Spring is in the Air

It’s mid-April, and spring is approaching. For some it’s here.  In Alberta, not so much.  On Thursday we got a little over a foot of snow in about six hours. Winter isn’t going quietly.  So, to remind myself of what is coming, I looked through my archives and found a shot from 2007 taken in Waterton National Park in southwestern Alberta.  This wonderful small park is at the southern tip of the Canadian Rockies and forms an International Peace Park with Glacier National Park in Montana.  Waterton is well known for its magnificent scenery, elk, and bears.  But this image is one of my more memorable ones.  I was visiting the park in mid-June to find young bears and fawns–the usual charismatic megafauna shots.  I had stopped for lunch along a small stream and was just wondering the gravel banks of the river looking at flowers to shoot.  I spotted these two insects and captured this image of them mating.  I had no idea what they were. I assumed they were a species of bee that I wasn’t familiar with.  It wasn’t until I got home and started researching that I discovered they were Snowberry Clearwings–isn’t that a terrific name! Hemaris diffinis. They are large bodied moths with the yellow and black body segments that easily permit confusion with bumblebees.  They are in the order Lepidoptera, family Sphingidae.  They are often referred to as hummingbird moths.

ISO 200, 60 mm, f14, 1/160th.