There are few soil animals as adorable as springtails!
This Platunurida sp. is a cousin of the famous 'giant' springtails in New Zealand. Instead of colourful spines, it has a flattened body, so it can squeeze into cracks in decaying logs, where it lives. They're surprisingly fast at escaping into the cracks, so it's difficult to get a good photo of them!
#Entomology #Macrophotography #SoilBiodiversity #Nature #SoilFauna #NaturePhotography #Soil #SoilEcology #TheWorldBeneathOurFeet
It's week 3 of fatherhood, and today I was granted special dispensation from shopping, housework, nappies and feeding, to do a brief spot of macrophotography in the sunshine, brilliant!
The highlight was this incredible Oribatid mite, sporting long defensive spines (Neotrichozetes spinulosa). I've nicknamed it the Hellraiser mite, which seems to be catching on - feel free to use it too!
#Macrophotography #SoilBiodiversity #SoilEcology #Acari #Entomology #Nature #NaturePhotography #Acarology #Mite
My slightly late offering for day ten of #invertober (common earthworm) 🪱
Did you know earthworms have a special lip-like first head segment called a prostomium (meaning 'before the mouth')? They use it to sense and manipulate food, and move through soil!
#SoilBiodiversity #Macrophotography #Entomology #Earthworm #SoilEcology #Soil #Nature
SOIL BIODIVERSITY SPECIAL ISSUE!
Are you researching the conservation, ecology or taxonomy of soil and litter invertebrates?
Then consider submitting your paper to this Special Issue of the New Zealand Journal of Zoology, edited by me, Carlos Barreto and Andrew Barnes (what a dream team!).
Just send me preliminary manuscript info by 30 November 2025.
More information: https://www.royalsociety.org.nz/news/nzjz-soil/
An alien creature traversing a distant world, or baby mite navigating the micro-fungi strewn surface of a decaying log? Arguably it's both!
Take a closer look at the life beneath your feet, and you'll discover a whole new world of dazzling complexity.
#SoilBiodiversity #SoilEcology #Acarology #Entomology #Macrophotography #Nature #NaturePhotography #Soil
These are the beautiful spore-producing structures of plasmodial slime molds. Which is your favourite colour?
Originally considered Fungi, these Myxomycetes are now classed as Amoebozoans - single celled organisms with thousands of nuclei... not animals or fungi but something else entirely!
#SoilBiodiversity #SoilEcology #Fungi #MacroPhotography #Nature #MoldMonday #Soil
This festival of waxy lumps is a baby biting midge, AKA a Forcipomyia larvae. Before they grow up to be bloodsuckers, they're surprisingly cute.
They're very common on decaying logs here in Aotearoa, but I don't often photograph them. However, my good friend and fellow macrophotographer Andy Murray loves them, and has a whole webpage dedicated to them - so go check that out!
https://www.chaosofdelight.org/forcipomyia
#SoilBiodiversity #SoilEcology #SoilFauna #Mesofauna #Macrophotography #Macro #Nature #NaturePhotography
Yesterday we had earthworm cocoons, today I bring you springtail spermatophores!
Springtails, like many other soil invertebrates, reproduce by a male leaving these structures (a blob of sperm-rich fluid on a stalk), which the female will sniff out, collect and use to fertilise her eggs. Very romantic!
#SoilBiodiversity #SoilEcology #Entomology #Macrophotography #Nature #NaturePhotography #Collembola #Soil
Did someone bury a tiny lemon?
Nope, this is an earthworm cocoon!
After mating, both earthworms will produce a cocoon like this (they're hermaphrodites), containing a fertilised egg. Inside, a baby earthworm will grow, before hatching out the end like a tiny pink noodle. Inside the cocoons, wormlings are protected from drought, flooding and low oxygen conditions, and will hatch when conditions are good again!
#Soil #SoilEcology #SoilBiodiversity #Earthworm #Macrophotography #Nature #NaturePhotography #Entomology
Predatory flatworms are found in damp habitats, such as under logs. They have an eversible tube-like throat called a ‘pharynx’, which externally digests their prey alive.
Here's one feeding on a land-hopper, a type of exclusively terrestrial shrimp found in the Southern Hemisphere. The New Zealand flatworm is an invasive species in parts of Europe, where it's threatening earthworm populations.
#SoilBiodiversity #SoilEcology #Entomology #Nature #Macrophotography #Worms
Frank Ashwood