In years past I’ve done a gallery of my “Best of the Year” images, or various shots I’d edited for blog use but never posted this year I’m doing something different for the year’s end. Largely because the weather has been dismal around here, and much the same for large portions of the country – indeed, probably most of
Category: Nature
Still getting out occasionally
Despite the weather and the holidays, I do still get out to do some shooting now and then, even though the pics in this post were from… jeez… ten days ago. These were taken, with one exception, at a botanical garden during a halfway-decent day. Above, a pintail duck (Anas acuta) provides a dozing pose as the cloud cover thickened up.
While UNC’s Botanical Gardens are dedicated mostly
Tanks for the memories
I really have to stop doing stuff like that with the titles…
As a section of the photo gallery shows, while I lived in Florida I ‘maintained’ a small saltwater aquarium – not exactly intentionally, and certainly not in the way that aquarium enthusiasts do. Instead, it was born simply from finding critters
Humans overboard, part two
This was originally intended to be part of the previous chapter, but it probably deserves its own post, plus that last one was getting kind of long.
I suspect most people would classify me as an animal lover, or at least leaning heavily in that direction. And on occasion, I have run into a shocked response when it is found that I am not a vegetarian or vegan. My reply to this has been to
No record this year
Last year, I was making it a point to post more than I had any year earlier, and did indeed reach that mark, just a few days past this date last year. It is safe to say that I won’t be setting any records this year, since with this one I am 44 posts away, and I don’t see me knocking out, like, three posts a day from here on.
The move to a new house had a lot to do with this, as did the
The days of yore, part three
Some time back, after posting a bunch of especially creepy pics, I added the above image and mentioned that I should do a post about it. As you can see, I’m right on top of that, having taken only nine weeks to get to it.
It is, like all images to be seen in this post, a zoo pic, the dreaded ‘captive’ subjects that seem so dire to people at times – real nature photographers
But of course
This autumn has proven to be one that I’ve rarely had the chance to take advantage of: a fairly good display of colors, peaking during clear weather, with no storms or even high winds to strip the leaves from the trees. So while this area has few vantages that provide the best display of colors – generally something that overlooks rolling hills with a wide variety of
Not according to plan
So, okay. I went out yesterday to check out the nature trails behind UNC’s botanical garden, for the first time in over a decade. You’d like to think that nature photographers are always in touch with every natural area nearby – and they probably are… it’s just that I’m not. Actually,
I can still do a bug update
While the weather has produced a few cold snaps and the trees are progressing into their autumn colors, the arthropods have gotten harder to spot, but can yet be found. Above, a jumping spider (genus Phidippus) saw me coming and took refuge in a shelter it had created within a rose blossom, presenting a significant photographic challenge – this is the best I could
Natural filters
I was aware of the impending partial solar eclipse, and even dug out some materials that might potentially assist in getting images, but failed miserably, on two fronts. The first was, what I had to help cut the glaring light from the sun down a manageable level for photos would only work if the light was already reduced, for instance by thin clouds or late in the day with a heavy