Crucial update

Sneaking this in before it becomes tomorrow, but I had to check and see if our new little friend had taken up a sleeping spot nearby, and indeed it had:


These are the seeds of one of the two hosta plants that our newborn Carolina anole (Anolis carolinensis) was skipping around on this morning. In the afternoon we got another horrendous downpour (I’m not complaining,) read more

Well, now…


Had to feature a sudden find late this morning – if this guy had held still, I would have easily missed it, especially since I’d about given up on seeing one this year. This is a newborn Carolina anole (Anolis carolinensis,) scampering around on one of the hosta plants, appearing at a time when even the adults could barely be found. This might have come about read more

Scattered, the start

I have a collection of semi-recent but unrelated images in the blog folder awaiting my attention, either to include them in a post or simply discard them as irrelevant, and so I decided that I’d do posts around a single image, partially because I haven’t been posting much and this is easier. Somewhere in there will sneak in a couple of longish, philosophical posts as I get motivated read more

Just once, part 29


I was a little surprised to find that I’d only ever featured a long-billed dowitcher (Limnodromus scolopaceus) once before, because I was certain that I’d gotten other images of the species – and I had, even featured here before. Kind of. Here’s how it works.

The source that I’m using to find the ‘Just Once’ candidates is a dump from the database of tags read more

These are not snakes


No, I’m not trying to show off my amateur naturalist cred, and no, ‘amateur naturalist’ doesn’t mean I’m bad at getting nekkid – that’s ‘naturist,’ goober. And you still wouldn’t want to see it.

No, I’m referring to the fact that all of these were shot while I was looking for snakes for World Snake Day, which is still going on as I read more

It qualifies

Today, as you undoubtedly know, is World Snake Day, and while you might think this is one of those crass bogus holidays that I make up to feature some convenient photos on hand, this is for realsies. Knowing that this was coming up, I went out to find some world snakes to feature, knowing that at the very least I was in the right geographic area (the world) to do so.


This is a northern read more

Blink and you missed it


The conditions held and I did get out to watch Spica disappear behind the moon. I tried a short video clip, unable to tell if it was actually capturing Spica or not but suspecting that it wasn’t – the frame rates for video translate to a pretty short shutter speed and even as bright as it was in comparison, Spica was still pretty dim. Upon returning home, I found that read more

Preliminary


Just now, took a peek out there as the sky was darkening, noticed that it was more than clear enough, and did a couple of test shots. I also noticed another speck in the viewfinder and reframed, but I was still working handheld and sharpness was lacking. As I was setting up the tripod and getting the remote release out and the camera set for mirror lockup*, the last little light read more

Watch Spica vanish before your eyes!


I really haven’t been finding posting material recently, because I’ve had a lot of other things going on, though I have a few unrelated pics that may show up a little later. Right now, I’m providing what little warning I can, having discovered only this morning that the moon will be occulting Spica this evening.

Basic orbital dynamics: the stars move across the read more

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