Just a couple-three images from today, before it’s not anymore. I could be doing video editing, but the posts have been thin, so…
Going out to do some work on the car this morning, I espied this little guy and had to go back in to get my camera. By now you know this is a Carolina anole (Anolis carolinensis,) but to be honest, I’m not sure if this is the same guy that I photographed on the neighboring pelican statue (this is a rabbit, in case it’s unclear,) or the second anole bebby that I spotted some days back, or even a third one – it seems even smaller than I recall, especially when I expect to see them getting a little bigger each time I spot them, but who can tell? Makes no difference anyway – they’re quite welcome no matter how many, even when they seem to think that they’re not somehow. This one was already turning away to plot its escape route.
Then this evening, I was working on the computer when the lightning alert came through, and I looked at the activity band and the weather radar, suspecting there might be a show down at Jordan Lake, so I collected the Illustrious Mr Bugg and we went down there to see what was happening.
The activity was clear as we were driving down there (it takes about fifteen minutes,) but it was tapering off by the time we could set up. Still, a few good flashes were able to be captured, and this one is my favorite, even getting a little cloud definition in there from the light of the bolts.
Curiously, there was no evidence of ground strikes the entire time, nor even any recorded on the lightning trackers, but if we get nice cloud-to-cloud stuff like this, I’m good with it. The wind coming off the lake was fierce, stronger than most ocean winds that I’ve experienced, though not at all uncomfortable – the temperature dropped a couple of degrees at most while we were out there. But it had an unintended effect that I would rather not have had.
None of the discharges were long or flickering, as lightning will sometimes display – they were all singular flashes. So seeing this multiple image (this is almost full-resolution to illustrate it clearly) was very curious, especially since I have it in more than one frame. It’s simply evidence of the strong wind vibrating the tripod, even in the brief duration of the lightning burst, which is impressive. One frame, I might have credited to bumping the tripod, but I’m pretty careful about that and was using the remote release. The wind was so fierce, however, that conversation was challenging, so I can understand this, but I still would rather not have had it. Ah well.
Okay, back to editing…