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Hummingbird, Costa Rica, 1998

"A hummingbird picks up more than nectar at a flower in Costa Rica's Monteverde Cloud Forest Preserve. Pinhole-size mites live in the blossom. When the plant's last florets bloom, mites wait for a bird's bill to enter, then climb on and sprint to the bird's nostril at cheetah-like speed—12 body lengths per second. The stowaways cling till they smell the familiar perfume of a new host plant, then deplane."

—From "The Variety of Life," February 1999, National Geographic magazine

Photograph by Frans Lanting