Prickly Pear landing

Image Critiques Flora Critiques
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Prickly Pear landing
Prickly Pear landing2000×1333 609 KB

This bee seems to be looking for a safe landing spot amidst all the thorns of this blooming Prickly Pear cactus! I was glad to catch it clearly and with its wing blur.
All comments welcome!

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Technical Details

Is this a composite: No
f/11, 1/400sec, ISO 360, 380mm using 200-500mm f/5.6 lens on Nikon D500.

3 Likes
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Bees in flight are my nemesis so great job catching her so well. The size of the flower compared to the size of the bee is great - shows us how they all just go forth and don’t give up. I could be persuaded to eliminate the other flower somehow…either with a vertical crop or with content aware fill. Hm…

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Mark: Really good flight shot with just enough SS to render the body of the bee sharp but yet allow the wing blur. I see Kris POV regarding the spent bloom but think it does add some interesting context. If anything I might have preferred a slightly wider view including more of the base of the main flower. Still a marvelous shot as is. :+1: :+1:>=))>

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Hi Mark! Really nice action shot! I like the image as is, nicely done!

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Mark, you have nicely captured a bee in flight, which has been my goal of late. Nice. I love the motion of the wings, yet the bee is nice and sharp. Really nice capturing it face on. :+1: :+1:

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Thanks @Kris_Smith , @Bill_Fach , @Vanessa_Hill , and @Shirley_Freeman for sharing your thoughts. I too am on the fence about the other spent blossom, but ultimately decided to retain it to show the thorns on the bottom, and it seemed to add some balance to the otherwise huge yellow blossom. Plus it adds a little bit of environmental context, even though this is a pretty tight shot.
Bees are so hard. I think this is my best one…I was lucky to get this one sharp. Probably because it was slowing down as it approached its next landing spot!
Thanks again for taking a look and commenting.

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Mark, You nailed the bee in flight perfectly! I don’t mind the spent flower as it adds balance. Agree with Bill on slightly widening the view. But having tried this numerous times and failed each time, It is hard to think about composition when you are trying to catch the been in action.