Posts in Category: Sunday
Black-shouldered Spinylegs at Old Falls Pond: Happy Sunday!
With my new interest in Odonata (dragon and damselflies), I am beginning to look at the landscape of Southern Maine in a different way. I know where most of the good “classic” photo ops are, and I know, pretty much, where to go for most of the birds that either live here or pass through. But I am only learning where to go for dragons and damsels.
This is the season when the American Red-spot flies…and I really want to see one. American Ruby-spot is a close relative of the Ebony Jewelwing, a broad-winged damselfly, which I featured recently, but it has clear wings with bright “ruby” spots close in to the body.
Unfortunately it is not listed on Odonata Central as occurring in York county, nor is it featured in range maps covering the county in the USGS data base of Odonata, and notes I have read elsewhere place American Ruby-spot in Maine but not on the coastal plain. I live on the coastal plain. Still, there are places in York county that have the kind of “clean” swift running rivers with lots of exposed rocks that the American Ruby-spot likes. (I am confident of all of the above but the “clean” part.) So it is worth looking.
The nearest likely spot is about 10 miles inland, on a little stretch of the Mousam between Estes Lake and Old Falls Pond. The Mousam tumbles down over rock ledges and through boulders for a quarter mile or so, all in a rush. It is one of my favorite places for fall foliage, with the overhanging maples and the white water of the falls and rapids.
But now, with my new Odonata eyes, I have to look at it as possible American Ruby-spot habitat as well! Like I say, a whole new layer to the landscape.
Unfortunately the American Ruby-spot does not seem to see this little stretch of the Mousam the same way I do. There were none.
Not that it was not a worthwhile trip. The view and the music of the falling waters would be enough, but I found Palm Warblers, a tiny Northern Leopard Frog, an even smaller Toad, and several new or seldom seen dragons and damsels. The lead image is, as you might have guessed from the title, a Black-shouldered Spinylegs. It is a member of a large family of dragons (Gomphidae) which all have more or less broad tips on their abdomens (tails)…clubtails, snaketails, spinylegs, etc. The Black-shouldered Spinyleg favors waters very similar to the American Ruby-spot, though it will tolerate slower moving “muddy” streams, and oxygen-rich ponds and lakes, where you would not find the damsel.
The full body shot shows off the broad tail.
I had a job identifying this dragon…made more difficult by the fact that Odonata Central does not list Black-shouldered Spinyleg for York County, Maine either, nor does the USGS data base. In fact I posted pics to the North-east Odonata Facebook group just to me sure of my id.
In researching for this piece this morning, however, I visited the Maine Dragon and Damselfly Survey site. Maine is one of only a few states to have such a comprehensive, scholarly survey of Odonata, conducted over several years by the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife. I have not used the site much, since it makes few (as in no) concessions to the amateur dragon and damselfly fancier. It uses only Scientific names, and cryptic codes for distribution. Still, with a bit of Googling Latin names and a bit of common sense on the codes, I found that the Black-shouldered Spinyleg is indeed recorded for York County Maine. It was not seen in the first round survey in the late 90s…but it was added a more recent 2006 follow-up. So there!
And for the Sunday thought: My own knowledge of dragon and damselflies is miniscule. I am humbled by every encounter with the folks who really know…which is most of the regular posters on the North-east Odonata Facebook group, the authors of the guides I use, and those who maintain the web-sites…to name a few. But I have to consider that even the experts admit to knowing very little, comparatively, about Odonata…compared, of course, to what there is to know…compared to what we have yet to learn. Odonata from an interesting, highly visible and certainly vital layer in the life-scape, and yet even the authorities are not sure if something as striking and identifiable as Black-shouldered Spinyleg lives in York County Maine (or at least not in agreement).
I love learning new stuff. I love discovering new bugs and new birds and new frogs and new ways of seeing the landscape in which I live. It makes me feel more alive to have found a Black-shouldered Spinyleg along the Mousam between Estes Lake and Old Falls Pond. And everything I learn brings me closer to the Creator of All Things. The love of learning, the love of discovery, is a vital aspect of the love the God. When we stop learning, when we stop discovering, then love is dead. This is a true of the love between people as it is of our love of creation. We have one eye…it is either open or closed. If I am not discovering a new way to look at the landscape around me, then it is likely I am not discovering new things to love about the people around me. That is death.
And that, this morning, hits me right in the face! That challenges me. That makes me wonder what I don’t know about the people around me…it makes me wonder if I am not seeing the Black-shouldered Spinylegs of their souls…of their spiritual landscapes?
One thing gives me hope. That same Maine Dragon and Damselfly Survey that lists the Black-shouldered Spinyleg for York County Maine, also lists the American Ruby-spot! That is enough to keep me checking likely spots in the landscape.
And this morning’s Sunday thought, is, I hope, a timely reminder to check the spiritual landscape of those around me to see what I am missing that I might love (and better love). That is what it means to be alive. And that is what it takes to keep love alive.
the Netherlands: the Oostvaardersplassen. Happy Sunday!
This is the accidental prairie/marsh formed when they built out the last section of the coast of the Netherlands in the 70s. Today it is home to an ancient breed of horse, recreated ancient cattle, Red Deer, foxes, and a few hundred species of birds…as well as being a major stop-over site on the European migration for many more. It is essential Holland, reclaimed from the sea-bed, cut by canals, backed up against a large inland lake, right on the edge of the sea. A beautiful place.
The weather while I was there was typical Dutch summer weather, with fronts coming through continuously: bouts of rain, sometimes heavy, and then periods of sun under skies straight out of a painting by Jacob van Ruisdael.
I felt blessed to be there, even when caught in a sudden downpour, even when the umbrella turned inside out.
These shots are with, of course, the Canon SX40HS. The top one was taken through the very dirty glass of an observation tower on the refuge, and I learned just how good the spot-removal tool is in Lightroom. It is very good!
1) 24mm equivalent field of view. f4 @ 1/1000th @ ISO 125. 1) 2 frame panorama, stitched in PhotoShop Elements. 24mm equivalent shots. f5 @ 1/1250th @ ISO 200. Processed in Lightroom for intensity, clarity, and sharpness.
And for the Sunday thought…well, it is going on 10PM here in Holland after a full day of work, workshops, and some birding and photography, and slightly too much good Chinese food. I am feeling decidedly spiritual in the sense of blessed and grateful, but my mind is too tired to make much more of it than that. I have an early train ride to the airport and then the long trans-Atlantic flight home, so I am thinking mostly of packing and getting some sleep. It has been, however, a great Sunday, and I hope yours was too!
Weather at the Pond. Happy Sunday!
Yesterday afternoon I took my electric scooter out, even though, at a casual glance, my weather app said there was a 67% chance of thundershowers. The great thing about weather apps, to me, is that you have access to real time radar maps of your area. At the click of an icon you can check the area to the west (at least here in New England it is the west, though certain seasons you do have to have an eye to the south) to see what weather is, or is not, coming. When I looked at the map, I could see storms well to the south of us, and tracking east out to sea, but nothing to the west…so I headed out, and had a good 3 pond photoprowl. And all under spectacular storm skies. And yes, I got home safe and dry.
This is the little pond where I am doing a lot of my dragon and damselfly hunting these days. As you see it is really drainage for a small industrial complex, now converted to a health care center. Health care is a major industry in Kennebunk. We have probably a dozen large residential care centers, three pharmacies, and two major medical outliers (mini hospitals) from larger full-service facilities in the area. And that is not counting all the physicians who are in practice on their own. Now if you live in a city you are probably thinking “ha, that’s nothing” but Kennebunk is a small town of 11,000 souls. We have become, somehow, an assisted living retirement destination. Go figure? (Actually the whole southern coast of Maine is hopping with residential centers…I have never lived anywhere where there were so many.)
That is not, of course, why we moved here…but, maybe because I turned 65 this week, it is more apparent to me now than it was when we got here 17 years ago.
But back to the image. I just like the intense sky and the empty parking lot…and the way the sky and trees reflect in the water. For me the shot has a lot of quiet tension…it should be pretty static…restful…calm…but that sky just keeps pulling the emotions in other directions.
Technically the scene was underexposed to catch all the detail in the sky. Canon SX40HS. Program with iContrast and –1EV exposure compensation. 24mm equivalent field of view. f5.6 @ 1/1250th @ ISO 160. I brought up the shadows (basically the whole foreground back to the building) using the selective exposure controls in Lightroom, and then added a final Graduated Filter effect from bottom to top to increase the brightness of the foreground for a more natural look. I think it works.
And for the Sunday thought. Lots of places to go here. At 65 I have to kind of, sort of, wish there were a life-weather app that would give me real-time radar of the life-storms that are, or are not, moving in from the west.
I also got my disappointingly small pension packet from the limited time I was in the pension system at my most recent employer (before they closed the system and went to mandatory 401ks), and had the inevitable discussion with my boss about when I was planning on retiring and what that means for my work, and the nature of my job, over the next few years. A kind of “lets get everything we can out of you while we phase you out” talk. Heady stuff. Stormy stuff if you let it get to you.
And I am feeling much like this image. There is a quiet, almost a calm, certainly a beauty…but an undeniable tension. I am not anticipating storms, but I can not deny the possibility. And yet, at my best, I would not have it any other way. I have lived my life by faith…never building barns (pension plans), as it is in Jesus’ parable…and, life-weather app or no, I know who has my hours and my days and all my years in hand. I will go on as I have gone. And I will, where ever I encounter it, celebrate the beautiful tension of living in this world.
And yes, I fully expect to get home, if not completely dry, at least completely safe!
Bicyclists on the Kennebunk Bridle Trail. Happy Sunday
Since getting interested in dragon and damselflies, I spend a lot of my time outdoors looking down, or looking in-close at least. When I close my eyes at night, small agile forms flit across my inner light. Oh, I still look up for birds, and the occasional spectacular landscape opportunity, but those images come as breaks in the dragon and damsel hunt. I will be traveling to new vistas, my first trip to the Netherlands, in a few weeks, and, hopefully I can get back into the habit of looking up and out…otherwise I may come back with nothing but the bugs and closer birds of Holland. 🙂
So I am posting this atypical shot, taken a few days ago on the Kennebunk Bridle Path, as a reminder to myself to look up an out. I am always attracted by the light in the tunnel of trees over the Bridle Path just here, and have attempted to photograph it many times. When these cyclists passed me, I turned to watch them cross the light, and had just the presence of mind to shift the camera off my dragonfly settings and grab a few shots.
The image has a posterish look to it, emphasized by the higher ISO and the long-lens perspective, so I brought that up a bit more in processing. I like the result quite a bit. It has a certain serenity to it…an gentle arrested action feel…and Alice down the rabbit hole from the tunnel effect…that gives it a painterly charm.
Canon SX40HS. Program with iContrast and –1 EV exposure compensation. Around 600mm equivalent field of view. f5.8 @ 1/160th @ ISO 640. Processed in Lightroom for intensity, clarity, and sharpness, and for that poster like look.
And for the Sunday thought: We often retreat to nature to get away from man…man and all his works. It is the John Muir attitude that traces its modern roots to the late 18th century romantic naturalists and their rebellion against the industrial world that was beginning to dominate the landscape, as they saw it, both physically and spiritually. We sometimes draw a dichotomy: manmade equals bad, natural equals good.
And, of course, I experience some of that myself. But, increasingly, as the dichotomy between physical and spiritual begins to disappear, I also become distrustful of the man vs. nature dichotomy.
I attempt to see the spiritual in the physical in all things. I am convinced that the physical is always the manifestation of the spirit, in all ways and in everything, and indeed, that you can not imagine, or conceive of, the spiritual without its physical manifestation. We have to look no further for the divine than our daily experience. God is all in all and in all. God is all that is, and all that ought to be.
And God is most especially God in man. (I know a Christ who makes it so.) So, it follows that I am challenged to look at man and all his works as natural. Oh, that does not mean that I do not still object to the power-lines crossing the view…but I am becoming aware that is disingenuous to do so while standing on the road that gives me access to the view in the first place, next to the car (or electric scooter as the case may be 🙂 that carried me there.
And I am not saying that the greed that is like a cancer in man (exactly and specifically like a cancer) does not threaten nature…I am just beginning to doubt that it is helpful to cast man and nature as enemies…to define man by this disease and deny our unity with nature, our natural state, our oneness with all that is.
Part of the charm we see in cyclist on the Bridle Path, riding down a man-made tunnel of leaves and light, on bicycles that are triumphs of modern technology, captured with a camera that a small computer with a lens…is that we glimpse how man and all his works might be integrated with nature, without harm, without disturbance or distortion of the spirit of all that is and all that ought to be.
Or that’s what I think anyway. Happy Sunday.
Quest Pond, Pondhawks, and other wonders for Sunday!
As I mentioned yesterday, my mother-in-law introduced me to a new little pond this week. It is your standard industrial drainage pond, part of the drainage system for a small industrial park, augmented by the fact that the whole facility was built on a pad of fill in more or less wetland and the water has to go somewhere. It is the last in a series of ponds and French drains on the property and it is remarkably healthy for a drainage pond.
The thin boarder of reeds and other water plants along the edge, the grassy verge, the exposed rocks and the gravel path around the pond, and the backing of trees and shrubs, make it ideal Odonata habitat, with easy access for photography as well…and indeed it is alive with dragon and damselflies. The number of species is impressive, but the number of individuals, for Southern Maine, is even more impressive. In several visits over the past two days I have seen:
Green Darner (15-20 at all times over pond and the grassy verge)
Eastern Pondhawk (both male and female in large numbers, 30 or more of each)
Twelve-spotted Skimmer (about the same numbers as Green Darners)
Widow Skimmer (many males and one female so far)
Common Whitetail (males only, and only two that I have seen)
Black Saddlebags (5-10, but very aggressive, and very present)
Blue Dasher (30 or more, and a few so small I am trying to make them into Elfin Dasher or Blue Dragonlets)
Eastern Amberwing (half a dozen)
A single female White-faced Meadowhawk
And one spectacular, and very red, Calico Pennant.
Then you have the damsels:
Azure Bluet for sure.
Familiar Bluet
Orange Bluet (I think)
Eastern Forktail
Slender Spreadwing
And bunches of sprites down on the floating vegetation that I have not begun to sort.
It is an Odonata lover’s feast! This is not a big pond…so watching this man dragonfies over the water at any given time is like watching a soccer match with no goals and no rules. When I close my eyes to sleep at night, my inner vision is full of darting shapes against the light.
I was especially delighted to find a newly emerged Green Darner on Friday. You never get a chance to photograph a Green Darner…oh, maybe a female hung up waiting on a mate, or a mating wheel…both of those I have from California…but not an individual Green unless they are newly emerged and not yet ready for flight.
And the Eastern Pondwalks are rapidly becoming one of may favorite dragonflies. Both male and female are striking in their own ways. The male in the lead image shows off the green face and the subtle blue pruinescence (powdery frost) covering the green body, while the female, without the pruinescence. is exactly the same shade of green as my electric scooter.
This pond is also the first place I have seen Dragonfly cases…the shells left when Dragonflies emerge from the last larva stage. The Green Darners climb high up on reeds or bushes for the transformation, and the shells remain attached to the reed by those strong legs until a sufficiently powerful wind knocks them loose. When I first saw them, I could not imagine what in the world kind of bug they were! With the low sun of late afternoon behind them they have a bizarre (maybe a bit creepy even) beauty of their own.
You will be seeing lots more of the Odonata wonders of Quest Pond over the coming days, I am sure.
And for the Sunday thought. If someone had told me a year ago that the highlight of my 2012 summer would be the discovery of new drainage pond at an industrial estate…
Well, actually I might not have found it that hard to believe given my past experience and what I know about myself, but it does sound unlikely on the face of it.
And, of course, except for the dragonflies and damselflies I would probably not have given Quest Pond a second look. just another drainage pond. And think of what I would have missed!
That is the thing about being awake in the world. Here I am at almost 65 years old (August 14th) and still learning…still finding new stuff to feed the wonder and the delight of being alive. Me and my Pondhawk green electric scooter pulling up to the pond on a sunny afternoon, with my white beard and with my camera on my hip and my Tilly hat hung down my back behind my emerald green helmet…must be quite a sight. But that’s okay. I am having fun.
And it is not like I am finding anything new…all these bugs have been seen and even photographed…by people who know a lot more about them than I do…people who have devoted, or are devoting, their working lives to getting to know everything there is to know about Odonata. I depend on them for what little I know. But, the fact is, this is all new for me…I have never seen and never photographed these bugs…this peculiar beauty…so it fills me with the delight of discovery.
And I think that is the key to being awake. I think our spirits require a constant diet of discovery…I think we are driven to keep exploring this world, these creatures that share it, ourselves, those we know and those we love…to find the newness in it all…the new every day…to find the beauty. I think we are driven, I know I am driven, to share it in these words and photographs. It is my spiritual act. It is the action of my spirit, to bring Quest Pond and Pondhawks and empty dragonfly cases to your attention this morning, confident that those who are in touch with the same spirit, the loving spirit of creation, the spirit of all that is new and all that we can discover…will find the delight in them…will see the beauty…will experience the love. Happy Sunday!
Is it Love? Northern Spreadwings on a Pond. Happy Sunday!
Down at the ponds on Back Creek yesterday on my photoprowl, there were lots of Northern Spreadwings, and several mating pairs. It was a still day, with subdued light..patches of sun but mostly clouds…waiting for a font to arrive…and the reflections on the pond were lovely. There is a lot going on in this image. The surface tension dimples around the stems of the delicate yellow flowers are fascinating. I think the deep one under the damselflies is caused by the weight of the flies on the adjacent stem. Their weight is pushing water “up” the stem and it is flowing into the dimple next to it, forming a small vortex with is pulling the dimple deeper. That is my theory anyway. Whatever is causing the effect, it adds visual interest and beauty to the image.
Then, of course, you have the damselflies themselves, perfectly mirrored in the still water for a shape that is simple in its apparent complexity…once the eye sorts it out. Finally you have the surface of the water, laced with what might be spider webs, or lines of pollen, or underwater vegetation…whatever…they add texture to pale silver-blue and delight the eye. All in all, this is an image I could look at a long time.
It is not perfect. It was taken at the full reach of my SX40HS…1680mm equivalent, with the digital assist of the 2x tel-converter function. The digital tel-converter works really well on highly detailed subjects like birds or close-ups of dragonflies…but when, as here, you have large areas with little detail, the digital artifacts are fairly apparent. I used some noise reduction in Lightroom, but if you were to blow the image up too large it would basically fall apart. Too large is say, to fill a 24 inch screen or larger, or to make a print at 11×14 or larger. I know the limits of my camera…but still…I would not have gotten the image at all with any other rig (can you see me on my electric scooter with DSLR and enough lens to reach this shot?). I might have come close with a very heavy crop, but that would have left me with about the same image quality. So I am happy to view the image at “regular” sizes and enjoy.
Canon SX40HS. Program with iContrast and –1/3EV exposure compensation. 1680mm equivalent. f5.8 @ 1/640th @ ISO 400. Processed in Lightroom for intensity, clarity, and sharpness. And I did crop it for composition and apply the noise reduction.
And for the Sunday thought:
I never took as many local images as I have since starting my Pic 4 Today blog, can it be…four and a half years ago…and I have never worked my local patch as hard as I have these past months when I am on “travel restriction” in my job…all my summer trips are canceled. If I want to take pics, it has to be fairly close to home. And on my electric scooter (my primary photoprowl transport in this summer of car complications) with its range of 10-12 miles round-trip, and I find myself visiting a few local locations over and over…and enjoying it. It is surprising the range of photographic interest such a small radius around my home can provide. I am loving it.
My fairly recent interest in photographing Odonata has helped, of course. It gives me motivation to go back to the ponds today, since there may be new dragonflies and damseflies that were just not there yesterday. But the real delight is finding images like this one…that transcend the subject to create a thing of beauty in itself. It might be the grand landscape of the Kennebunk Plains under stacked cumulous clouds, or it might be the patterns the high tide as made of the tall marsh grass, or it might be a Song Sparrow on a branch with a bug…or it could be pair of mating spreadwing damselflies reflected in a pond…but just about every day I find one image that makes me say “I love that!” That image touches my center of delight. You see there, I have just defined at least the surface level of love. We love what delights us.
Of course, we know that beyond delight, love must move us to commitment…to commitment to the good of what delights us. Love that does not move us to serve and preserve what delights us, is not love. Ultimately love that does not move us to delight even in the unlovely is not love, according to the best example we have been set in God. Hence the question mark in the title today. It is a challenge as much to me as anyone else, and, honestly, an open question in my life. Is it love? Is that what I see in Northern Spreadwings reflected in a pond. Is that what I am finding as I work my local patch these days?
Time will tell.
Northern Broken-dash on Northern Blazing Star, Kennebunk Plains
Happy Sunday!
My little electric scooter and I took our longest trip to date yesterday…from the house to the Kennebunk Plains, about 13 miles round-trip. That is the absolute limits of its range, at least up and down hill and carrying my considerable weight. I got back under power, but I was down to about 8 mph at the end. 🙂
I wanted to try for the Plains in part to test the limits of the scooter, but, of course, in part to see what was happening on the Plains. I have written about the Plains before, but essentially they are sand plains, kept open as kind of tall grass prairie, well out of place in forested Southern Maine, by a combination of natural wildfire (now managed) and soil conditions, and home to several endangered species. Grasshopper Sparrow, Clay-collared Sparrow, and Upland Sandpiper all reach range limits on the Plains, but it was first protected, by the Nature Conservancy, because of the presence of the Northern Blackracer snake and Northern Blazing Star wildflower. Management and ownership of most of the property has now been turned over to the State of Maine, and lumped together into a larger conservation area that embraces almost all of the habitat.
The area where Route 99 crosses is known locally as the Blueberry Plains, and it is still about the only place in Southern Maine where you can fill a bucket with wild low-bush blueberries. Picking is allowed during the month of August, but I saw a few people (who apparently believe that the law does not apply to them) picking yesterday. These early berries are supposed to be for the wildlife. Of course maybe these folks just did not read the numerous signs to that effect.
The Northern Blazing Star was just coming into bloom yesterday, but I could see that the show should be spectacular in another week or two. Lots of plants, tall and well grown, covered in buds about to open. The one in the image is only about half open, but already it had attracted a Northern Broken-dash Skipper, who was extracting nectar…sipping nectar…from down deep in the flower.
The other thing I was looking for, of course, was dragonflies. There were a few, but they were flying high yesterday and not perching. I did hike down to the pond on the backside of the Plains along Cold Brook, where I found a female Common Whitetail (a first for me, and pictured here) and a newly emerged Widow Skimmer, along with a few Ebony Jewelwings haunting the stream where it leaves the pond.
The most common Odo at the Plains yesterday was some kind of female (I think) damselfly of the Bluet variety. The female bluets are mostly all similar enough so it is not safe to make an id without a specimen in hand, and way more knowledge than I have.
And we will return to the Blazing Star for the final image. This one with one of the smallest metallic bees (or hover fly maybe) that I have ever seen.
I will, of course, be going back to the Plains some Saturday or Sunday afternoon soon, to catch more of the Blazing Star show, and maybe find a few perched Meadowhawks. 🙂 but for now, the Sunday Thought:
My tag line on Google+ is “kind of walking the line where technology and spirituality meet”. By that I mean that I am pretty much a geek when it comes to technology. I like camera tech, computer tech, tablet tech, phone tech, and even electric scooter tech. I want stuff that works…and it has to work because, maybe beyond geekdom, I actually do use the tech. I take pictures and video, I record sounds, I write words…I process the same on the computer…I show it off on my tablet…I tell people about it on computer, tablet and phone. And I get to the places, these days, at least locally, on my electric scooter. So I am geek who actually uses the tech for what it was made to do.
But way beyond that, nothing I do is complete until it is shared. Yes I show my stuff to friends and family, but I also blog (here and elsewhere), I twitter, I Facebook, I Google+. To me the miracle of modern technology is how easy it makes it to both create and share content…to catch your bit of the world and life, make a bit of meaning out of it, and broadcast it to a, relatively speaking, wide audience. Almost 27,000 people have me in circles on Google+. That is a small number compared to the super-stars of the internet, but it is a huge number compared to the number of people I could have touched even 10 years ago (without being noticeably rich, famous, or powerful).
And that is where the spirituality comes in. It is, I am certain, a spiritual act to catch your bit of the world and life, and to make a bit of meaning out of it. It is, I am certain, a spiritual act to share whatever meaning we make. And, for me, the more I share, the more certain I become that there is only one Spirit that gives meaning to all of us, and that my only value in life or in the world, comes from touching that Spirit, and sharing that Spirit. Personally, my experience has lead me to identify that Spirit with what most of us call God, and specifically with the God of love who we know, who we can come to know, in Jesus Christ. That is my experience, and, for me, it gives a whole new layer of meaning to what I make of the world and life.
So I take a moment, each Sunday, as I continue my walk along the line where technology and spirituality meet, to celebrate the Spirit that moves us all…with digital images and word-processed words…on a computer, through the internet, and out to you…so you can experience a bit of the meaning I made of a Northern Broken-dash Skipper sipping nectar from a Northern Blazing Star on the Kennebunk Plains. 🙂
Ebony Jewelwing, Emmon’s Preserve. Happy Sunday!
I have been enjoying getting out most days on Froggy the Scoot (my frog-green electric scooter) on short lunch-hour and after-work photoprowls and dragonfly hunts, but some places are just beyond the range of the batteries in Froggy. Emmon’s Preserve, along the Batson River beyond Cape Porpoise (and managed by the Kennebunkport Land Trust) is just such a place. At something over 8 miles one way, it has to wait for a Saturday when I have a car available (rare in these days of driving-to-work daughters). It takes some planning.
I did manage a pilgrimage to Emmon’s yesterday, in hopes of finding the Ebony Jewelwings in flight, though it is a few weeks earlier than I photographed them there last year. The Batson flows down through mixed forest over a series ledges…little waterfalls and rapids…alternating with deep pools in the Preserve, so it is ideal Jewelwing habitat, and indeed, the male Ebonys put in an appearance soon after I arrived, as the sun worked its way through early clouds and the branches of the overhanging trees. Oddly I did not see a single female yet. I will get back there in the next few weeks to try to video some of the mating behavior.
There are few damselfies so striking as the Ebony Jewelwing. Jewelwings are large (comparatively speaking) broad-winged members of the Odonata family (damsel- and dragonflies), and carry their intensely colored wings vertically above the body most often when perched. They fly much more like butterflies than dragonflies, with a lot of flop and flutter, in short flights from perch to perch, and in even shorter flights as they flycatch from perches. It takes a lot of mosquitoes to keep a a hunting Jewelwing in flight, and, all things considered, I am very much on the side of the Jewelwings. 🙂
In the Ebony, the large black wings that give them their name are spectacular, but no more so than the metallic body flashing in the sun, most often an intense emerald, but sometimes, in certain lights, electric blue.
There is a level of intensity to the green that the camera just does not catch…though some of the shots from yesterday come as close as I have come.
Since the Ebony Jewelwings tend to return to favored perches even after flycatching it is easy to come back from Emmon’s, as I did, with way too many images…but they are, I think, worth the effort…even when it involves planning around drive-to-work daughters.
And for the Sunday thought: While I certainly see evidence that some process similar to that described by evolutionists is operating in nature, it will never be enough, to me, to explain the Ebony Jewelwing.
The Ebony Jewelwing is just too much fun…too whimsical, too utterly beautiful in such unlikely ways…for me to believe that it is the result of any process that is based on random chance and natural selection, no matter how long you give the process to work. I mean, for a simple little mosquito eating machine, or even organism, the Ebony Jewelwing is certainly overly ornate, well beyond any idea of practical functionality…delightful in a way that requires intelligence and a larger view of existence to appreciate, or even to imagine…or that is the way I see it.
I don’t need to go to nature for evidence that there is a creator (though I enjoy doing so)…the knowledge that there is a creator, and one who is loving all we are and all we know into existence, is inescapable in a relationship with Christ…but if I did need more evidence, then the Ebony Jewelwing would be pretty much enough, all by itself, for me. Happy Sunday!
7/8/2012: RiBBit. Coastal ME Botanical Gardens. Happy Sunday!
On our visits to the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens I always spend some time at the Amphibian Pond shooting frogs and Water Lilies. After-all, that is what it is there for.
You can always hear the pond before you see it. As you come up the rise from the Rose Gardens or across the clearing from the Event Lawn you are greeted by the improbably loud calls of the bull frog. “RiBBit”, though the conventional representation of the sound, does not really do it…at least for the bull frog. There is a deeper, darker undertone that gives the sound its character…a characteristic fall and rise…with just an hint of the echo of deep wells and damp caves at the bottom.
r
i it!
BB
You can not even say it properly without a frog in your throat.
There are generally a few frogs basking in the shallow water were the stone path crosses a corner of the pond, or hauled out on the rocks sunning themselves, if it is early morning yet. This specimen is, apparently, considering the wisdom of climbing out…especially with me standing there. I am not really that close. I was using the 1.5x digital tel-converter function and full zoom so this is at 1240mm equivalent from about 6 feet. He had his space.
The other thing about frogs is that, even at the best of times, if you look them in the eye as we are here, they seem to be thinking the dark thoughts their voices express. It is all projection of course. We project human feelings based on a similarity of the frog’s countenance to the human expression associated with the emotions. Still I can hear some mother saying, “Oh stop making that frog face and cheer up! Things are not all that bad!”
And for a frog in the Amphibian Pond on the grounds of the Coastal Maine Botanical Garden, a pond teaming with just what a frog eats…barring an encounter with a member of the heron race (who I have never seen in the gardens)…life is indeed pretty good. It just comes down to who has the loudest and most convincing riBBit (at least for the males).
And where do we go from here for the Sunday thought now? This is the kind of whimsical rabbit trail that must lead to some significant insight…the, shall we say…frog leap to enlightenment at the end. ??
Or is it that sometimes a frog is just a frog?
What I really like about this photo is that it makes me smile. There it is. I can’t look at it without smiling, at least just a little bit. It tickles me somewhere I need tickling. And really, I have come to expect that of nature, whether in the face of a frog, the majesty of a mountain, the intensity of a storm, the beauty of butterfly wings, the awesome ingenuity of the structure of a dragonfly, the promise of sunrise, or the benediction of sunset…I always feel lifted up toward joy…in touch with significance…just a bit more alive…and happy about it. And thankful. Always thankful to the spirit that is all in all for every expression of grace.
And that is what I am always trying to photograph. RiBBit!
6/17/2012: Prairie Birding Dawn. Happy Sunday!
Birding the high prairie in North Dakota this week has been a real blessing! Such an amazingly diverse area, with all shapes and sizes of watery (and wildlifey) gems hidden in the folds of the landscape, and that prairie sky with all its drama overhead. This is birders at dawn, out towards Chase Lake National Wildlife Refuge. We piled off the bus to walk this prairie track and look for Grasshopper Sparrow and Upland Sandpiper. Marbled Godwits circled over head. A muskrat floated like a log in a small pothole watching us. Black-crowned Night Herons and White Pelicans did fly-bys at hill top on their way from one small lake to another.
It was miraculous. Miraculously alive and miraculously beautiful. The image just maybe catches a bit of the miracle. Canon SX40HS in program with – 1 /3EV exposure compensation. 24mm equivalent field of view. I exposed for the sky and counted on being able to bring the foreground up in Lightroom. Processed in Lightroom for intensity, clarity, and sharpness, as well as exposure balance.
And for the Sunday thought: we are always tempted to call such moments “magical”.. I suppose we mean that they awake a sense of mystery and wonder in us… and we are aware of that the are things going on that defeat the rational mind. But of course there is another word that attempts to catch that sense of wonder and mystery. ” Miraculous.” Miraculous includes the awareness of a specific power for good in action, an attempt, not to mystifying and impress, but to enlighten and uplift. And it is certainly the sense of miracle that fills me in the prairie dawn!