Unusual spider

Found this spider on our fence in Double Oak Texas.  Ive never seen this species before.  I took some photographs of the little spider and then let it go.  The pattern on it's back is pretty unique.  I also came across a wolf spider, a yellow crabspider and some other unidentified spiders this weekend.  The yellow crabspider was one of the highlights of my photography this weekend.

Shotgun shell photographs

These are some photographs I took of shotgun shells.  I haven't shot a shotgun in ages but I had some ammunition around and decided I would photograph it.

The first couple of photographs are shotgun shells isolated on a white background.

Shotgun shells on a white background

Four shotgun shells

It was rainy this weekend and I couldn't do any hunting or fishing.  I took some photographs of different bullets including some 30-30, 22 caliber, 9mm, a 44 magnum and a 223.  I also took these photographs of shotgun shells.

Green, yellow and black shotgun shells.

 There were several different gauges involved as well as shot and a slug.

Three shogun shells with poker chips.

Construction Barrel Dragon

I was driving south on Highway 35E and exited Garden Ridge in the north Flowermound area.  On the frontage road there is a bunch of construction going on.  This weekend I was driving down the frontage road for the first time in a long time.  I looked over right as I exited and I notice the construction crew has built a dragon out of construction barrels.  They did a really good job.  I had to come back a day later and take some photographs.  Below are the photographs of the Construction Barrel Dragon on 35E.

Macro photograph of Wolf Spider

These are some macro photographs of a Wolf Spider on a white background.  Wolf Spiders are not aggressive and are mostly harmless.  They will bite if harassed but in general they can be held if you are gentle.  A bite will be painful but otherwise it wont cause death, sickness or permanent damage.

These photographs of a Wolf Spider were shot on a Canon 5D Mark II and a Sigma 180mm macro lens.  I used a Canon MT-24EX twin flash unit.

Photographs of a Tarantula.

These are photographs of a Tarantula I shot a few weeks ago.  My co-worker knows that I like to take photographs of animals.  Over the fourth of July weekend she offered to bring me back anything unusual she found at her parents ranch.  She called Sunday and said she had found a Tarantula Spider for me.

The first photograph is my hand holding the Tarantula.  These arachnids are mostly gentle and wont bite unless you really harass them.  

Tarantula in hand.

I decided I wanted to get some shots of the spider crawling on a branch.  I grabbed a branch from the yard and set it up so that the Tarantula was crawling on it.

Tarantula Spider

In the end I wanted to do some stock type shots as well.  I couldn't think of anything except using some toy blocks to spell the word spider and have the Tarantula crawl on it.  These eight legged arachnids are pretty slow moving and calm so it wasn't hard to get a few photographs of the Tarantula.

Tarantula on blocks