Since I made everyone else share a selection of their best photos, it is only fair that I post my own favorites from the past year. Click on each to view large.
Close up of a honey bee (Apis mellifera) covered in dandelion pollen. Focus-stacked composite image. Illinois, USA.
A honey bee (Apis mellifera) pollinates a common milkweed (Asclepias syriaca). Illinois, USA.
A parasitioid wasp (Telonomus sp.) inserts her eggs into an egg of an owl butterfly. Cayó District, Belize.
A parasitic mermithid nematode bursts forth from the abdomen of a trap-jaw ant, killing it. Cayó District, Belize.
An ant-decapitating fly (Apocephalus sp.) moves in on a carpenter ant. Illinois, USA.
A male eastern firefly (Photinus pyralis) signals to females in mid-air. Illinois, USA.
White was the first sex-linked gene discovered in the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster. Laboratory stock at the University of California, San Diego.
Kidnapper ants (Polyergus mexicanus) carry pupae they have captured during a late afternoon raid. Illinois, USA.
Cocoons of the parasitoid wasp Cotesia line the back of a tomato hornworm. Illinois, USA.
2013 was the year I became a dad- forgive my sneaking in a photo of my newborn daughter!
