lsifer's Favourites

I have no idea what this is. There's entire orders of tiny arthropods I'm not familiar with beyond name and general morphology, but still, it's strange to get good clean shots of a thing and still have no idea what I'm looking at.

Edit: We have a professional ID! https://bugguide.net/node/view/1977688/bgimage

Habitat hypersaline lake.
Image 1 - Male, dorsal view.
Image 2 - Female, dorsal view.
Image 3 - Male head, frontal view, showing the distal segments of the second antennae to be i) flat, ii) broadly triangular, iii) with pointed apices directed medially.
Image 4 - Habitat.
The major solution salt in this lake is sodium carbonate (Cummings, J.M. 1940. Saline and Hydromagnesite Deposits of British Columbia, Bulletin No. 4. BC Dept of Mines: 160pp)

Habitat small, temporary grassland pool.
Image 1 shows the female, ventral view.
Image 2 shows the male, ventral view.
Image 3 shows the male 5th legs, posterior view, with two cuticular outgrowths on the inner margin of the right basis.
Image 4 shows shows the process on the antepenultimate segment of the male right first antenna.
Image 5 shows female dorsal view , with expanded metasomal wings (above) and genital segment with lateral protrusions (below).
Image 6 shows the female 5th pair of legs.

Choy Aming, Bermudian shark researcher and expert, sitting on top of a dead Sperm Whale floating off Challenger Banks, Bermuda. Cause of death is unknown. Choy was called to the scene in order to film 3 Tiger Sharks and 1 Blue Shark feasting on the carcass. Photo taken by Chris Burville.

Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge, Georgia. Three-day paddling trip from Suwannee Canal to Round Top to Floyd's Island.

• Suwannee Canal between mile markers 8 and 9; N30.79682° W82.24604°
• Cloudy with occasional light rain, high near 75, low around 63.
• Sunrise 6:43 am; sunset 6:32 pm
• Day length: 11 hours, 48 minutes (+1m 52s)
• First quarter moon

See and learn more about the incredible Okefenokee Swamp at www.okefenokee.photography
Help protect the Okefenokee at https://protectokefenokee.org/

I managed to catch the moment where two Juniperus virginiana pollen grains' intines expanded and ruptured their exines. I think the first probably helped trigger the second. Check out this paper for more on the mechanism at work here.
Measurements
Unruptured exines
23–27×21–25 μm; Q=1.01–1.15
Images
All slides in water
1: External intines hydrating and expanding to rupture exines
2: Intact pollen grains
3: Ruptured pollen grains
4: Habit

Whirling colony of rotifers connected by the feet. About 2-3mm. Every now and then, they would all retract in unison.

Description of Sinantherina semibullata is that it has two dark warts behind the corona. Viewed under transmitted light these are not dark but simply denser tissue.

A female Giant Ichneumon wasp (Megarhyssa macrurus) oviposits into the side of a tree.

I was honored to have this observation selected as observation of the day for June 11, 2020, and again as observation of the week (week of June 21, 2020). It is covered in this blog post: A Trip to Texas Provides a Long Sought Photographic Opportunity - Observation of the Week, 6/21/20.