Monthly Archives: September 2015
Black Squirrel
Black Squirrel, Bay City Recreation Area, Bay City MI
As far as I know, we have no Black Squirrels in Maine. Black Squirrels occur as mutated variations of both Gray Squirrel and Fox Squirrel…at the rate of 1 in 10,000. However, it becomes a recessive trait in some populations, and, for various reasons, the Black varieties are a bit a bit more durable, and can come to dominate whole areas…as they apparently do on the east shore of the thumb in Michigan. We did see Grey Squirrels at Bay City Recreation area…but they were far outnumbered by the Blacks. Interestingly, Black Squirrels have been intentionally introduced in some areas of the country…sometimes to compete with Red Squirrel populations where Red Squirrels are doing structural damage, and sometimes for the sheer fun of it. Where introduced they appear to do well, and, again, can come to dominate the area. I have no idea if the Black Squirrels of Bay City are “natural” or introduced.
Nikon P900 at about 1200mm equivalent field of view. ISO 900 @ 1/30th @ f6.3. (Not much light on a cloudy day in the forest…but the exceptional image stabilization of the P900 pulls it off 🙂 Processed in Lightroom.
Lizard Display
Western Fence Lizard, Boyce Thompson Arboretum, Superior AZ
I am in Bay City Michigan this morning, for the Midwest Birding Symposium. Yesterday was a travel day, so I only got one photo…which I will post as my For the love of landscape… shot for today. I still have hundreds of images that I would like to share from my cross country trip with my daughter Sarah. This is Boyce Thompson Arboretum, in Superior AZ…one of my favorite places to visit, though I have not been there in more than 20 years. We always used to stop on the way back from Tucson to Gallup on our spring break trips when I lived in New Mexico. Sarah and I were having lunch on the patio of the visitor center when these two Fence Lizards decided to dispute the territory on the top of a log round at the edge of the patio. I shot these from our table, between bits of sandwich. 🙂
Nikon P900 at 2000mm equivalent field of view. 1/500th @ ISO 220 @ f6.5. Processed in Lightroom.
Immature Red-Tail Revisited.
Immature Red-tailed Hawk, Wells National Estuarine Research Center at Laudholm Farm, Wells ME
I am off to the Midwest Birding Symposium this am, so we have an early post. I ran a collage of images of this cooperative immature Red-tailed Hawk, found along one of the trails at Laudholm Farm last week. This is a close up view. A lovely bird by any standard.
Nikon P900 at 3200mm equivalent field of view using about 1.7x Perfect Image Zoom beyond the 2000mm optical. 1/200th @ ISO 400 @ f6.5. Processed in Lightroom.
Rare (for me) Meadowhawks
Saffron-winged Meadowhawk, Day Brook Pond, Kennebunk Plains Wildlife Management Area
Band-winged Meadowhawk, Kennebunk Bridle Path, Kennebunk ME
It might be my imagination, but it seems to me that the Sympetrum dragons are late emerging this year. Suddenly there at tiny red Meadowhawks everywhere…most of which look to me to be Cherry-faced. And, despite its being after the 1st of September, I have yet to see any number of Autumn. I did find, on opposite sides of Kennebunk, two Meadowhawks that I see much more rarely. At Day Brook Pond on the Kennebunk Plains Wildlife Management Area, most of the Meadowhawks in flight were Saffron Winged, which is only my second sighting in Maine. And, within a few days I found Band-winged Meadowhawks along the Kennebunk Bridle Path by the lower Mousam River, again, only my second sighting of this dragon in Maine. Each is an interesting variation on the Sympetrum theme 🙂
Sony HX90V at 1440mm equivalent (using 2x Clear Image Zoom). Both shots 1/250 @ ISO 160 @ f6.4. Processed in Lightroom.
Immature Red-tailed Hawk
Immature Red-tailed Hawk, Wells National Estuarine Research Center at Laudholm Farms
I was bent over taking a flower macro on the Pilger Trail at Laudholm Farms (Wells National Estuarine Research Center) when I head the sound of big wings behind me and caught movement in the corner of my eye. I turned and looked down the trail in the direction of the movement. There was immature Red-Tailed Hawk sitting in a tall tree about 50 feed from me. It had evidently been on the ground or on a trail sign tucked just around a little crook in the trail where I could not see it when I walked up and stopped for the flower, and had flown just a couple dozen yards and up into the tree. It did not seem particularly alarmed at my presence. I got off a series of shots with the Sony HX90V in my hand…which reaches out to 720mm equivalent. I did not think there was much hope the hawk would sit there while I dug the Nikon P900 with its long zoom out of my camera bag, but it did. I shot lots of images of the hawk, even moving slightly closer and out into the trail to get a better angle. The hawk looked right at me, several times, but still did not seem to be particularly concerned with what I was doing. Eventually it moved further on and higher up, and then flew off under the canopy to somewhere my eye could not follow. It was one of those encounters that seems lifted out of time…so special that the world stops and balances on that point while it lasts. I felt incredibly blessed…privileged…and grateful.
I could not decide on just one image to post, so this a collage of three, taken at different focal lengths to show the full beauty of the hawk. All shots are with the Nikon P900, from 1000mm to 2000mm equivalent field of view. Processed in Lightroom and assembled in Coolage.
Funny story (about a spider). Happy Sunday!
Garden Spider, Kennebunk Plains Wildlife Management Area, Kennbunk ME
Funny story! The other day I was out at Day Brook Pond on the Kennebunk Wildlife Management Area, taking pics and enjoying the day. When I got back to the parking, a gentleman who I often see exercising his dog there was coming back to his car, and we discussed our recent wildlife sightings at the pond for a few moments. He drove off, and I got in the car and headed out on the dirt track toward the main road. The windows were wide open and I was enjoying our first day with a hint of fall in the air. I felt something on my bare leg, and glanced down, still driving, and saw a huge yellow and black spider climbing rapidly up my leg. It was big, with a body the size of a quarter and a leg-span 4 times that. My mind went: “WooO!!! Spider!! Big spider! Bright yellow and black! Garden Spider. Harmless.” in the fraction of a second it took me to scoop it into my palm and attempt to toss it out the window. I will admit there was a micro-second of caught breath panic at the “WooO” but “Harmless” pretty much coincided with its reaching the open window. The car was still moving forward of course, and the wind was blowing in the open window and through the car, so I immediately suspected that the spider had not really gotten out the window. I stopped and looked out, but the dirt track was empty. Yes, well, even though I knew it was harmless, I did not want to drive out on to the highway with it in the car. A startle at 50 mph is different than a startle at 10, and I knew I would be distracted just thinking about that spider somewhere in the car. Besides, by this time I wanted a picture of it. I remembered it, from my glimpse, as being particularly bright even of its kind. I opened both front and back doors, and began a search of the interior. It was there, under the front seat, attempting, without much success, to climb the smooth plastic of the center console. I snapped a couple of pics before thinking about how to get it out. I was able, eventually, to use a folded dollar bill from the toll stash to maneuver the spider onto a red plastic ice scraper I found under seat. It did not stay on the scraper of course, but it hung from a tread of web silk long enough for me to transfer it to a birch sapling by the side of track. I even thought ahead and crossed to the far side of the track to hang it in better light for photography 🙂 Of course, it immediately sought the shade of the back side of the leaves. I figured for sure it would be well hidden by the time I got my camera from the car, but it was still there, perhaps still recovering from its trauma, when I got back. It took some doing, and an angled LCD to get an angle in behind the leaves, but I did manage a few good shots of the spider. It was indeed, one of the brightest, and one of the biggest, Garden Spiders I have ever seen.
The Garden Spider (Argiope aurantia) should really have a more exotic name. It is certainly exotic looking. Big. Bright. Boldly patterned. With orange legs! If it were not so common, and if it did not live, generally, right in our gardens and yards, it probably would have a more fitting name. It certainly would if it were not pretty much harmless to humans. It will, under extreme provocation, bite, and it does use toxins to kill its prey, but we do not react to its poison. It is a good thing to remember when you find one climbing your leg while you are driving the car. 🙂 I can not really figure out how it got in the car. The windows were closed while the car was parked, and I certainly did not feel it on me while talking the gentleman with the dog. He certainly did not comment on it. Seems like he would have said something if he had seen it crawling on me. I might have brushed it off a bush with my camera bag, or it could have been hanging off my hat. I am not sure. Despite my micro-second of panic when I first saw it, I am delighted to have had the encounter…it makes a good story…and blessed to have had the opportunity to photograph this beautiful spider. I am especially happy that no harm came to the spider through the adventure.
I know, there are some of you who do not like spiders, and I respect and understand your fear. I am sure just looking at the pic gives you shivers, and reading the story, if you got this far, probably sets your heart racing. Not your fault. While I will admit to having a healthy respect for spiders, and an awareness of the harm some of them might do, I don’t have the impulse to smash them, and I can appreciate their beauty. Especially a magnificent specimen like this one. On the other hand, I am certainly not going to provoke it into biting me. 🙂
“If your eye is generous, then your whole being is filled with light.” Jesus said it, and it is the key. Open eyes, and a spirit that sees the light in all that lives, in very shape of the landscape, in everything that the light touches. The light within shines out of open eyes to illuminate a beautiful world, full of meaning, full of grace…worthy of love. Just as the creator loves it into being. Seeing it so, generously, makes it so. Even one spider at a time. And I thank you, Jesus, for relighting the light in me! Happy Sunday!
Canada (NOT! actually a Lance-tipped) Darner
Lance-tipped Darner, Emmon Preserve, Kennebunkport ME
For some reason, the meadows behind and above the Kennebunkport Land Conservancy buildings at Emmons Preserve are one the best places for darners in my patch of Southern Maine. I have seen at least 5 species there, though what species is dominant varies from year to year. Last year they were all Black-tipped. Some years Green-stripped. This year, mostly Canada. (since this is actually a Lance-tipped Darner, I am not so sure now 🙂 I have also seen the occasional Shadow there and Springtime. Green-stripped and Canada are hard to distinguish, and I am only mostly sure this is a Canada. I am willing to be corrected by those who know better. 🙂 There were many more darners in flight during my visit, including at least one smaller, darker darner, but this Lance-tipped is the only one I caught perching.
Sony HX90V at 720mm equivalent field of view. 1/250th @ ISO 160 @ f6.3. Processed and cropped for composition in Lightroom.
Female Wood Duck floats on light
Female Wood Duck, Batson River, Emmons Preserve, Kennebunkport ME
There is stone bench at the back of the meadow behind the Kennebunkport Land Conservancy headquarters building at Emmons Preserve that overlooks a window through the trees down to a bend in the Batson River. I suspect that if you had a day to sit on that bench, you would see a fair amount of wildlife through that window. On my last visit, I caught this female Wood Duck, the first Wood Duck I have seen on the Batson, paddling and calling in the little bit of visible open water. I waited for the male to appear, especially as the female was calling, but he did not show, and eventually the female gave up and flew off downstream. The reflections of the foliage in the rippled surface make it just slightly more than your average “portrait of a duck”. Or that’s what I think anyway. 🙂
Nikon P900 at 2000mm equivalent field of view. 1/125 @ ISO 500 @ f6.5. Processed in Lightroom.
Apple Eyes!
Blue Dasher, Emmons Preserve, Kennebunkport, ME
Yesterday, early, I went out to Emmons Preserve (Kennebunkport Land Conservancy) to look for dragonflies. I hoped to get them while they were still cold from the night and not as active as they would be later in the day. It was a moderately successful trip…there were a number of dragons in flight, and I found one Green-stripped Darner perched, as well as a Twelve-Spotted Skimmer and this cooperative Blue Dasher. The light was just right to bring out the amazing apple green of the eyes, which contrasts nicely with the dull blue of the abdomen. The Blue Dasher is one of the most common dragonflies in southern Maine, so as a record shot it is not very interesting…but as image, I think it is very satisfying.
Sony HX90V at about 1400mm equivalent field of view (720 optical plus 2x digital Clear Image Zoom). 1/250th @ ISO 125 @ f6.4. Processed in Lightroom.
Greater Yellowlegs on a log
Greater Yellowlegs, Wells National Estuarine Research Center at Laudholm Farm, Wells ME
As I have mentioned, we are well into fall migration here in Maine, as least as far as shore-birds go. This Greater Yellowlegs was posing on its log in the pond behind the dunes at Laudholm Farm (Wells National Estuarine Research Center). This is one of those shots only possible with the Nikon P900 (or a digiscoping rig). The bird was well off-shore.
Uncropped. Nikon P900 at 2800mm equivalent (2000 optical plus some Perfect Image digital zoom). 1/500th @ ISO 140 @ f6.5. Processed in Lightroom.