Sweet Victory
While photographing the sun rising over Patoka Lake, I heard the sound of birds rustling in the trees above. As I stepped away to get a better angle, I noted this little guy scurrying around the tree jumping frantically from limb to limb. His action/reaction made me think that on this morning, breakfast may be a little more difficult to find.
Just as I drew down on this perfectly preened, not a feather out of place little guy with my lens to get a picture, he did the unthinkable…he jumped head first into a large Tent caterpillar colony! I stood and shivered as the web stretched side to side much like a mothers stomach as the baby rolls in the final days of pregnancy. It wasn’t the worms that bothered me…it was the webs full of caterpillar droppings that freaked me out to my core.
It was then that one of my favorite verses from one of my favorite songs sung as a child in church popped into my head…translating quickly to my tongue as I said aloud the fourth verse to Andy Williams’s song “The Impossible Dream.”
“To fight for the right
without question or pause,
to be willing to march
into hell for a heavenly cause.”
Now I know it was hunger and not a “Heavenly cause,” but in my opinion this little guy jumped into hell without pause. When he emerged some time later, looking like hell but holding victory high in the air, I had to smile and capture the moment. A hard fought victory and breakfast for him, happiness in finding out that something eats Tent caterpillars for me.
Sweet Victory
While photographing the sun rising over Patoka Lake, I heard the sound of birds rustling in the trees above. As I stepped away to get a better angle, I noted this little guy scurrying around the tree jumping frantically from limb to limb. His action/reaction made me think that on this morning, breakfast may be a little more difficult to find.
Just as I drew down on this perfectly preened, not a feather out of place little guy with my lens to get a picture, he did the unthinkable…he jumped head first into a large Tent caterpillar colony! I stood and shivered as the web stretched side to side much like a mothers stomach as the baby rolls in the final days of pregnancy. It wasn’t the worms that bothered me…it was the webs full of caterpillar droppings that freaked me out to my core.
It was then that one of my favorite verses from one of my favorite songs sung as a child in church popped into my head…translating quickly to my tongue as I said aloud the fourth verse to Andy Williams’s song “The Impossible Dream.”
“To fight for the right
without question or pause,
to be willing to march
into hell for a heavenly cause.”
Now I know it was hunger and not a “Heavenly cause,” but in my opinion this little guy jumped into hell without pause. When he emerged some time later, looking like hell but holding victory high in the air, I had to smile and capture the moment. A hard fought victory and breakfast for him, happiness in finding out that something eats Tent caterpillars for me.