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Found in the Ecuadorian Amazon. Leaf mines are trails left within leaves after being mined by herbivorous insect larvae. The adult female lays her egg(s) within the mesophyll, giving the hatchlings access to the nutritious inner layers of the leaf, both allowing the larvae to exclusively consume the high-nutrient contents of the mesophyll rather than the cuticle walls, which often contain toxic defenses from the plant, and also protects the larvae from predators in the outside world. You'll notice that the trails start of very thin and narrow, but end up large and thick. The red coloration is likely frass, also known as bug poop.
Leaf mining is not unique technique, although it's surely innovative. Many groups of insects have convergently evolved leaf mining, including flies (Diptera), moths (Lepidoptera), sawflies (Symphyta), as well as some beetles (Coleoptera) and wasps (Hymenoptera). The morphology of leaf mines is, thus a somewhat useful diagnostic character, although I've yet to determine what sort of critter made these.
Fall is among us.
Froze a leaf in a 9x13 dish and then shot it from above, with a SB800 at 1/4 power from underneath with a really tight homemade gridspot attached.
Taken for the Macro Mondays Theme of "It's all about the shadow".
I like the way that the veins of the leaf are shadowed against the bright green areas.
Strobist Info - Metz 45CL-1 fired behind leaf into camera. Diffused by snoot and grid, and fired via Aputure Trigmaster (Plus on Camera and II on flash)
I saw this leaf lying around and thought it would look great in this setting.
Anyone know what type of leaf it is?