[Photo Contest] Candid Camera

Finalist Photo: Giant cockroach molting. Photo shows that when cockroaches molt they are "white" for a very short time until their exoskeletons harden.

Photographer: Andy Murdock, supervisor, Rose Exterminator Co., Troy, Mich.

Finalist Photo: Up close shot of a "very angry looking yellow jacket" taken at Potato Creek State Park, South Bend, Indiana.

Photographer: Steve Sims, Whitmire Micro-Gen

Finalist Photo: Praying mantis that was resting on a wall next to photographer’s house. The sound of the beeping camera seemed to perk its interest, causing him to face the camera lens.

Photographer: Rick Bachman, director of Central Exterminating, North Brunswick, N.J.

Finalist Photo: Photo of a male pine sawyer beetle on a ponderosa pine, taken October 4, 2004, in Hayden, Idaho, using a Fujifilm FinePix 3800.

Photographer: Chuck Hawley, Idaho Dept. of Agriculture, Coeur d'Alene Field Office, Hayden, Idaho

Finalist Photo: A "Mantisfly waiting for prey on leaf." This particular mantispid was captured in the swamp of Bayou Sauvage Wildlife Refuge in east New Orleans, Louisiana.

Photographer: Ed Freytag, research entomologist, New Orleans Mosquito & Termite Control Board

Finalist Photo: Crab spider on ox-eyed daisy taken in Mills County, Texas, using a Canon Digital Rebel, 100mm Canon Macro lens.

Photographer: Jeff Tucker, Entomology Associates, Houston, Texas

Finalist Photo: "The Spider and The Fly." The daddy longlegs has overtaken what appears to be a cluster fly.

Photographer: Donna Richardson, associated with Royal Pest Management, Newark, Del.

Finalist Photo: Photographer spotted this marbled spider, Araneus marmoreus, resting beneath leaves that she had formed into a domed retreat at the upper corner of her orb web. She is one of several common orbweaver spiders that frighten customers during late summer and early autumn when these arachnids reach adult size and their impressive webs are found on porches, eaves and ornamentals close to buildings. Photographed with a Mavica 20X Steady Shot digital camera using ambient sunlight.

Photographer: Gerry Wegner, technical director, Varment Guard Environmental Services, Columbus, Ohio

Finalist Photo: Wolf spider photographed in Masyrktown, Fla. Photographer said biggest challenge was keeping the spider still long enough to snap the shot.

Photographer: Curtis Rudolph, Emergency Pest Patrol, Inc., Tampa, Fla.

Finalist Photo: Photo of Ichneumonidae wasp laying an egg on the side of an old Elm tree stump in my backyard. This Ichneumonidae wasp has a long ovipositor, but not for stinging. The three (3) inch hair-like ovipositor which penetrates the bark of trees to parasitize horntails. The wasp can sense that there is a larva in the wood under the bark and it then lays an egg on the larva. It hatches out and parasitize the horntail larva.

Photographer: Richard States,Environmental Pest Management, Cortland, Ohio