foxtrot666

The amazon isn't as dangerous as people think. I think that the only time I had to choose between my personal safety and getting the perfect picture is when I was photographing a jaguar on the bank of a river with my friend Phil. The jaguar was looking at us through some plants and growling. It could have come at us and killed both of us in an instant. Got a good pic of him looking directly at us though: Jaguar Photo

I think that the only time I was in serious jeopardy of dying is when I had dengue fever. I got dengue after a 19 day camping trip in the amazon. It feels like your bones are exploding. I tried to make my flight to Lima but I collapsed in front of the airport. I went to the hospital in Puerto Maldonado and then went back to Lima the next day. I spent 3 days in the hospital in Lima. I laid in bed for a week and it took me about a month to recover. The doctor in Lima said that I was close to dying when I got to the hospital.

I started doing astrophotography about 12 or 13 years ago. Astrophotography is when you use telescopes to take photos of galaxies and nebula etc. Its really technically challenging and I learned a lot about photography doing that. After awhile I decided to turn my camera to terrestrial subjects.

After college I started traveling around central america and taking pictures. I eventually moved to Costa Rica and then Peru and Colombia. During a trip to the Amazon I had the chance to work in the amazon so I took it and the rest is history. I don't know much about biology or entomology but I like nature and bugs etc. and get to work with a lot of great entomologists like @Phil_Torres and @AaronPomerantz. I learn a ton from them.

Every day my friend. Glow worms, spiders, other insects, there is all sorts of WTF stuff in the jungle. Here is a WTF picture of a wax tailed plant hopper: https://twitter.com/JCremerPhoto/status/531676026003521536/photo/1

This pic of a tailless whip scorpion with babies on its back is also very WTF: https://twitter.com/JCremerPhoto/status/475400921758072832/photo/1

Thats a really good question. Nobody knows :) The discovery of the spider brings up tons of questions such as how does the spider know what he looks like, and how can it make the drawing without stepping back and looking at the drawing.