Sure Was a BIG Bee!

  Forced perspective is a weird thing.  I see it all of the time with folks claiming to have "killed a 12ft long moccasin!"  Nope you did not.  There are no moccasins that big.  Sorry but the size of that snake was not twelve feet long if it was indeed a moccasin.  You may have killed a 6ft long rat snake but not a 12ft long moccasin.  And...why are you killing a snake anyway??  But back to forced perspective and photography.  It is just weird.  Enough said.

  I was out and about trying to find a neat picture to send to the grandlittles when I decided to plop myself down on the ground and take a photograph of the clouds.  While I figured that this photograph would not work as a "Find the Critter" picture (a game I created for the kiddos), it may be one of interest.  Tall trees, poofy clouds...interesting, right?  It was not until I looked closer at the photograph that I realized that I did indeed get a critter in the shot.  A carpenter bee just happened to fly right in front of the camera at the perfect time!  At first, I was just impressed that I caught a bee flying about the yard, then I looked at the thing a bit differently.  If you stare at the photograph, the bee starts to look huge in comparison to the 50ft (or so) tall trees.  The bee almost looks to be some huge creature actually flying high in the clouds and not a small insect buzzing about my face.  I admit that  carpenter bees are some of the larger bees and they do look huge when they dive bomb you for getting too close to their nest but seeing what seems like one as large as an airplane is a tad ridiculous. They are closer to the size of a thimble!

  Still, the photograph is interesting and it goes to prove a point that it is easy to make things appear to be somewhat different than they truly are. So...that said...bees are not as large as planes, all snakes are not moccasins and moccasins average around 3ft. (occasionally longer but not 12ft!).  All sorts of lessons learned!