{"id":42454,"date":"2026-08-24T11:26:03","date_gmt":"2026-08-24T15:26:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/?p=42454"},"modified":"2026-08-24T11:26:03","modified_gmt":"2026-08-24T15:26:03","slug":"when-last-we-left-out-heroes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/2026\/08\/when-last-we-left-out-heroes\/","title":{"rendered":"When last we left out heroes…"},"content":{"rendered":"

A couple of follow-ups to previous posts, because I know you’ve been dangling anxiously…<\/p>\n

Two days ago, I saw a vehicle that would haul that tankah<\/del> I mentioned in passing<\/a> that I should have backlit the empty eye sockets of the molted exoskeleton of a golden silk orbweaver, because of course I should. Late that evening, I found in sorting that one of the images where the flash was aimed much too high bounced light from the background through those very eye sockets, so I had inadvertently (no, really) achieved this goal anyway. Even better, the very muted light probably did a better job than I would’ve intentionally, because this is much more subtle and mysterious.<\/p>\n

\"bad
I think I might have to load this into a projector for Halloween…<\/p>\n

Further back<\/a>, I had been on a quest to capture decent images of the ruby-throated hummingbirds, and lamented that I could never get the light right on the males to showcase their namesake red breast\/throat feathers. Which I did manage, in the next two days.<\/p>\n

\"male
This isn’t bad<\/em>, but hardly what I was after – I just took the opportunity to snag the shot while this possessive male was maintaining a vigil over both a feeder and one of the salvia plants, because they seem to have little better to do with their time than waste energy protecting their ample food supplies. I did a little better, a little later.<\/p>\n

\"male
Not just caught in a hover, but at the right angle to bring out the iridescence of those feathers, about as much as possible in this light, and even get the individual feathers standing out a little. I’m still after better pics, but at least we get some of the red.<\/p>\n

While pursuing the hummingbird pics, I caught something wheeling overhead and fired off a couple of quick frames – could definitely have been sharper, but it confirmed something regardless.<\/p>\n

\"juvenile
This is another Mississippi kite<\/a>, but notably, this is juvenile coloration, which means we did actually have a nest not terribly far away. Chances are, it was in a neighbor’s yard someplace, so getting pics next spring would probably require their permission at least (the neighbors’ – nobody cares about what the birds think,) so we’ll see if such a thing comes to pass.<\/p>\n

And speaking of juveniles, we’ve had a lone juvenile male wood duck making the occasional visit, and their plumage at this stage deserves a gander (sorry.)<\/p>\n

\"juvenile
Now, the wood ducks have all but left the pond, perhaps partially because of the water level having dropped, but more, we think, because this is what they do in late summer;<\/strong> the same thing happened last year without any drop in the water, and it seems the waterfowl just scamper off at this time and return in the winter because we distribute corn and that’s dependable food. This one male, however, makes the occasional visit and seems to hang out for a while, in this case in the tree on Duck Island. This was not just shot in the morning in weak light, but through a downstairs window since opening the door or window would have spooked it off.<\/p>\n

\"juvenile
This shows the nice mid-point between the muted brown coloration of the later adolescent ducklings and the brilliant plumage of the adult males – more on the head than anything, since the body feathers haven’t changed much yet. Wood ducks are virtually always in at least pairs, but usually groups, especially when they come here to feed, so why this individual has been alone so many times (we’re assuming it’s the same one, anyway,) we can’t say.<\/p>\n

\"full-frame
This is full-frame at 600mm, to give you a faint idea of the range involved;<\/strong> I roughly measured it at 36 meters, meaning the coloration isn’t distinguishable to the naked eye unless the light is perfect.<\/p>\n

“Naked eye” – this phrase annoys me, but as yet I haven’t determined one that works better.<\/p>\n

The pond levels, by the way, have bounced around quite a bit since that drastic drop<\/a>, coming back up to high level after some fierce rains but then slowly subsiding back down again. With the latest rains, however, it has been holding steady back where it had been all last year, so we’re hoping things have stabilized again. Still no clue what caused this, still haven’t been able to kayak down to check out the area. Well, technically we could<\/em> have several times, but only if we wanted to pass out from the heat, so I suppose that counts as “not.” Good to see it back, though.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A couple of follow-ups to previous posts, because I know you’ve been dangling anxiously… Two days ago, I saw a vehicle that would haul that tankah I mentioned in passing that I should have backlit the empty eye sockets of the molted exoskeleton of a golden silk orbweaver, because of course I should. Late that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,3],"tags":[224,1234,3952,8082,3196,6915,8081,223,6954],"class_list":["post-42454","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nature","category-photo","tag-archilochus-colubris","tag-exoskeleton","tag-golden-silk-orbweaver","tag-ictinia-mississippiensis","tag-juvenile","tag-juvenile-plumage","tag-mississippi-kite","tag-ruby-throated-hummingbird","tag-trichonephila-clavipes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42454","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42454"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42454\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":42465,"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42454\/revisions\/42465"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42454"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42454"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42454"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}