture tells the whole story! Great capture and love the details on both the predator and the prey.

[Steve Maxson]

Thanks for the comments Krishna, Artie, and Ravi! :S3: