Chipper at the pond
Chipmunks are always cute, but they are cuter out in the wild, well away from my bird-feeders. 🙂 This one was teasing me from the shelter of the brush around the base of a big tree on the shore of Day Brook Pond on the Kennebunk Plains Wildlife Management Area in West Kennebunk. Sony RX10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr.
The Generous Eye. Happy Father’s Day.
“if your eye is generous, your whole being is full of light.” Jesus
As it happens, yesterday we celebrated a new baby to be in the family at Erin and Paulo’s baby shower for Everleigh (they already know the baby will be a girl). And, today, of course, is Father’s Day. Certainly cause for reflection, and, yes, celebration (if I do say so myself). I have 7 wonderful daughters, enough to make any man proud. Each one is enough to make me proud. I have not always been the best of fathers, and that is not just false modesty…love is the hardest thing to do well, and I have often failed. Still, my heart tells me that Our Father, who dwells in us, has worked it all for good, and that, over all, love has won the day. That, honestly, is all any father can hope for…and it is my prayer for all father’s today, and that includes Paulo, as he sets out on this journey. It does not take a generous eye to see he has made a good start already. Happy Father’s Day to all of us today.
Giant Jack-in-the-pulpits
Near the bike-rack, right where I see them every time I go to the Rachel Carson National Wildlife Refuge Headquarters in Wells Maine, there are a few stands of giant Jack-in-the-pulpits growing…the largest plants of their kind I have ever seen. This is one of them. The tallest blossom is about two and half feet off the ground. Giant! Sony RX10iv at about 150mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr.
Gold Finch
We put up a new feeder pole on the other corner of the deck this week, along with a branch I saved from pruning the cherry tree last fall. The birds started using it immediately. I also added one of those metal screen thistle feeders to replace the thistle sock, which never, in the past three years, attracted a single Finch. That too was a success. The Goldfinches, which came to the Black-oil Sunflower Seed feeders even if they did not come to the thistle sock, started using the screen thistle feeder on the second day. They also like the cherry tree branch, which is straight in line with the deck door and easily visible from the breakfast table…if I am careful I can get the door open a crack before the birds fly, hence this shot of a Gold Finch at close range. Sony RX10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr.
Red-winged Acrobatics
More shots of the acrobatic Red-winged Blackbird from a few days ago at the drainage pond at Southern Maine Medical Center in Kennebunk. Endlessly entertaining…unless they are at your feeder :). (And maybe even then, depending on your tolerance.) Sony RX10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr. Assembled in Framemagic.
Tom Turkey in the tall grass
The other day, while out on a photoprowl on my ebike, I happened on two large flocks of Wild Turkeys…or maybe it was one huge flock and I just saw both ends of it while it was spread out over 600 yards or so…along the road into our local beach. There were two big handsome Toms at the very far end of the two groups, feeding in tall grass. When I stopped my bike one of them decided to disappear so it sat down in the grass with only its head sticking up. As though that bright red head would be inconspicuous in the green grass. 🙂 600mm and 1200mm equivalents (1200 with 2x Clear Image Zoom). Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr and assembled in FrameMagic.
Red-winged Blackbird
While dragonfly hunting the other day, out on my ebike, the Red-winged Blackbirds entertained me around the little drainage pond at Southern Maine Medical Center here in Kennebunk. The males were super vocal. I am not sure if they were responding to each other or to me being at their pond! This one hopped from cattail reed to cattail reed about 30 feet from me for as long as I wanted to watch, yelling at the top of his lungs. Though they are common, Red-winged Blackbirds are not easy to photograph. It took some careful post-processing to being out the subtle plumage details in the black on black bird. Sony RX10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr and Apple Photos.
Painted Skimmer
The early Odes are finally emerging (or arriving) in southern Maine. This is somewhat worn (so migrant) male Painted Skimmer from Day Brook Pond on the Kennebunk Plains Wildlife Management Area in West Kennebunk. I saw it over the pond first, with its wings flashing orange in the sun, and tracked it down to the shallow end of the pond to find its perch. I waited it out through several hunting sorties out over the pond but it came back to the same twig and I worked my way closer until I got this shot at 840mm equivalent (1.4x Smart Zoom). Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr.
Tree Swallow in a Wood Duck box.
They have put up two new Wood Duck boxes at Day Brook Pond on the Kennebunk Plains Wildlife Management Area, complete with sheet metal shields below to protect the nests from predators…but as you might expect, the Tree Swallows have taken both. Hopefully, if Wood Ducks decided to nest there, they will evict the swallows. 🙂 In the meantime the swallows seem happy with their new accommodations. The nice big door/window makes an ideal perch to survey the world. Sony RX10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr.
The Generous Eye: Wild Iris. Happy Sunday!
“If your eye is generous, your whole being is full of light!” Jesus
Here along the coast we will not have Wild Iris for another 2 weeks at least, but just a few miles further inland they are all over the place…in roadside ditches, and along wet swales in hayfields and on the edges of meadows near ponds. Maybe there are that many more this year as we have had a wet spring. I found a boggy pasture edged with pines that must have had 5000 Iris in bloom. Quite a show. Evolutionists will tell you that wildflowers got their form and color due to the evolutionary pressure, not to say competition, for reproduction and pollination. It is not so much that I don’t believe it could have happened that way, as that I find it much easier to believe that the loving creator just likes flowers…loves flowers. There are so many and so many different colors, different forms…from a simple round of petals to the ornate structures of the iris and orchids. Form may follow function, but, to my way of thinking, and my generous eye at its best, part of the function of flowers might just be…well…to be beautiful. If that is naive…or even “simple minded”…then I proudly claim naivety and simplicity as legitimate aspects of the generous eye. The generous eye sees the glory of the creator in everything. How can you not see it in the Wild Iris?