Ants walk on water!

I thought yesterday's blip was a bit weak, I didn't really nail it, but I had nothing else to offer. Some days the blip monster likes to test me. Still, it made pole on the spotlight page, but that was more because of all you wonderful friends wishing me birthday felicitations, so I am a bit embarrassed about that. Thankyou all so very much for your good wishes.

A funny story about the birthday thing: My old friend Iain (Euphemist) who introduced me to blip, sent me a Facebook message, saying, "Welcome to the 56 club". This made me feel a bit stupid on the one hand, but mostly it made me feel ecstatically happy, because I have been calling myself 56 for the last twelve months. So I get to celebrate a birthday and stay the same age for another year, how cool is that!

As for this little project that I started yesterday, were I tell you of something that I learned on that day. Make no mistake here, this is just a me thing and definitely not a me teaching you thing. If the information is useful to you then that is a bonus for me.

This idea came about because we have all noticed how we see things more clearly as blippers and see things that we would have missed before. What I am experiencing is that this tendency to learn seems to be accelerating and I am noticing it more, so for a bit of fun I decided to log the learning.

So, what did I learn today - the first thing was that the log on the left sinks! Why I stood on it I do not know as I always use the log on the right side of this muddy patch. A split second later, I learned that 3Lbs of camera and lens makes a very effective counterbalance weight, as I narrowly escaped falling into the rice paddy!

The main thing that I learned today was that ants can walk on water - well, I never knew! As I was struggling to my feet after another ant and ladybird session, I noticed a splashing in the unplanted paddy field behind me. My first thought was one of those water skaters that are on my blip list. But it seemed to be making a lot of noise and not making that much progress, so I had a closer look.

It was a bit of a dance, but the ant was moving along slow but under control, moving three legs at a time in a triangle formation. Every now and then, a leg would break the surface tension and it would sink upto its knee, but it would pull the leg out and shake it in the air and continue. In fact, the blipped image caught the leg drying process, as you can see, all the rest of the legs are in contact with the surface. This is probably why this was the sharpest of the series, as the ant was stood still for a second while drying the leg. Not so sure how today's lesson is going to transform my life, but it was Impressive!

I did have some great keepers today, but this ant shot was an easy choice. Hope you like it too.

Dave