On my last trip to Shenandoah National Park, on 7/19, I was looking for Turk's Cap Lilies - and found none until getting home and looking in a neighbor's yard. Today I went hoping to find butterflies. Eureka - I found both and at the same time. I believe the butterfly is a female Eastern Tiger Swallowtail (the male is bright yellow & black). It and another were in the company of a male so that's why I assume it's the female (southern - others are yellow like the male) and not some other dark swallowtail. Anyone help out here with an ID?
I have three lens / attachment combos that I use for macros & for closeups like this PAD. Today I used a Nikkor 75-300 with a 1.4X teleconverter. It's the one I use when both magnification and a large working distance (ability to avoid having to get too close to the subject) are important. This was the case today - I needed to keep my distance or the butterflies would - well, fly. This was shot at a distance of 4-5 feet. The 18-200 with Canon 500 D necessitates getting within less than 2 feet - and ditto for the 105 macro for this level of magnification. In general, the latter two lenses have it all over the 75-300 - but not for this type of shot.