Croatia Zadar 2024 Insects and Spiders – 1 Hour Macro Photography

26 Mar Croatia Zadar 2024 Insects and Spiders – 1 Hour Macro Photography

In late June 2024 I went to Zadar, Croatia for a week and was hoping to find time for some field trips to photograph local insects and spiders as well.

Unfortunately it boiled down to one sole opportunity to do some macro photography for about one hour on a piece of land of a friend in Babindub.

As much as I wish I had more time there and also explore other spots – especially as I was hoping to find some Empusa sp. Praying mantises – I enjoy these confined 1 hour sessions a lot, as they tend to surprise you.

The habitat was great for locusts, grasshoppers and various beetles, also some ground-dwelling spiders and jumping spiders as well.

The dry land was supposed to be build on and was still very wild and rather untreated.

Only a handful of young olive trees and fruit trees had been planted.

Shrubs and thistles dominated on the wild plant side.

The Thistles

Thistles are both beautiful plants with their intense lilac flowers and also home and feeding ground for a surprisingly high number of insects.

Whenever I find these tall and wild thistles, I find a lot of species there.

On one of the stalks I could find 3 weevil species, several bug species, including a rather big assassin bug, and some more beetles.

Larinus sturnus or Larinus turbinatus

Protaetia cuprea obscura

Mylabris variabilis Blister beetle

Rhynocoris rubricus (Assassin bug)

Carpocoris sp. (mediterraneus, pudicus, purpureipennis) Shield bug

Unidentified True bug

Camptotus lateralis

The Crickets and Grasshoppers

The field was flooded with bush crickets and grasshoppers.

You could literally not go a meter without half a dozen jumping away in all directions.

I only managed to photograph a handful different species (it must have been a dozen or more), as some required a lot of patience and time to get close enough for a decent macro photo – time, which I did not have.

Although I wasn´t able to photograph it, I found an Acrida (maybe A. ungarica) specimen, also known as slant-faced grasshopper, which was definitely one of my highlights.

The biggest insect I found, was this Ephippiger discoidalis (Ensifera > Ephippigeridae), the Dalmatian Saddle Bush-Cricket, a widespread and rather common species in the Mediterranean part of the country.

The black half-circle structures, protuding from under the “saddle”, with the white spots, are actually the insect´s wings.

It is obviously a female, as only those have that impressive ovipositor.

Ephippiger discoidalis

Pholidoptera (maybe P. fallax) Bush cricket (male and female)

Other, unidentified Grasshoppers or Crickets

Spiders

While I am always focusing on Salticidae (Jumping spiders), I often only find a few when I visit places that are close to the ocean and also close to settlements (cosmopolitan species).

However, this time I found some non-salticid spiders, which I had not phorographed before and was quite pleased despite it being only a handful of species.

For the short time span that I had for macro photography, the total number of findings and photos was absolutely fine.

Menemerus semilimbatus – female (top) and male (bottom)

Cyrtophora citricola (Tropical Tent-web Spider)

Neoscona subfusca male

Episinus truncatus

What else did I find and photograph in Croatia?

Trichoferus fasciculatus

Antlion adult (Myrmeleontidae)

On another day I found this enormous black Carabus coriaceus ground beetle in a park

Croatia as Macro Photography destination

Is Croatia worth a visit just for macro photography?

It sure is, even though i only had very little time, I got a good impression of the extremly diverse and rich insect and spider fauna.

I will definitely be back with more time to dedicate to macro photography.

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