Monthly Archives: June 2020
Proud and not purple yet…
Immature Purple Finch, Kennebunk, Maine, USA — This has to be one of this year’s fledglings. It shows just a hint of color in the plumage. By next spring it will be more pronounced, and by summer this will be a full purple male. Or that is my theory at least. He was really enjoying the buffet of aphids on the bittersweet vine. 🙂 Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr and Apple Photos.
Proud and Purple!
Purple Finch, Kennebunk, Maine, USA — This is most likely the first-year male that was just coming into its purple this spring. The other male we have coming to our feeders is even more intensely colored. He enjoyed a long drink from my stacked buckets water feature. I used the chair blind again. What a great invention. I sat it just into the edge of the shade of one of our big maples and had a very pleasant hour close to the birds. Then just packed it away into the shed. 🙂 Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr and Apple Photos.
Delta-spotted Spiketail
There is a poem that goes with this:
6/18
Stalking one of the (admittedly,
kind of ugly) drainage ponds
on the grounds of one of the
senior citizen condo complexes
(very upscale) between here
and Wells behind Route 1,
I was hit hard enough to stop
me in my tracks with one of
those “whoo, what is that!”
moments. You know them if
you are into any kind of nature
study...I get them still once in
a while, in birding, and I am
new enough to the whole dragon
and damselfly thing so they can
still happen on any outing. This
was a dark dragon, relatively
large, with bright yellow spots
and big jade green eyes, something
I certainly had never seen before.
“Whoo, what is that!”
Those moment are certainly
part of what keeps me birding
and a big part of what has me
hooked on dragons and damsels.
“Whoo, what is that?”
And then you have the fun of
finding out...digging out the
books and apps and coloring in
the background, fitting the critter
into the complex framework of
what we know about dragonflies
and damsels and life in general.
(This was a Delta-spotted Spiketail.)
That too is part of what keeps
me watching and photographing
nature. Always something new
to see and learn. How great is that?
Says it all. 🙂 Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr and Apple Photos.
Juvenile Bluebird visit
Juvenile Eastern Bluebird, Kennebunk, Maine, USA — I took down my photo blind last week when I mowed the lawn. It has given me much joy this spring, but it already killed one patch of lawn and was going on its second. There had to be a better solution so I researched and ordered a “chair” blind. It came yesterday and I had to try it out. It is just a standard double camp chair. You sit down in the chair and pull the blind up from behind you and down over the front. The fabric is supported by spring steal bands and it is quite roomy. It has lots of viewing options…two small windows on each side, and your choice of opening the whole top of the front, or just a round window about about 14 inches across. The advantage, for me, is that when I am done for the day, I can just fold it up and put it in my shed…and then just as easily take it out and set it up the next time I want to use it. In theory it should be much easier on the grass since I can set it down in a slightly different spot each time I use it. We will see. The birds are still coming to the feeder station I established for the blind, though it is much harder to photograph them with the undergrowth of vines and bushes in full leaf under the big pines. Yesterday, on my first trial of the new blind, I had a visit from our juvenile Eastern Bluebird, which I have only occasionally seen in the week since I took my original blind down. It is getting very independent…hunting and taking insects on its own, and not waiting around for dad to feed it. In fact, dad must be busy providing for mom, who is, most likely, on her second brood of the season. I have not seen her in over a week, though the male is stilling coming for meal worms many times a day. Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr and Apple Photos.
Stream Cruiser
Stream Cruiser, Cold Brook Pond, Kennebunk Plains Wildlife Management Area, Kennebunk, Maine, USA — I am thinking the north side of the Kennebunk Plains is still under State management, as the signs have not been replaced, but the big yellow gates are up there too, limiting access to Cold Brook Pond at the back of the plains as it slopes off to the Mousam River. I did make out there on my last odes trip to the plains, and found many Stream Cruisers patrolling the path as though were a stream. Males this time, and perhaps a few females that did not perch for me. Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr and Apple Photos. I noticed something I had never seen before. The club on the end of the abdomen was “breathing”, visibly swelling and contracting in a regular rhythm. ??
Racket-tailed Emerald
Racket-tailed Emerald, Day Brook Pond, Kennebunk Plains Nature Conservancy, Kennebunk, Maine, USA — I have now seen both male and female Racket-tailed Emeralds and an American Emerald in the same little cove on Day Brook Pond. I am talking a small area here, maybe 12 by 12 feet, six feet out over the water, and six feet back from the shore among the sheep’s laurel and ferns. I don’t know enough about Emerald behavior to know if that is unusual or not…but impresses me. 🙂 Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr and Apple Photos.
Disputed territory. Dragonflies
Dot-tailed Whiteface and Eastern Pondhawk, Day Brook Pond, Kennebunk Plains Nature Conservancy, Kennebunk, Maine, USA — These two were actually having a dispute about who owned this sunny piece of driftwood. They drove each other off repeatedly as I watched, even though there was plenty of room for them both. 🙂 The Eastern Pondhawk (male) is another of my favorite dragonflies…I know it is beginning to look like all the dragonflies are my favorites…but I really like the blues and greens on this dragon. The fact that it often perches nicely for photos does not hurt either. Sony Rx10iv at 494mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications…but I overrode the settings using Program Shift for greater depth of field to ensure both dragons were in focus. ISO 100 @ f14 @ 1/100th. Processed in Polarr and Apple Photos.
Spangled Skimmer, another FOY
Spangled Skimmer, Day Brook Pond, Kennebunk Plains Nature Conservancy, Kennebunk, Maine, USA — Another of my favorite dragonflies…the Spangled Skimmer is not so striking perched, kind of plain in fact, but in flight with those white spots flashing the sun, it is a wonderful thing to watch! I am always happy to find my first of the year. Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr and Apple Photos.
Calico Pennant
Calico Pennant, Day Brook Pond, Kennebunk Plains Nature Conservancy, Kennebunk, Maine, USA. — One of my favorite dragonflies. Comes early, stays late…and is beautiful in all summer. This is my first of year Calico for 2020. Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr and Apple Photos. And still…it should be called the Valentine Pennant!
Wild Iris
The Wild Iris, also called the Blue Flag Iris, is one of the most beautiful and widespread wildflowers of late spring / early summer in North America. I wait patiently for this reliable clump, a the edge of a pond along one of our local roads, to bloom each year. Generally I can catch them on at least one sunny day, but this year they were in full bloom on the first of day of several days of overcast and rain. Still beautiful. I used Program Shift to select f16 for this shot…to increase depth of field, and selectively focused on the closest Iris. Though I say that, I was also using HDR mode to help keep detail in the cloudy sky…so, while the recorded aperture is indeed f16, at a shutter speed of 1/20th of a second (ISO 100 and an exposure bias of -1 (again for detail in the clouds)…some of the individual exposures for the HDR will have varied one or more of those settings. At any rate, I was pleased with the results. I try to avoid anything under f5.6 in general shooting, as the Sony lens is sharpest near wide open, but this, I think, worked. Processed in Polarr and Apple Photos.