Northern Water Snake
I apologize to those of you who don’t like snakes…but I think this is the largest Northern Water Snake I have ever seen and deserves some celebration. I was looking for Odonata and wildflowers along the edge of the pond on the Kennebunk Plains Wildlife Management Area in West Kennebunk when I spotting this snake swimming along the edge of a little peninsula-like extension of the shore about 10 yards from me. It proceeded to turn and swim right toward me, across the shallow little bay full of vegetation, passing in front of me at a about 10 feet. It had to be 6 feet long and maybe 4 inches through its thickest section. A big water snake. I was busy zooming in and out to frame the snake and I shifted my feet on the spongy moss underfoot. It disappeared in a sudden dive under the vegetation…so I am pretty sure it had not been aware of me until just that moment. Sony RX10iv at 600mm and 244mm equivalents. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr and assembled in Framemagic.
Pink Lady Slipper Orchid in the sun
As I mentioned in my previous Lady Slipper post, I do know of a few scattered and more isolated areas where the Pink Lady Slipper blooms here in Southern Maine, besides the reliable clumps along the trail at Rachel Carson National Wildlife Refuge Headquaters. There are always a few along the edge of the pond on the Kennebunk Plains…and these are the only ones I know of that are growing in full sun (at least part of the day). This an in-camera HDR shot with the Sony Ultra Wide, 18mm equivalent lens on the Sony a5100…and it puts the Lady Slipper in context. The flower is about 8 inches from my lens, and I used selective focus to focus on it, but the extreme depth of field of the ultra wide renders a scene rich in texture and detail. It would make an excellent 16×20 print to dominate a wall! Processed in Polarr.
The Generous Eye: Compressed Season. Happy Sunday!
“If your eye is generous, your whole being is full of light!” Jesus
It seems like we have not had a “normal” spring in southern Maine in years. Perhaps it is time for me to admit that this might be the new normal…or at least the current normal. Wildflowers are blooming late, and migrant birds and dragonflies are arriving late, and our native dragons are emerging later each year. And, the season is compressed. When the wildflowers bloom, they bloom all at once. Take the panel here. These flowers should not be in bloom at the same time…and they certainly should not be having their first blooms at the same time. In the recent past, the Painted Trillium (upper left) and Blue-bead Lilly (upper right) would be showing their last tired blooms before the Lady Slipper (in the center) began to show. And the smaller forest floor flowers like the Starflower and Twin-berry would have be in full boom by the time the Lady Slippers appeared…but this year these are the first blooms I have found. If you are at all aware of the natural world around you…if you observe the rhythm of the seasons through the birds and insects and trees and wildflowers…it is hard to deny that the climate is changing. Spring in Maine is later and later, and more and more compressed. You can debate whether this is a good thing or a bad thing, for us humans, and for the earth…or you can be uncertain of the causes, and doubtful of the solutions, but it is becoming harder and harder to deny it is happening.
The generous eye is an open eye…one that sees what is in front of it. A being full of light has the wisdom to identify causes and the hope to see solutions…or at least to see the things we can each do to help the planet, and our species, children of the living God that we are, to survive this change in climate. And if we each did what we can do, that might be enough. Certainly if we all did what we can do, together, then I have to believe that that would be enough.
A late compressed spring may be the new normal, and it may be just a transition phase toward a more balanced planet. It begins with generous, open, eyes, and moves through beings full of light to a future where what is normal is better, for us, and for the planet.
Pink Lady Slipper, first of season
Yesterday I biked down to the Rachel Carson National Wildlife Refuge Headquarters trail to check on the Pink Lady Slipper orchids, which were just budding out the middle of last week, several weeks late. There is a large patch on the inside (land side) of the trail right behind the buildings, and there is a small patch below one of the overlooks where they maintain an opening onto the marsh view. The ones on the inside were still in bud, but at least two of the flowers on the sunnier marsh side had opened. There are more to come, clearly, in both spots and if we get a few warm days here they will all be open. The first blooms to open this year are pale compared to other years. Only time will tell if that is the trend this year, or just characteristic of the early bloom. The Lady Slippers are wonderful, ornate, delicate blooms…endangered due to habitat loss, and protected. I know of a few other more isolated spots where they bloom in the area, but the ones along the headquarters trail are certainly the most reliable and accessible. Sony RX10iv at 365mm equivalent. In-camera HDR. Processed in Polarr.
Eastern Screech Owl, Magee Marsh
There are often Eastern Screech Owls nesting or roosting along the boardwalk at Magee Marsh, and this year there were two…sitting out approximately 100 yards apart. They were there every day I visited during the Biggest Week in American Birding. There was often a spotting scope on one of them, effectively blocking the boardwalk and creating a owl-jam that was difficult to navigate. The panel shows both individuals, three shots of one, and one shot of the other (bottom right). Sony RX10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr and assembled in Framemagic.
First Dragonflies of the Season
After seeing a few dragonflies in Florida when I visited Key West and the Dry Tortugas, and one dragonfly when in Ohio, I have been eagerly checking my local ponds for my first Maine dragon of the season. Earlier in the week I stopped by the Southern Maine Medical Center drainage ponds here in town, one of my most productive dragonfly spots over the years. Nothing happening. Yesterday, only a few days later, there were at least a dozen Common Green Darners hunting over the water and the adjacent parking lot. Green Darners are highly migrant and these are probably last year’s darners returning from a winter spent further south, and they were mostly males, but I caught at least one pair in the act of depositing eggs in the reeds at the edge of the pond. Things are looking up! Sony RX10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr.
Wildflowers
Yesterday was a day for looking for wildflowers. I took my ebike out to the headquarters trail at Rachel Carson National Wildlife Refuge to see if, despite our ridiculously late spring, there were flowers in bloom. The Hobblebush is, of course, still in bloom, but then, that sometimes blooms in February. The Lady Slippers, generally a safe bet for Mother’s Day, are just budding out. Late indeed. However the Two-bead Lily are past, so they apparently bloomed on schedule. ?? I found the Rhodora above in a road-side ditch on my way to Rachel Carson, and the Wood Violet, Blueberry, and Painted Trillium along the trail. Sony RX10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr and assembled in Framemagic.
In our backyard…
We interrupt this parade of the birds of Magee Marsh and Ohio with breaking news from the backyard! Carol first noticed the hummingbirds coming to our ornamental cherry tree blossoms a week ago, just as the last light was fading. I had to run for my binoculars to see for sure that they were Ruby-throated Hummingbirds (the only likely hummer we have here in Maine, but never, considering the nature of hummingbirds, the only possible hummingbird 🙂 When we saw them again around the pansies on the back deck, we dug out the hummingbird feeder and I mixed up a new batch of juice and hung it on its hook in one corner of the deck. We have had occasional hummingbird activity in the yard in the past (enough to have invested in the feeder and some hummingbird juice mix) but this year we have two pairs of Ruby-throats…two bright males and two clean females…coming to the feeder every few minutes all day long. At first both males tried to defend the feeder…keeping even rival females away…but now they have settled in to more or less tolerate each other. The females often feed at the same time, and I have seen both males on the feeder during the warmest part of the day. As it cooled yesterday, they got fiesty again, pushing each other from feeding hole to feeding hole around the feeder, but they still managed to share the resource. I have seen the males displaying for the females, and have some hope one or the other pair will nest in the big pines along the edge of our yard. The shot above was taken just before sunset, with no direct sun, and does not show the deep ruby of the gorget. Still I was happy to get what I could, standing in the open back door. There is a bit of heat distortion due to the differential between the warm house and the cooling deck, but I did not dare to step further out for fear the bird would fly. Sony RX10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr.
Close Hermit Thrush
Sometimes the birds along the boardwalk at Magee Marsh on the Erie shore of Northern Ohio are just ridiculously close. This Hermit Thrush was happily hunting right under the boardwalk while we walked overhead. It popped out into sight and full sun and appears to be asking what all the fuss is about 🙂 This is an odd angle on the bird but I was straight above it and not much more than 4 feet from it’s head. Sony RX10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr. (Custom birds and wildlife modifications can be found in my Sony RX10iv for P&S Nature Photography ebook here.)
Wildflowers of Southern Portugal
When I visited southern Portugal in December a few years ago, my guide assured me that if I returned in the spring, I would find the fields full of wildflowers…and that promise figured largely in my plans for our April trip this year. I was not disappointed. The Portuguese practice a form of agriculture which includes a rotation of crops, grazing, and fallow fields…and the fallow fields, not to mention roadsides, hillsides, orchards, cork groves, hedgerows, and riversides, are indeed full of wildflowers in the spring. I photographed well over 70 species. I have only begun to identify them (and may have already mis-identified some). Here is first small sample. The English name is on each photo, but you will probably have to view the photos full screen to read it. Some of the most interesting wildflowers I found are proving the most elusive to identify. The situation for wildflowers seems to the same as the situation for birds in Portugal. The only resources I could find were English language, published in England, by Englishmen (and women). It would certainly be possible to spend as much time in the Alentejo and Algarve studying the wildflowers as you could spend on the birds…which is to say a lot of time! All photos taken with the Sony RX10iv and processed in Polarr.