Maple Flower, the back yard, Kennebunk Maine

We are having a strange spring…but then I am beginning to believe that strange is the normal for southern Maine. No two springs in the two decades I have lived here have been remotely the same. This year the Maple Flowers are at lest 2 weeks early…but when, on the strength of that, I checked for Trout Lily in the forest, it was barely sprouting leaves above the leaf litter. Last year I photographed both Maple flowers and Trout Lily on the same day around the first of May. Go figure.

The lowest Maple Flowers in our back yard are just far enough above my head so I need a strong telephoto to reach them, and yet too close for my Nikon P900’s minimum focus of 16.5 feet…so I got out the P610 for this shot (and many others 🙂 This is at about 2000mm equivalent field of view, using the P610’s full 1440mm optical and bit of Perfect Image digital zoom. 1/250th @ ISO 100 @ f6.5. Processed in Lightroom.