Inside a Bearded Iris

Out on the Cliff Walk today I stumbled upon a Bearded Iris and decided to do a macro study of it. Well, okay, there was a bug foraging down in there and that helped me decide to pull out the macro lens and go digging.

Okay, so here's our subject seen as a whole. 

Next we look down the throat of the Iris and see the shadow of somebody crawling around down there, most likely gathering pollen. 

It comes out towards the light, getting ready to head off to find another target. It's something in the Ant, Bee, & Wasp family; we used to call them Sweat Bees when I was a kid, but I don't know what the real name is. This one was grooming itself in preparation for flying off. 

And off it flies, leaving us to look down the empty throat of this Bearded Iris. not that it isn't an interesting sight all on its own! 

And that's our trip through the innards of a Bearded Iris. I suggest you look at the full-size pictures in the flip panel at the top - there's lots of interesting detail to be seen in the bigger pictures. I hope you've enjoyed this little inner journey!