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I had not intended to post flowers from my garden today but then falgarra2002 sent an orchid from her office which I had in my garden so I just got to post this up. Falgarra, this is dedicated to you for making me work :)
Check out Flowres #169 for how long it last and examples of my other long-lasting orchids.
I haven't walked the lower trail at Taughannock in years. It was so worth it. A warm rain on the way back was way nicer than the snow we've been getting for months.
Please also visit:
The final Leyland Leopard to operate in normal service for Tees & District was Plaxton bodied 1112 (LGR412T), which is seen in Saltburn very much at the end of its life on 30/08/95. It was the only one to receive the Tees diagonal livery.
Jacaranda mimosifolia
Sub-tropical tree with long-lasting pale indigo flowers
Jacaranda mimosifolia is a sub-tropical tree native to south-central South America that has been widely planted elsewhere because of its attractive and long-lasting violet-colored flowers. It is also known as the jacaranda, blue jacaranda, black poui, Nupur or fern tree. Older sources call it J. acutifolia, but it is nowadays more usually classified as J. mimosifolia. In scientific usage, the name "jacaranda" refers to the genus Jacaranda, which has many other members, but in horticultural and everyday usage, it nearly always means the blue jacaranda.
Quick Facts Conservation status, Scientific classification ...
In its native range in the wild, J. mimosifolia is listed as Vulnerable by the IUCN.[1]
Description
The tree grows to a height of up to 20 m (66 ft).[4] Its bark is thin and gray-brown, smooth when the tree is young but eventually becoming finely scaly. The twigs are slender and slightly zigzag; they are a light reddish-brown. The flowers are up to 5 cm (2 in) long, and are grouped in 30 cm (12 in) panicles. They appear in spring and early summer, and last for up to two months. They are followed by woody seed pods, about 5 cm (2 in) in diameter, which contain numerous flat, winged seeds. The blue jacaranda is cultivated for the sake of its large compound leaves, even in areas where it rarely blooms. The leaves are up to 45 cm (18 in) long and bi-pinnately compound, with leaflets little more than 1 cm (0.4 in) long. There is a white form available from nurseries.
The unusually shaped, tough pods, which are 5 to 8 cm (2 to 3 in) across, are often gathered, cleaned and used to decorate Christmas trees and dried arrangements.
J. mimosifolia fruits
J. mimosifolia fruits
A jacaranda seed pod
A jacaranda seed pod
Early jacaranda sprout
Early jacaranda sprout
Tree in flower in Whakatāne, New Zealand
Tree in flower in Whakatāne, New Zealand
Jacaranda trees in Bhutan
Jacaranda trees in Bhutan
Wood
Wood
The wood is pale grey to whitish, straight-grained, relatively soft and knot-free. It dries without difficulty and is often used in its green or wet state for turnery and bowl carving.
Habitat and range
Jacaranda mimosifolia is native to southern Brazil, Paraguay, northern Argentina (Salta, Jujuy, Catamarca and Misiones provinces) and southern Bolivia. It is found in the Dry Chaco and flooded savannas, and in the Southern Andean Yungas of the eastern Andean piedmont and inter-Andean valleys, up to 2600 meters elevation. In its native range the tree is threatened by uncontrolled logging and clearing of land for agriculture, and is assessed as Vulnerable in the IUCN Red List.[1]
The jacaranda is regarded as an invasive species in parts of South Africa and Queensland, Australia, where it can out-compete native species.[5]
Taxonomy
The taxonomic status of the blue jacaranda is unsettled. ITIS regards the older name, J. acutifolia, as a synonym for J. mimosifolia. However, some modern taxonomists maintain the distinction between these two species, regarding them as geographically distinct: J. acutifolia is endemic to Peru, while J. mimosifolia is native to Bolivia and Argentina. If this distinction is made, cultivated forms should be treated as J. mimosifolia, since they are believed to derive from Argentine stock. Other synonyms for the blue jacaranda are J. chelonia and J. ovalifolia. The blue jacaranda belongs to the section Monolobos of the genus Jacaranda.
Ornamental use
The blue jacaranda has been cultivated in almost every part of the world where there is no risk of frost; established trees, however, tolerate brief spells of temperatures down to around −7 °C (19 °F).[6] Even when young trees are damaged by a hard frost and suffer dieback, they will often rebound from the roots and grow in a shrub-like, multi-stemmed form.[6] However, flowering and growth will be stunted if the jacaranda is grown directly on the California coast, where a lack of heat combined with cool ocean winds discourages flowering.[6]
This plant has won the Royal Horticultural Society's Award of Garden Merit.[7]
It has been well over a year since the COVID-19 global pandemic, but we didn't expect that 2020 would have a lasting impact for commercial aviation.
Even prior to the pandemic, the number of Boeing 747s in commercial passenger service was dwindling; British Airways had already carried out its last D-check on its Boeing 747-400 prior to their final retirement in 2024.
Just before the pandemic, British Airways had finished the refurbishment programme of the last remaining Mid-J Boeing 747-400s that would have lasted up to 2024... Coincidentally, the last refurbished Boeing 747-400s were the Negus & Negus and Landor heritage jets to mark the carrier's centenary.
For the best part of 2019, finding the 4 retro-jets were a struggle... Whilst the BOAC, BEA and Negus & Negus were spotted, Landor had proved much difficult to find, annoyingly when visiting Heathrow it was always parked up near the maintenance hangars surrounding Hatton Cross.
Whilst I have captured G-BNLY in the Chatham Dockyard livery, it was finding the Landor livery in service much more difficult.
During the pandemic, there were slithers of hope that there could be a return to Boeing 747 operation following their grounding due to a downturn in traffic. But hopes were dashed when British Airways formerly announced their early retirement on 16th July 2020, the last to leave Heathrow taking place on 8th October 2020 and the last ever flight on 11th December 2020.
Just like Concorde, British Airways Boeing 747 retirement was a watershed moment as the jumbo formed the back-bone to long-haul traffic for the best part of nearly 5 decades.
Following their retirement, the question was whether any of the Boeing 747s would be preserved... G-CIVB, CIVW and G-BYGC were quickly selected heading to Kemble, Dunsfold and RAF St. Athan respectively. But it was G-BNLY's preservation that was prolonged.
Prior to retirement, G-BNLY had received a cabin refurbishment on 24th November 2019 with new Panasonic eX3 in-flight entertainment systems to replace the ageing Rockwell Collins system; further to this, World Traveller and World Traveller Plus had been reupholstered. G-BNLY would have been one of the last Boeing 747-400s earmarked for retirement.
Bravo November Lima Yankee was one of 57 Boeing 747-400s that British Airways had operated throughout its lifetime, delivered new to the flag-carrier on 10th February 1993 and she was powered by 4 Rolls-Royce RB211-524H engines. She had not received the World Tail colour scheme, delivered new in BA's Landor colour scheme and carried the name City of Swansea until June 2002 where she gained BA's standard Chatham Dockyard Union Jack livery. She was one of the last remaining Boeing 747-400's to receive New First interiors, having been retrofitted with the cabin in March 2015. G-BNLY was supposed to have been withdrawn in November 2016, but was prolonged beyond to 2019 following the Boeing 787 fleet suffering from issues with their Rolls-Royce Trent 1000 engines. Her life was further extended until March 2020 after being repainted back into Landor colours and regaining the City of Swansea name it lost in June 2002, and receiving refurbishment which would have lasted until 2023.
With the pandemic, G-BNLY was placed into short-term storage on 23rd March 2020 at London Heathrow, until being ferried to Bournemouth-Hurn on 31st March 2020 before finally heading to Cardiff on 15th June 2020. After being saved for preservation following a huge petition, it was ferried from Cardiff to Dunsfold Aerodrome (home of BBC's Top Gear) on 5th December 2020 and was opened up to the general public on two separate occasions as part of the Landor Experience.
Happy retirement G-BNLY.
Boeing 747-436 G-BNLY 'City of Swansea' enjoys retirement life at Dunsfold Aerodrome during the Landor Experience event.
Explore. April 14, 2009.
~ Hodding Carter
My precious Cara
Monochrome
Baton Rouge, Louisiana
Copyright ©G.DelaCruzPhotography. All Rights Reserved.
Interestingness: #110.
The approximately last time the lights turn on for a canoeing session this spring in the kanupark markleeberg....
After a real great session canoeing on these rapids the sunset was just huge...
so stoked on that
there were just 5 min to capture the emptying channel with floodlights turned on just right enough to take 3 shots ... and stick them together to a pano:)
"You might want to take a look out the window..."
So coaxed my wife as she nudged me awake, my sleep-addled photographer's brain kicking in as I jumped with a start and rose to sweep a curtain aside. Not much can get me out of bed that quickly early in the morning - could it be, could it be? It was! Fog!
Twenty minutes later an unshaven and bleary-eyed (but excited!) yours truly was heading out in search of opportunity, cursing the wildly innacurate weather report I'd watched the night before and my subsequent lack of preparation. It was still a good half hour before sunrise, and thick pearlescent shrouds of grey vapour were clinging to the streetlights as if threatening to engulf them. As I drove past the local river, ashen mist blankets hung inches from the dewy banks, and everything had that eerie quality that only comes with such conditions - a seeming muffled reality.
This was one of my first images of the day in a local park. I'd decided to eschew the beaches and instead concentrate on what was closest to home initially, misty conditions rarely last at this time of year and are prone to burn off almost as quickly as they occur. Snapping away it was liberating too for once to shoot without the usual encumbrance of my heavy ND filters, typically I take a very limited number of shots over a given time but I was determined to bag something worthwhile and the day warranted a change of tactic. Time felt of the essence and each exposure was radically short compared to my usual LE work, filling my CF card at a rate of knots. Oddly, it soon became clear (no pun intended) that the sun had no intention of casting aside the cloying atmosphere anytime soon. Having explored all the possibilities I wanted too at this location, I raced on to a second nearby park and completed my mission there. By this time it was almost 10am, and still no change in the weather. A chance then to head on to the coast and see what awaited me - racking my brains to remember some of those possibilities I had shelved to memory for just such an occasion.
In retrospect, I have realised that in fact I forgot two key shots from the ones I'd mentally stored previously. They will have to await another day, but how refreshing it was to think I'd bagged several possibilities in a short space of time - making up for recent day-long excursions when I'd returned empty handed. All in all I'm almost embarrased to say I'd shot over 160 exposures by the time the mist eventually cleared at noon while I was in Torquay, but certainly my hit rate felt pretty good and I had no qualms as I headed home. Compare this with the 10 or so I might usually make over such a timeframe...
It wasn't until later that a work colleague told me he'd been a little further along the coast throughout, where the fog had remained unabated for the entire day. For once I hardly cared!
Douglas DC-3, C-47, Dakota, a flying legend.
The Douglas DC-3 is a propeller-driven airliner which had a lasting effect on the airline industry in the 1930s/1940s and World War II. It was developed as a larger, improved 14-bed sleeper version of the Douglas DC-2. It is a low-wing metal monoplane with conventional landing gear, powered by two radial piston engines of 1,000–1,200 hp (750–890 kW). (Although most DC-3s flying today use Pratt & Whitney R-1830 Twin Wasp engines, many DC-3s built for civil service originally had the Wright R-1820 Cyclone. The DC-3 has a cruise speed of 207 mph (333 km/h), a capacity of 21 to 32 passengers or 6,000 lbs (2,700 kg) of cargo, and a range of 1,500 mi (2,400 km), and can operate from short runways.
From Wikipedia, the free encylopedia
About the model:
Following my Catalina model it came natural to build my DC-3 to the same scale, 1:72.
The model is my LEGO representation of the last airworthy DC-3 / C-47 in Denmark, belonging to the non-profit association DC-3 Vennerne (Danish Dakota Friends).
It wasn't particular difficult to build, but still had a few challenges, and it follows many of the same techniques used for my other models, e.g. the wing dihedral is made in the same way as my N.A.Harvard, with a basic hinge on top of the wing-panel, and a finger hinge on the lower side, that isn't fully interlocked and prevent the outer wing-panels from ”falling” down. For the leading edge de-icer panels, the new curved 1x1 brick came in very handy. The most difficult part was getting the nose-profile right, but I'm very happy how it came out!
As always, comments and critisism are more than welcome!
Douglas DC-3, C-47, Dakota, a flying legend.
The Douglas DC-3 is a propeller-driven airliner which had a lasting effect on the airline industry in the 1930s/1940s and World War II. It was developed as a larger, improved 14-bed sleeper version of the Douglas DC-2. It is a low-wing metal monoplane with conventional landing gear, powered by two radial piston engines of 1,000–1,200 hp (750–890 kW). (Although most DC-3s flying today use Pratt & Whitney R-1830 Twin Wasp engines, many DC-3s built for civil service originally had the Wright R-1820 Cyclone. The DC-3 has a cruise speed of 207 mph (333 km/h), a capacity of 21 to 32 passengers or 6,000 lbs (2,700 kg) of cargo, and a range of 1,500 mi (2,400 km), and can operate from short runways.
From Wikipedia, the free encylopedia
About the model:
Following my Catalina model it came natural to build my DC-3 to the same scale, 1:72.
The model is my LEGO representation of the last airworthy DC-3 / C-47 in Denmark, belonging to the non-profit association DC-3 Vennerne (Danish Dakota Friends).
It wasn't particular difficult to build, but still had a few challenges, and it follows many of the same techniques used for my other models, e.g. the wing dihedral is made in the same way as my N.A.Harvard, with a basic hinge on top of the wing-panel, and a finger hinge on the lower side, that isn't fully interlocked and prevent the outer wing-panels from ”falling” down. For the leading edge de-icer panels, the new curved 1x1 brick came in very handy. The most difficult part was getting the nose-profile right, but I'm very happy how it came out!
As always, comments and critisism are more than welcome!
Made a new shirt and Thalia snatched it up. I'm pretty happy with it but there are some things I would change. Anyway I'm happy to be out of school and back to sewing!
NY Harbor, Lady Liberty. View On Black
I ride the Staten Island Ferry every day. This was the first time I was able to take a picture of the Statue since 911. I had attended a memorial the night before and was still reflecting on that. Was late going home, so it is rare when I catch the sunset. I felt such peace and a calmness come over me when I took this shot. It took my breath away
The humpback whale (Megaptera novaeangliae) is a species of baleen whale. One of the larger rorqual species, adults range in length from 12–16 metres (39–52 ft) and weigh approximately 36,000 kilograms (79,000 lb). The humpback has a distinctive body shape, with unusually long pectoral fins and a knobbly head. An acrobatic animal known for breaching and slapping the water with its tail and pectorals, it is popular with whale watchers off the coasts of Australasia and the Americas. Males produce a complex song lasting 10 to 20 minutes, which they repeat for hours at a time. Its purpose is not clear, though it may have a role in mating.
Found in oceans and seas around the world, humpback whales typically migrate up to 25,000 kilometres (16,000 mi) each year. Humpbacks feed only in summer, in polar waters, and migrate to tropical or subtropical waters to breed and give birth in the winter. During the winter, humpbacks fast and live off their fat reserves. Their diet consists mostly of krill and small fish. Humpbacks have a diverse repertoire of feeding methods, including the bubble net feeding technique.
Like other large whales, the humpback was and is a target for the whaling industry. Once hunted to the brink of extinction, its population fell by an estimated 90% before a moratorium was introduced in 1966. While stocks have since partially recovered, entanglement in fishing gear, collisions with ships, and noise pollution continue to impact the 80,000 humpbacks worldwide.
while sitting on the shoreline waiting on Big Red, I would keep an eye on this lone red breasted merganser far away from all the other shorebirds. She came closer and closer and I couldn't believe my luck when she decided to waddle out of the water and preen herself quite close to me. She was so unassuming, duck dainty and duck darling... When all of her feathers were in order, she waddled out and paddled away leaving a lasting impression!
The Flowers still keep going, Although it's getting cooler in the UK now. We still have some great plants out and about. Still butterfly's too.
Happy weekend all.
| Voiceb[©]x | Copyright Adam Voice |
Ummm ... yes, this is a couple -- though it's hard to tell how serious and long-lasting the relationship is. Indeed, it could just be a casual friendship ... who am I to judge?
The young woman seems wrapped up in the display shown on her smartphone; but the young man has spotted me taking his photo, and does not seem to be very happy about it.
I can't help wondering if I would see the same couple here a week from now, a month from now, or a year from now ...
********************************
I am fascinated by the couples I see out on the street, and have decided that I should devote a Flickr album to show you some of the examples I’ve seen. It’s only been the past couple of days that I’ve decided to focus on couples specifically, so it will be a month before I feel that I can review and edit the new photos I’ve taken, without being too subjective about what I like and dislike. In the meantime, I’ll go through the photos I’ve already taken—which extends back over 45 years—to see which couple-related photos look worthy of bringing to your attention.
Why am do I find couples so interesting? The simple answer is: public displays of affection. I’m a sucker for situations where I see a couple embracing, hugging or kissing; and I can’t help smiling even when I see an ordinary couple walking down the street, holding hands. Sometimes it’s even more subtle: it may be only the body language that shows you something special is going on. Indeed, sometimes I have to be very careful: the mere fact that two people are walking side-by-side on a crowded street does not necessarily mean that they even know each other, let alone that they are a formal couple. But you can usually tell by watching for a few seconds: even if they are not holding hands, a “real" couple will tend to adopt a common stride, and they’ll move their legs and feet in tandem. Sooner or later, one of them will look at the other; or one of them will reach across and grab his/her partner’s hand.
Sometimes it’s not the affection that catches my interest, but the individuals themselves. If it’s two beautiful people, I can’t stop help staring in amazement and appreciation. And if it’s two ugly people, I often think to myself, “Thank goodness the two of you found each other!” Sometimes one of them is beautiful, and the other one is not; and then I find myself thinking, “What on earth is he doing with her?” Or, obviously, the converse: “What on earth is she doing with him?” Sometimes the situation does not cry out, “These two don’t belong together,” but merely, “Who on earth would have predicted that these two would have found each other? I wonder how that ever happened?”
Of course, the very term “couple” can be a little tricky these days — especially in a large, multicultural city like New York. Most of the couples that I see are old-fashioned traditional “straight” couples; but more and more of the couples are gay pairs, of one persuasion or another. I’m delighted that the gay couples look happy and unembarrassed; and I’m even happier that nobody (at least here in NYC) pays any attention to them.
Indeed, my definition of “couples” is broader and more general than just two adults who have some kind of relationship. I’m equally interested in couples that consist of parent and child, or brother and sister, or even two friends who get along well but who may not have any romantic association at all. And it doesn’t have to be a twosome: three or four close friends, or a parent with several children, or any other reasonable combination, is still something I’m likely to notice and photograph.
So I’ll start this album by adding any existing couples that I’ve already photographed in the past (and who have thus appeared in one or more other Flickr albums of mine), and will add some notes to indicate why I think they are an “interesting” couple. That should keep me busy for a while, and within a few weeks, I’ll start adding “new” couples that I’ve seen on the street, and that I’ve decided photograph primarily they are couples.
If you see any of my other Flickr photos that you think should be included here, please let me know.
*********************************
As I wrote in another Flickr set a few years ago, you can be reasonably sure that there will be lots of interesting people to photograph in Central Park if you happen to visit when on a weekend when the weather is nice. My typical plan, on such photo expeditions, is to walk through and around several different parts of the park -- in order to see different groups of people, and also to take advantage of different scenes and backdrops. But it means that I don't spend very much time in any one place, and most of my shots end up being "ad hoc" in nature, with almost no planning, preparation, framing, or composition.
On this particular weekend in mid-April, I decided to restrict my wandering to just one area -- the "Great Lawn" that's more-or-less in the center of the north-south expanse of the park. I walked around the sidewalk perimeter of the large grassy area, starting at the north end (because I had entered the park at 86th Street), heading down to the south end by the Delacorte Theater and the Belvedere Castle, and then back north again to my starting point. Actually, I went around the same loop two or three times before I got bored and went home ...
I had a 24-200mm zoom lens on my Sony RX-10 camera while I was walking, and while that made it relatively easy to capture some interesting scenes of people out in the middle of the lawn, as well as people just a couple feet away from me. Normally, I would just shrug and mutter to myself, "Well, that's the way it goes". For most of the walk,I set the lens to its maximum wide-angle setting, and take advantage of quick, unfocused, wide-angle "hip shots" whenever there was something interesting nearby that I had to shoot quickly.
When I got home, I decided to take a quick look at the Wikipedia article about the Great Lawn, to see if there was anything special that I needed to mention in these notes. I didn't expect to find much, because -- as far as I knew -- it had always been part of Central Park, and had always been the same. To my surprise, I found that that was definitely not not the case. Indeed, today's Great Lawn is situated on a flat area that was occupied by the 35-acre "Lower Reservoir" that was constructed in 1842 to supply water to the residents of the city. After the Croton-Catskill reservoir system was completed, the Lower Reservoir became redundant -- but political battles ensued for several decades before the city finally settled on a plan for an oval lawn.
That plan basically fell apart because of the Depression, and the open area was filled with a "Hooverville" of improvised shacks for quite some time. Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia finally brought in the legendary Robert Moses (the visionary force behind so many other parks around New York City and the rest of the state) to implement the plan -- and it was essentially finished in 1934.
And there's more to the history, too, but I'll let you read that on your own if you're interested. (You might be interested to know, for example, that in 1995, Pope John Paul II held an open-air mass for 125,000 on the Great Lawn. Yes, it is that big!)
In any case, I finished my third loop around the park, went home and uploaded several hundred photos, which I've winnowed down to the ones you'll find in this set...
Time for a logo revamp! This is a very simple contest lasting 2 weeks. Design a brick-built logo for the LCN. :)
Rules: Design a brick built logo for the LCN. Must be made from Legos. No clones or other non-lego sources. It would be wise to include the lettering... but you don't have to. No size restriction, just remember you are judged on the resulting logo, and not the epicness of the build. Everyone is limited to 2 entries per person.
Prizes: There is only a first place. You will get two things. First and most obviously your logo will be used as the LCN Icon until a distant future. Second, you will receive this small mosaic 1st place Trophy from us complete with an ‘LCN Contest Victor’ brick.
Judges: Siercon and Coral, and three professional graphic designers. Steph and I will narrow the selection down to a final grid and provide that to the designers. They will then use that grid of slightly oversized logos to chose a final 5. These final 5 will be chosen based on a more in depth look from all 5 of us.
Deadline: Sept 30th, 2012. This contest is easy, fun and therefore short.
Hints and Tips: We advise a mosaic. Non-mosaics won’t be disqualified, just realize and play around with that which provides for a good logo. As three of our judges are not necessarily Lego experts, but professional logo designers 'NPU' is not the most important thing to consider. Color, balance, weight, shape, complexity, clarity, eye drawing, memorable, and message are all aspects that should be given attention. Here in the first comment are examples of excellent brick-built logos.
If you do intend to build a non-mosaic logo, remember that the L C N lettering should probably be inherent in your design, as LCN has become a recognized acronym, and the logo would become the symbol for the group.
Ask all questions here or over at the LCN. Please also place your entries in the Entry Thread.
This contest is meant to be fun and relaxed! :D
Happy Building!
Starting today (Sat 10th Jan 2026) and lasting for 3 consecutive weekends, East Grinstead was/will be awash with rail replacement buses and coaches operating services to Three Bridges and to Gatwick, both at 5 minute frequencies.
For the first half of each route, both services travel along the A264 through Felbridge, which is where we based ourselves for this extravaganza. This meant a whopping 48 buses per hour came past our cameras in what became a very easy game of 'spot the bus'!
In our morning session we saw 58 different buses and coaches from 30 different operators including a Borismaster advert bus, a newly launched South East Bus Hire Omnilink, a Wheelers bus in the new fleet livery, a Tomorrows Travel Irizar i6, and a Spirit of Sussex Enviro400 MMC. Oh, and Benjamin came past too.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humpback_whale
The humpback whale (Megaptera novaeangliae) is a species of baleen whale. One of the larger rorqual species, adults range in length from 12–16 metres (39–52 ft) and weigh approximately 36,000 kilograms (79,000 lb). The humpback has a distinctive body shape, with unusually long pectoral fins and a knobbly head. An acrobatic animal known for breaching and slapping the water with its tail and pectorals, it is popular with whale watchers off Australia, New Zealand, South America, Canada, and the United States.
Males produce a complex song lasting 10 to 20 minutes, which they repeat for hours at a time. Its purpose is not clear, though it may have a role in mating.
Found in oceans and seas around the world, humpback whales typically migrate up to 25,000 kilometres (16,000 mi) each year. Humpbacks feed only in summer, in polar waters, and migrate to tropical or subtropical waters to breed and give birth in the winter. During the winter, humpbacks fast and live off their fat reserves. Their diet consists mostly of krill and small fish. Humpbacks have a diverse repertoire of feeding methods, including the bubble net feeding technique.
Like other large whales, the humpback was and is a target for the whaling industry. Once hunted to the brink of extinction, its population fell by an estimated 90% before a moratorium was introduced in 1966. While stocks have since partially recovered, entanglement in fishing gear, collisions with ships, and noise pollution continue to impact the 80,000 humpbacks worldwide.
Taxonomy
Humpback whales are rorquals (family Balaenopteridae), a family that includes the blue whale, the fin whale, the Bryde's whale, the sei whale and the minke whale. The rorquals are believed to have diverged from the other families of the suborder Mysticeti as long ago as the middle Miocene.[3] However, it is not known when the members of these families diverged from each other.
Though clearly related to the giant whales of the genus Balaenoptera, the humpback has been the sole member of its genus since Gray's work in 1846. More recently, though, DNA sequencing analysis has indicated the humpback is more closely related to certain rorquals, particularly the fin whale (Balaenoptera physalus), and possibly to the gray whale (Eschrichtius robustus), than it is to rorquals such as the minke whales.[4][5] If further research confirms these relationships, it will be necessary to reclassify the rorquals.
The humpback whale was first identified as baleine de la Nouvelle Angleterre by Mathurin Jacques Brisson in his Regnum Animale of 1756. In 1781, Georg Heinrich Borowski described the species, converting Brisson's name to its Latin equivalent, Balaena novaeangliae. In 1804, Lacépède shifted the humpback from the Balaenidae family, renaming it Balaenoptera jubartes. In 1846, John Edward Gray created the genus Megaptera, classifying the humpback as Megaptera longipinna, but in 1932, Remington Kellogg reverted the species names to use Borowski's novaeangliae.[6] The common name is derived from the curving of their backs when diving. The generic name Megaptera from the Greek mega-/μεγα- "giant" and ptera/πτερα "wing",[7] refers to their large front flippers. The specific name means "New Englander" and was probably given by Brisson due the regular sightings of humpbacks off the coast of New England.
Description
A humpback whale can easily be identified by its stocky body with an obvious hump and black dorsal coloring. The head and lower jaw are covered with knobs called tubercles, which are hair follicles, and are characteristic of the species. The fluked tail, which it lifts above the surface in some dive sequences, has wavy trailing edges.[8] The four global populations, all under study, are: North Pacific, Atlantic, and Southern Ocean humpbacks, which have distinct populations which complete a migratory round-trip each year, and the Indian Ocean population, which does not migrate, prevented by that ocean's northern coastline.
The long black and white tail fin, which can be up to a third of body length, and the pectoral fins have unique patterns, which make individual whales identifiable.[9][10] Several hypotheses attempt to explain the humpback's pectoral fins, which are proportionally the longest fins of any cetacean. The two most enduring mention the higher maneuverability afforded by long fins, and the usefulness of the increased surface area for temperature control when migrating between warm and cold climates.
Humpbacks have 270 to 400 darkly coloured baleen plates on each side of their mouths.[11] The plates measure from a mere 18 inches (46 cm) in the front to approximately 3 feet (0.91 m) long in the back, behind the hinge. Ventral grooves run from the lower jaw to the umbilicus about halfway along the underside of the whale. These grooves are less numerous (usually 14–22) than in other rorquals but are fairly wide.[11]
The stubby dorsal fin is visible soon after the blow when the whale surfaces, but disappears by the time the flukes emerge. Humpbacks have a 3 metres (9.8 ft), heart-shaped to bushy blow, or exhalation of water through the blowholes. Because humpback whales breathe voluntarily, the whales possibly shut off only half of their brains when sleeping.[12] Early whalers also noted blows from humpback adults to be 10–20 feet (3.0–6.1 m) high.
Newborn calves are roughly the length of their mother's head. At birth, calves measure 20 feet (6.1 m) at 2 short tons (1.8 t) The mother, by comparison, is about 50 feet (15 m). They nurse for approximately six months, then mix nursing and independent feeding for possibly six months more. Humpback milk is 50% fat and pink in color.
Females reach sexual maturity at the age of five, achieving full adult size a little later. Males reach sexual maturity at approximately seven years of age. Humpback whale lifespans range from 45–100 years.[13] Fully grown, the males average 13–14 m (43–46 ft). Females are slightly larger at 15–16 m (49–52 ft); the largest recorded specimen was 19 metres (62 ft) long and had pectoral fins measuring 6 metres (20 ft) each.[14] Body mass typically is in the range of 25–30 metric tons (28–33 short tons), with large specimens weighing over 40 metric tons (44 short tons).[15] The female has a hemispherical lobe about 15 centimetres (5.9 in) in diameter in its genital region. This visually distinguishes males and females.[11] The male's penis usually remains hidden in the genital slit.
Identifying individuals
The varying patterns on the tail flukes are sufficient to identify individuals. A study using data from 1973 to 1998 on whales in the North Atlantic gave researchers detailed information on gestation times, growth rates, and calving periods, as well as allowing more accurate population predictions by simulating the mark-release-recapture technique (Katona and Beard 1982). A photographic catalogue of all known North Atlantic whales was developed over this period and is currently maintained by College of the Atlantic.[16] Similar photographic identification projects have begun in the North Pacific by Structure of Populations, Levels of Abundance and Status of Humpbacks, and around the world.
Life history
Social structure
The humpback social structure is loose-knit. Typically, individuals live alone or in small, transient groups that disband after a few hours. These whales are not excessively social in most cases. Groups may stay together a little longer in summer to forage and feed cooperatively. Longer-term relationships between pairs or small groups, lasting months or even years, have rarely been observed. Some females possibly retain bonds created via cooperative feeding for a lifetime. The humpback's range overlaps considerably with other whale and dolphin species—for instance, the minke whale. However, humpbacks rarely interact socially with them, though one individual was observed playing with a bottlenose dolphin in Hawaiian waters.[17]
Courtship and reproduction
Courtship rituals take place during the winter months, following migration toward the equator from summer feeding grounds closer to the poles. Competition is usually fierce, and unrelated males, dubbed escorts by researcher Louis Herman, frequently trail females, as well as mother-calf dyads. Male gather into "competitive groups" and fight for females.[18] Group size ebbs and flows as unsuccessful males retreat and others arrive to try their luck. Behaviors include breaching, spyhopping, lob-tailing, tail-slapping, fin-slapping, peduncle throws, charging and parrying. Whale songs are assumed to have an important role in mate selection; however, they may also be used between males to establish dominance.[19]
Females typically breed every two or three years. The gestation period is 11.5 months, yet some individuals have been known to breed in two consecutive years. The peak months for birth are January, February, July, and August, with usually a one- to two–year period between humpback births. They can live up to 48 years. Recent research on humpback mitochondrial DNA reveals groups living in proximity to each other may represent distinct breeding pools.[20]
Song
Both male and female humpback whales vocalize, but only males produce the long, loud, complex "songs" for which the species is famous. Each song consists of several sounds in a low register, varying in amplitude and frequency, and typically lasting from 10 to 20 minutes.[21] Humpbacks may sing continuously for more than 24 hours. Cetaceans have no vocal cords, so whales generate their songs by forcing air through their massive nasal cavities.
Whales within a large area sing the same song. All North Atlantic humpbacks sing the same song, and those of the North Pacific sing a different song. Each population's song changes slowly over a period of years without repeating.[21]
Scientists are unsure of the purpose of whale songs. Only males sing, suggesting one purpose is to attract females. However, many of the whales observed to approach a singer are other males, often resulting in conflict. Singing may, therefore, be a challenge to other males.[22] Some scientists have hypothesized the song may serve an echolocative function.[23] During the feeding season, humpbacks make altogether different vocalizations for herding fish into their bubble nets.[24]
Humpback whales have also been found to make a range of other social sounds to communicate, such as "grunts", "groans", "thwops", "snorts" and "barks"
Ecology
Feeding and predation
Humpbacks feed primarily in summer and live off fat reserves during winter.[26] They feed only rarely and opportunistically in their wintering waters. The humpback is an energetic hunter, taking krill and small schooling fish such as Atlantic herring, Atlantic salmon, capelin, and American sand lance, as well as Atlantic mackerel, pollock, and haddock in the North Atlantic.[27][28][29] Krill and copepods have been recorded as prey species in Australian and Antarctic waters.[30] Humpbacks hunt by direct attack or by stunning prey by hitting the water with pectoral fins or flukes.
The humpback has the most diverse feeding repertoire of all baleen whales.[31] Its most inventive technique is known as bubble net feeding; a group of whales swims in a shrinking circle blowing bubbles below a school of prey. The shrinking ring of bubbles encircles the school and confines it in an ever-smaller cylinder. This ring can begin at up to 30 metres (98 ft) in diameter and involve the cooperation of a dozen animals. Using a crittercam attached to a whale's back, some whales were found to blow the bubbles, some dive deeper to drive fish toward the surface, and others herd prey into the net by vocalizing.[32] The whales then suddenly swim upward through the "net", mouths agape, swallowing thousands of fish in one gulp. Plated grooves in the whale's mouth allow the creature to easily drain all the water initially taken in.
Given scarring records, killer whales are thought to prey upon juvenile humpbacks, though this has never been witnessed. The result of these attacks is generally nothing more serious than some scarring of the skin, but young calves likely are sometimes killed.[33]
Range and habitat
Humpbacks inhabit all major oceans, in a wide band running from the Antarctic ice edge to 77° N latitude, though not in the eastern Mediterranean or the Baltic Sea.They are migratory, spending summers in cooler, high-latitude waters and mating and calving in tropical and subtropical waters.[21] An exception to this rule is a population in the Arabian Sea, which remains in these tropical waters year-round.[21] Annual migrations of up to 25,000 kilometres (16,000 mi) are typical, making it one of the mammals' best-traveled species.
A large population spreads across the Hawaiian Islands every winter, ranging from the island of Hawaii in the south to Kure Atoll in the north.[34] A 2007 study identified seven individuals wintering off the Pacific coast of Costa Rica as having traveled from the Antarctic—around 8,300 kilometres (5,200 mi). Identified by their unique tail patterns, these animals made the longest documented mammalian migration.[35] In Australia, two main migratory populations have been identified, off the west and east coasts, respectively. These two populations are distinct, with only a few females in each generation crossing between the two groups.[36]
Whaling
Humpback whales were hunted as early as the 18th century, but distinguished by whalers as early as the first decades of the 17th century. By the 19th century, many nations (the United States in particular), were hunting the animal heavily in the Atlantic Ocean, and to a lesser extent in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. The late-19th-century introduction of the explosive harpoon, though, allowed whalers to accelerate their take. This, along with hunting in the Antarctic Ocean beginning in 1904, sharply reduced whale populations. During the 20th century, over 200,000 humpbacks were estimated to have been taken, reducing the global population by over 90%, with North Atlantic populations estimated to have dropped to as low as 700 individuals.[37] In 1946, the International Whaling Commission was founded to oversee the whaling industry. They imposed rules and regulations for hunting whales and set open and closed hunting seasons. To prevent extinction, the International Whaling Commission banned commercial humpback whaling in 1966. By then, the population had been reduced to around 5,000.[38] That ban is still in force.
Prior to commercial whaling, populations could have reached 125,000. North Pacific kills alone are estimated at 28,000.[8] The full toll is much higher. It is now known that the Soviet Union was deliberately under-recording its catches; the Soviet catch was reported at 2,820, whereas the true number is now believed to be over 48,000.[39]
As of 2004, hunting of humpback whales was restricted to a few animals each year off the Caribbean island Bequia in the nation of St. Vincent and the Grenadines.[31] The take is not believed to threaten the local population. Japan had planned to kill 50 humpbacks in the 2007/08 season under its JARPA II research program, starting in November 2007. The announcement sparked global protests.[40] After a visit to Tokyo by the chairman of the IWC, asking the Japanese for their co-operation in sorting out the differences between pro- and antiwhaling nations on the Commission, the Japanese whaling fleet agreed no humpback whales would be caught for the two years it would take for the IWC to reach a formal agreement.[41]
In 2010, the International Whaling Commission authorized Greenland's native population to hunt a few humpback whales for the next three years.[42]
Conservation
The worldwide population is at least 80,000 humpback whales, with 18,000-20,000 in the North Pacific,[43] about 12,000 in the North Atlantic,[44] and over 50,000 in the Southern Hemisphere,[45] down from a prewhaling population of 125,000.[8]
This species is considered "least concern" from a conservation standpoint, as of 2008. This is an improvement from vulnerable in 1996 and endangered as recently as 1988. Most monitored stocks of humpback whales have rebounded well since the end of commercial whaling,[2][46] such as the North Atlantic, where stocks are now believed to be approaching levels similar to those before hunting began. However, the species is considered endangered in some countries, including the United States.[47][48] The United States initiated a status review of the species on August 12, 2009, and is seeking public comment on potential changes to the species listing under the Endangered Species Act.[49] Areas where population data are limited and the species may be at higher risk include the Arabian Sea, the western North Pacific Ocean, the west coast of Africa and parts of Oceania.[2]
Today, individuals are vulnerable to collisions with ships, entanglement in fishing gear, and noise pollution.[2] Like other cetaceans, humpbacks can be injured by excessive noise. In the 19th century, two humpback whales were found dead near sites of repeated oceanic sub-bottom blasting, with traumatic injuries and fractures in the ears.[50]
Once hunted to the brink of extinction, the humpback has made a dramatic comeback in the North Pacific. A 2008 study estimated the humpback population, which hit a low of 1,500 whales before hunting was banned worldwide, has made a comeback to a population of between 18,000 and 20,000.[51] Saxitoxin, a paralytic shellfish poisoning from contaminated mackerel has been implicated in humpback whale deaths.[52]
The United Kingdom, among other countries, designated the humpback as a priority species under the national Biodiversity Action Plan. The sanctuary provided by US National Parks, such as Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve and Cape Hatteras National Seashore, among others, have also become major factors in sustaining populations.[53]
Although much was learned about humpbacks from whaling, migratory patterns and social interactions were not well understood until two studies by R. Chittleborough and W. H. Dawbin in the 1960s.[54] Roger Payne and Scott McVay made further studies of the species in 1971.[55] Their analysis of whale songs led to worldwide media interest and convinced the public that whales were highly intelligent, aiding the antiwhaling advocates.
In August 2008, the IUCN changed humpback's status from Vulnerable to Least Concern, although two subpopulations remain endangered.[56] The United States is considering listing separate humpback populations, so smaller groups, such as North Pacific humpbacks, which are estimated to number 18,000-20,000 animals, might be delisted. This is made difficult by humpback's extraordinary migrations, which can extend the 5,157 miles (8,299 km) from Antarctica to Costa Rica.[20]
Whale-watching
Humpback whales are generally curious about objects in their environments. Some individuals, referred to as "friendlies", approach whale-watching boats closely, often staying under or near the boat for many minutes. Because humpbacks are often easily approachable, curious, easily identifiable as individuals, and display many behaviors, they have become the mainstay of whale-watching tourism in many locations around the world. Hawaii has used the concept of "ecotourism" to use the species without killing them. This whale-watching business brings in a revenue of $20 million per year for the state's economy
lasting for a very short time
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© VanveenJF Photography
Ah use this'ere gun fer huntin' gators and pickin' muh 5 teeth..
Shinbone Valley is in Alabama, where the Lord apparently provided these people with a rusted tin roof. It's a lasting trend in the swamps.
Anyways, this was my second experiment with a real life photographic background in a Second Life photo.
Credit to Soren (www.flickr.com/photos/bricklovinfreakboy/) for the Chub base
Credit to James McKelvie (www.flickr.com/photos/mckitten) for the new jointed arms.
** This is a seven minute video so has to be down-loaded to see the full clip as only 3 minutes are shown on the Flickr front-page.
** I hope you think its worth the effort to view it and read the story..
** It has just come to my notice (10/12/23) that the Download option below and to the right of the media _does not_ allow you to download the full version, only the 3 minutes available here. So, I am going to try and 'fix' this for all videos lasting more than 3 minutes, this is the link to obtain the full version shown here-
www.flickr.tightfitz.com/Video/Landscape_Set_EoY_2015-con...
Another belated end-of-year piece which has been in preparation a number of weeks and would have been ready to go last week were it not for a serious problem which occured with my main work disk. A head crash caused the disk to be rendered useless, and apart from a concerted effort yesterday to move the disk platter from the old drive to an identical new one, this hasn't worked; so far! The loss of the disk has meant re-creating the whole of the text for this video and that to the next single picture from the end of this clip. So... here it is, a sequence of pictures, sort of rail-related, taken from the years crop of visits to various locations and which all have their own significance in the broader scheme of railway photography. The video is in 10 sections portraying some of the places visited to undertake the rail photo-shoots, where possible, and all photographed during 2015. Each section is titled and each of the 80 pictures is shown for 5 seconds, including cross-fade, music, to my taste only maybe, accompanies the video and reflects the peaceful, silvan feel to many of the places, particularly on the Moors. The sections are-
1. The Derwent Valley. The very low levels of water in the Derwent Valley reservoirs, and other around here, see the Stocksbridge section later, has only changed in recent weeks with the advent of some, though not enough, rainfall, to fill up the dams once more. The 1st two pictures show the state of Derwent Water 1st, the low level of water resulting in it then being possible to walk a good way around the sides of the damn on either side. This image across the water is only a short distance from the two towers and wall where the dam-busters did their practice runs during the 2nd world war; the building at either side of the wall holding commemorative exhibits to this event; the 70th anniversary of 'Operation Chastise' when the RAF's 617 Squadron attacked the Möhne, Eder and Sorpe dams in Germany with Barnes Wallis's "bouncing bomb", resulting in flooding of Industrial Valleys below the dams, occured in 2013. The low level of the water can be seen once more in the picture at the head of the reservoir which shows one of the building housing the Dam-Busters material and a line of people sat looking over the scene; the 'staircase' is part of an outfall which brings water collected in the hills above the reservoir.
2. Attercliffe Area. The site of the old Sandersons Steel works features in these shots and now shows that even the outfit which eventually took over the site, a Tyre Recyclers, has now also vacated the space and these pictures show the buildings which were left over from the period when Sandersons were here, are now being demolished, leaving once more a large tract of old Industrial land for which it may well prove hard to find another use. The title picture in the sequence looks west to the bridge which carries the occasional cement and scrap trains out of Cemex and what was Coopers Scrapyard, now EMR, European Metal Recyclers. The cement trains go back to Peak Forest for more grist for the cement process and the scrap as far south and west as Cardiff to convey material onto boats bound for other shores... see-
www.flickr.com/photos/daohaiku/17819302492/
for an EWS move, 66124 coming out of Coopers, but conveying wagons bound for the Peak Forest. in the lower half of that picture is a pice from Adrian Wynn's Flickr site showing a diesel shunter in operation in 2009, hauling wagons over to the junction with the main line at Grimesthorpe Junction, see-
www.flickr.com/photos/37093581@N06/11927840045/
There are still remnants, for the time being, of the old internal railway system see-
www.flickr.com/photos/daohaiku/17634321318/
which shows the lines outside the building to the left of the contractor who is on his phone, of course, and the building can be seen in a 'better state', in the lower two pictures above. Adrian Wynn has an even earlier picture, taken in the 1950s and with his own comparison shot from last year, see-
www.flickr.com/photos/37093581@N06/18651845289/
Moving further south towards the GC's Lincoln line at Woodburn Junction, more derelict land, now track-side and once used as sidings space for the main lines out of Sheffield to the East. As usual on these sites, the area has been used as a dumping ground for all sorts of materials and the buildings in the background are heavily graffiti'd as is some of the, broken, palisade fencing and a wall along the roadside to the site. A Sheffield Supertram comes over Woodburn road bridge, heading for Meadowhall, its passengers almost certainly oblivious to the scene to to the left as they move down hill over the GC's Lincoln line just beyond the long building; this building was in fact the GC's Woodburn Junction C.E.E. (Central Electrical Engineering?) Workshops with lines running into it off the main lines just beyond. This is now all that remains of the facilities and the tracks which once went along here have either been removed or covered over, as far as I can tell from this view. Moving directly west to the South Yorkshire Navigation, Tinsley Canal, and once again the pleasant silvan atmosphere with canal, gas holder and with the old Sheffield Victoria Station's Victoria Hotel poking out above the Northern Rail service heading into Sheffield across the canal; this being a class 158 unit working the 2B41 Huddersfield to Sheffield service. The Gas Tank domed roof also pokes out above the canal-side building on the right; all the UK's Gas Holders are now in their 'twilight years' as a deconstruction and clearance program is in effect; the land being offered back for other uses... The view towards Park Hill flats at centre, the Veolia Recyclers at left, the Capita Building at the end of the Sheffield Parkway to the right of the flats and dominating the scene beyond that, standing out above the River Don on Sussex St. Gasworks Gas Holder. To the railway once more and the Norfolk Bridge where the quiet stillness of the water, multi-colour traction passing along the road and rail passenger stock flying over-head on the main Midland line out of Sheffield all come together to add dynamism to the scene. In the 1st of the last two pictures in this set, a Cross Country Trains class 222, Voyager rattles over heading north-east on the 1E32 Reading to Newcastle 'fast service'. Veolia Recycling is close by and one of their trucks adorns the road where the gates to the old Attercliffe Station stand, locked now of course, the station having closed, due to lack of patronage, in 1995; the fact it was only around 1km from Midland station, can't have helped either. Shortly after the Voyager cleared away, another service, this time in the form of a local passenger DMU, Northern Rail class 158 heads north-east as well on the 1L84, Sheffield to Leeds service whilst 'down below', a '1 Up Crane Access' truck heads towards north Sheffield with the logo/graffiti, 'Imagine Waking Tomorrow and all Music has Disappeared', writ prominent on the large pipe alongside the road over the river... a poignant reminder of what music certainly means to me...
3. Neepsend Area, Gasworks. The area of Neepsend close to the old Power Station, Gasworks and Neepsend Loco Shed. Of the three only the Gasworks remained until very recently and this, like many others, is in the process of demolition. Here the 1st picture looks towards the still extant Farfield Inn and beyond to the Gas Holder which at this date, 19th October, was still in one piece; though in recent weeks, panels have been removed from the roof and it looks to be in the process of demolition. As recently as yesterday, Adrian Wynn has made comment on this and includes a picture, taken in 2007, see-
www.flickr.com/photos/37093581@N06/24043196150/
in addition, Berris Conolly also has an even earlier picture, when two gas holders were present, and both these photographers provide additional information about the local sites, see-
www.flickr.com/photos/bconolly/23683956064/
The Farfield appears to have ridden out the storms and although looking shabby and ripe for demolition, it is still there hiding, in part, the hilly landscape behind where once the 1908s built 'Ski Village' held sway, testament to new things happening in this area, along with others, like the Museum of Pop Music in Sheffield and the 'Earth Centre' at Conisbrough, the y all succumbed in one way or another, the Ski Village suffering fire and then vandal damage which finally say it a complete wreck, the land now deserted. Many other notable buildings abound in the immediate area, the next one has been taken over by 'Wells Richardson, Chartered Accountants and occupies what may be considered a prestigious location, as all the buildings here do in fact, right next to the river and off the main road.The Samuel Osborn building is still in tact and right on the riverside and is part in use as a clothing business; the building itself looking in very fine shape and in a very desirable location; if only!! The tall graffiti'd red brick building, now due for demolition, was the old Cannon Brewery with the hill of the Ski Slope just visible at right of centre above the re/brown graffiti tag. Adrian Wynn also has a piece on this taken just a week before my shot, see-
www.flickr.com/photos/37093581@N06/21261986374/
and, as he mentions, the 'Window Smashers' appear to be out and about again, don't they ever bloody well get fed up of doing this... Nothing like decent advertising to attract the right clientèle and this is a good example of the opposite, 'Northside Cars', 'Man & a Van' and 'Circle of Friends' must have increased their revenue significantly after these well placed ads in one of the old Cannon Brewery boarded up windows. More graffiti on one of the other businesses along the backstreets up to what was Neepsend Shed, 'The House Skatepark' it says above the door... so that's what they do in there presumably, not much parked outside and no sign of any noise or life whilst I was about...
4. Ecklands TPT. Into early November and 'the season of mists and mellow fruitfulness' is well under way it being the 2nd of November and this the Millennium Bridge at Bullhouse Crossing on what was the electrified route to Manchester through the Woodhead Tunnels just 5km behind the camera back along the Transpennine Trail; which is what the trackbed has now become, and surfaced all the way from Penistone to the portals of the 3 tunnels. This 1st view looks towards Penistone over the new bridge and on the right is the Penistone Wire Co with its now disused Century Works, the last time I was along here, a few months ago, it was all a buzz, but they have now quit the site and lent an eerie solitude to the place, wrapped as it was on this day by swirling fog. Looking along the main road in this area otherwise known as Ecklands or Millhouse Green, it appeared to be jinxed with a series of rail accidents, see-
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penistone_rail_accidents
some of which were quite serious but all beyond the days of the electrified railway. Today the scene of serious accidents has now moved to our over-burdened roads and travelling quite fast back up the grade towards the A628 Manchester Road, an A.M. Bracewell transport HGV, possibly on its way back to Accrington in Lancs before the fog really sets in 'over the top'. Back on the TPT and a short distance away from the Century Works, one of the well-built accommodation over-bridges sees two cyclists making the best of the scenery and about to come under the bridge adorned with one of a handful of artworks adorning the bridges and side of the old track-bed; the material for the work looking to have been collected locally.
5. Fox Valley, Stocksbridge. What's to be said about this 42,000,000 pound development of retail shops and housing on land once occupied by Samuel Fox, and others, now the scene of this huge development in the Valley. Nothing much else was happening 'down there', Samuel Fox occupied the area to the west where the main retail building is now going up, but the Fox, now TATA of course, Stockyard has been moved over to other land, west beyond the retail building and the whole space is now given over to the development. The private Stocksbridge Railway and the River Don, both still pass along on their old courses behind all the new build, the space being marked by the line of trees in the B/W image and just to the left of the corner of the building where the yellow/green striped tank is located, again along the treeline. The local works shunter brings billets up here every weekday night, see-
www.flickr.com/photos/daohaiku/11873748563/
for rolling the mill and transport back to the TATA steel works at Aldwarke, for further processing; there being now facilities at Aldwarke for rolling the large billets, at Deepcar, see-
www.flickr.com/photos/daohaiku/8767204891/
and at Oughtibridge, see-
www.flickr.com/photos/daohaiku/17234990259/
Finally another view of a reservoir devoid of much water, this is one of the 3 in a line above Stocksbridge, Underbank and it must be only 10% full. In the far distance are its two feeders, Midhope and Langsett and they looked in much healthier condition but considering the water in the high peak reservoirs feeds into the Trent Water network for the East Midlands, its not hard to see that this lot could be emptied quite easily in a drier winter and cooler summer...
6. Rotherham Masbrough Area. The Masbrough area of Rotherham has seen dramatic changes over the years since trainspotting briefly caught my attention and I used to wonder round these parts before finally leaving the area, and the county, in 1970, never to return, well .. almost never! Centenary Way now bisects the area just behind the camera and the land behind the 'Bohemia', as it was known when this picture was taken, used to be occupied by the sidings of the GCR's main line through Rotherham, their Central station a short distance away along Main St. This is a 'Then & Now' set regarding this building, the old 'Travellers Rest' pub on the one side and the Rotherham Bowling Alley over on the right, this picture taken in August 2011 to compare with the more recent pieces taken a few months ago, at the end of October last year. The 'Bowling Alley' eventually morphed into something else, in similar fashion to the 'Travellers Rest', it becoming 'Club Liquid', though I suspect it should be pronounced 'Liqweed'. Both the 'Gentlemans Club', Bohemia and 'Club Liquid', didn't last very long, unlike their earlier incarnations which lasted many decades in the 1st case and many years in the second and now, as the contemporary pictures show, they have been turned into a car park on the left with 'City Plumbing'# behind and, on the right, with the RUFC's 'New York Stadium' forming a backdrop, demolition was in progress under control of the Ron Hull Group, one of the big Rotherham Recyclers. The 'Club Liquid' pillar still stands amid the ruin in one of the shots which looks north to Masbrough Station, past another relic of past times, the ex-'Moulders Rest' pub, see the earlier picture from June 2011, here-
www.flickr.com/photos/daohaiku/5860414041/
stood on the corner of Masbrough St and Lyme St, the latter now taking traffic to the site of Booths Scrapyard off to the right and also now back onto the newly re-designed junction of Centenary Way with Main St; traffic lights once more appearing in preference to the horrendous roundabout which existed here up until last year. The next picture, a two-part panorama shows the site extending from Don Street where the 'New York Stadium' is located west of the town centre and over to the right where the old lighting standards of Millmoor Football ground can be seen, right next to Booths. Looking north in the next shot, Ron Hull have left a small brick building which was just outside 'Liquid' but I suspect now, all this has gone and there is, I recall, another car park here. The new Rotherham Council Offices, built just before construction of the New York Stadium was started a few years ago, stands prominent at the top right, The old council offices on the Park Gate side of town were demolished after the move and those offices, along with the awful Library Complex/Blockhouse and local car parks taken over and redeveloped and is now occupied by the large Tesco Supermarket; itself having moved of its old site on Forge Island, behind the 'Magden' building, seen to the left of this shot. The old Sheffield and Rotherham Railway line from the Wicker, through Holmes Junction and into Rotherham Westgate was just out of shot off to the right; this was removed a long while ago and all that remains now is a short stub od line into the Booths Recycling Scrapyard where old Coal wagons have recently been taken in for scrapping, see-
www.flickr.com/photos/daohaiku/22142289796/
7. Dunford Bridge, The Woodhead Tunnels. Been here before and could say, 'done that', but no as the area has now been cleared of the National Grid paraphernalia and apart from the fact there aren't any lines, stations, signalling or trains, it looks once more as it 'always' has done. The old MSLR tunnel portals have now been bricked up, as the introductory shot shows, the old National Grid buildings still occupying the space where steam trains used to lurch through, belching smoke and steam on the climb up from the South Yorkshire coalfields with 1000 tonne trains, double headed and banked and then, easier for the crews, returning with the empties. In this picture the tunnel which carried the down-line, on the left, was subject to the excessive exhausts of many moves of heavy coal trains which caused severe degradation in the tunnel walls and ceiling as the trains went westwards to the power stations. It was for this reason therefore, that the east-bound, up line, tunnel on the right was ultimately selected by National Grid when it came to installing the 'Supergrid' cables, running at 500kV, to ameliorate the impact on the Peak National Park, the whole process having been subject to objections on the grounds of preserving the pristine scenery over the top of Woodhead. In light of the fight that the Supergrid pylons stride along the valley at both sides of Woodhead, on the east from the area at Neepsend where the emerge above ground and are conveyed through Wharncliffe Woods, to the north of Stocksbridge and then along through the equally pristine scenery to the east portal of the tunnels. On the east side the situation is no different as the cables there run along the Longdendale Valley, supported on the huge Supergrid pylons and on their way west to the Fiddlers Ferry power station, near Liverpool. Refurbishment of the Supergrid system was photographed recently, on the west side, see a short video here-
www.flickr.com/photos/daohaiku/21654747635/
and picture here-
www.flickr.com/photos/daohaiku/21655333495/
Moving further back, the next shot shows the scene looking along the 'new' access, in 1954, to the new 2.3million pound Woodhead Tunnel now the repository of the Supergrid cables which were moved over from the old tunnel due to its diminishing state of repair; in addition it didn't, and now doesn't, seem likely that trains would/will ever run through here again. A rare HDR shot (for me) over the hills with one of the Supergrid pylons standing above the tunnel portals, the cables being taken down to ground level for conveyance through the new tunnel; never sure why the 'spit' of ground was left in place when the electrified system was being installed as the excavation for the new tunnel could have easily have removed it, one would have thought, leaving a clear view over both sets of tunnels from this angle! Popular in its heyday, the Stanhope Arms now stands deserted but not derelict and its difficult to see what use this could be put to, excepting perhaps as a terminus facility if the line up from Stocksbridge is ever re-instated for leisure activities into the Peaks and for the local transport needs of Stocksbridge, Wortley, Oxspring, Penistone, Oxspring, and Thurlstone en-route to Dunford. A shot along the track-bed of the electrified section looking into the Woodhead new portal with its palisade fence and gate blocking entrance to the tunnel and the road bridge through Dunford oozing rain water down the side of the support wall opposite the National Grid control building. This is followed by a close-up of the tunnel portal with its 1954 keystone showing who built it.. B.R., though I think the L.N.E.R had some input in the years before the war and upto Nationalisation in 1948.. Along the old track-bed to the old tunnels, National Grid laid a set of narrow-gauge tracks to convey their materials using small diesel locos. National Grid have now donated the Woodhead tunnel locomotive and rolling stock to Moseley Railway Trust see-
www.narrow-gauge.co.uk/news/2015/04/12/1076
On the far left in the foreground, some cable wrapped around what looks like the burnt off base of one of the stanchion posts for the electrified cables, though why it would be on the track-bed of the old tunnels is a mystery. The public gate of the tunnels is set back along the track-bed at the Dunford road bridge, where more palisade features threats and warnings, something hardly seen on the electrified system in such a profusion. The last two pictures, one in B/W, say it all, gone are the heady days of the busy electrified railway, the subsequent clearance of ALL the materials from the whole length of the complete system from Manchester in the west to Wath at the 'centre' of the coalfields and to Rotherwood exchange sidings to the east of Sheffield, and then the presence, in the latter days of National Grid, working to install the Supergrid cables and they finally departing... all is now quiet and the rainbows appear once more on a new Transpennine Trail..
8. Thorncliffe & Chapeltown. On the GC once more, this time its local and time to root out some remnants of line along the trackbed near Chapeltown. Although not particularly close to the track-bed, The Thorncliffe Arms has a name synonymous with the local Thorncliffe Iron Works which was served by both the GC and the Midland companies and was located not far off to the north of Chapeltown. This building looked like it could have been built by the GC to serve the liquid requirements of the passengers using its station, though they would have had a fair walk from there as the station was around 1km due south of here, still on a pleasant summer evening it may well have proved worthwhile to get off the train for a walk, amble up tot this place and sit and watch the sun set over Parkin and Thorncliffe Wood, before the thunderous M1 motorway came, just 500m behind the camera, in the early 1960s. The other building of note, mentioned earlier and just a 20 minute walk away, through what looks like the pleasant Parkin woodland, the GC's Chapeltown station, seen here as a private dwelling and in very good order. The railway line from the junction at Wincobank, south along the Blackburn Valley, from Sheffield to Barnsley, passed along at the other side of the building beyond the stand of tall trees on the left, the line heading almost due north here and having just passed ove the Midland's Chapeltown line, in the 1500m long Tankersely tunnel, the line also making for Barnsley. The track-bed south from the station is walkable as far as Wincobank, further south, the line approaching the Midland line to within about 200m, see-
www.flickr.com/photos/daohaiku/12521491454/
showing an RCTS (Railway Correspondence & Travel Society) rail tour being hauled by the 'South Yorkshireman' on the GC's line with class B1, 61165 in charge and just behind, a class D11, 62660, 'Butler Henderson'; running alongside, 2 Northern Rail services one heading south into Sheffield, the other north to Barnsley. Some track-bed remnants remain and the council recently installed a fence along the western side of the footway, allowing the residents on the other side to keep the remaining land on their side of the fence, free-of-charge; nice! At the side of the track-bed, just north of the A629 Chapeltown road bridge and almost buried in the undergrowth, a large block of concrete carrying an old wire pulley system, possibly the baser of a signal post where a change in direction of the wire was required to take it up to its appropriate signal. Finally, looking back north along the trackbed and amusing myself for 15 minutes by taking a series of shots of the other popular sort of traction these days, as a handful of HGV type vehicles rattle along the road, south and north and once again, completely oblivious to the scene below which once carried heavy goods traffic, passenger stock, all drawn along by classic steam locos; behind the camera, the now non-existent Smithy Wood Coking Plant and south of that the Midland line parallels this one to what is now a much simplified junction arrangement at the new Meadowhall Interchange with the line from the Blackburn VAlley and Midland Main Line out of Sheffield.
9. Attercliffe Area, Gas Works. A failed attempt to try and get the leaf fall season RHTT in a shot with the Sussex St. Gasworks gas holder but unfortunately due to the dominating appearance of the gas tank the pictures taken with the RHTT doesn't do justice to the DRS class 20s on their jaunt up to Stocksbridge Works. The Sussex St gas holder is one of the 3 remaining in the are, the other two being at Neepsend, seen earlier in this video and the one at Wincobank, now in an advanced state of deconstruction. Just about visible in the 1st B/W picture, DRS 20302 with 20303 on the back is on the 3S14 working, the afternoon Sheffield back to Wakefield Kirkgate move and is here on its way up and then back along the Stocksbridge Branch. It is just about to pass in front of the Victoria Hotel, near the right-hand edge of the picture with the RHTT set crossing the Wicker Arches and passing through the now denuded site of Sheffield Victoria Station. A better view follows with the camera trying to avoid a plethora of verticals in the form of street lighting posts, the most prominent, unavoidable, but probably 'clone-outable', although 2 of the grey posts pass across the loco and Sandite tanks as well. Businesses have come and gone in the spaces under the rails, 'Underneath the Arches', as it were, the Wicker Bridge having been cleaned nicely some years ago but now once more is showing signs of neglect. Along Effingham St. which runs alongside the River Don, just past the Gas Holder, other more traditional Sheffield businesses still exist in the form of Veolia Recycling at centre background, Browill Rewind Co., electrical engineers and with an old rusty sign along the top of the wall advertising their services from Tel: 0142 760188, with the old STD code for Sheffield; now 0114. And on the left in their nicely kept building, Cromwell Tools just over the road from the Don Riverside; Park Hill Flats pokes into the picture on the far right centre. Swinging round so that the camera faces along Effingham St. with the river on the left and Cromwell Tools at centre, beyond is part of the long run of the Norfolk Bridge and passing along in a north-easterly direction is a DBS/EWS Class 66 on the 6E03, Hope Earles Sidings to Hunslet Yard, working, taking aggregates to Hunslet in what are essentially coal hoppers, with the old EWS rust-red livery on the wagons and loco. A closer shot shows the 66 appearing from behind the back of the Cromwell Tools building, crossing the arches of Norfolk Bridge which will take in on, along the Midland Main line through Meadowhall and Masbrough and so on to the YArds at Hunslet just outside Leeds. Another of the local businesses, and again right next to the Midland line, on the right beyond Browill Rewind, is R.H.S. Paneltech Ltd and possibly these folk who worked at some of these places may well have used the local station; Attercliffe Road station being just around the corner in front of the leading EWS class 66. The final picture shows what is probably one of the more famous names in Sheffield, Thomas W. Ward Ltd., their building sat alongside the River on the other side from Attercliffe Station. Sited in the Albion works, Ward became a legend as the ultimate recycler, his operation responsible for breaking up many navy ships and reusing much of the material recovered, a piece form Wikipedia-
'...At the outbreak of World War I, 1,235 people were on the payroll of Thomas Ward's company and a thousand tons of scrap metal per day was being fed to the country's steel makers. However, with demand so high, and many of the horses Ward had previously used to transport his goods around Sheffield conscripted by the military he had an increasingly difficult time to match supply with demand. Lizzie the Elephant was brought in as a solution to this problem...'.
One of the more famous ship-breaking projects was the recovery of all the materials from the SS Majestic White Star Liner in the early 1900s which was broken up at his yard near Morecambe in 1914, before that she had been commanded for 9 years by Capt. Smith who went down with his new command - the Titanic!
10. Barnetby, Visit 2. And, finally, in this long narrative piece, destroyed last week when the disk heads crashed on the unit holding all this material, and now re-typed over several hours and to include as the last piece, some images from Barnetby on December 14th, 2 weeks before the grand change-over to Multi-Aspect Signalling. The six shots, taken in the mid-afternoon and in a mixture of bright sun but with mist swirling and finally making for atmospheric shots as the afternoon wore on to our TPE train departure at 15:50, back to Sheffield. First up, taken at 14:20, with soft warm lights glowing from the porch to the cabin, the iconic, listed and, up to this point, holder of second ranking for the largest manually operated lever box in the UK; Wrawby Junction Box. One would have thought the contemporary adornment of a radio aerial would have neb better sited around the back; the new lighting looking unobtrusive. In a location where it is occasionally difficult to determine what is straight and what isn't, at the other end of the station, in this 2nd picture, this is put to a real test and one can only assume the signal posts are vertical, leaving Barnetby East box with a definite pronounced 'lean' as are some of the telegraph posts her, though these are out of shot. DBR class 60, 60001, first of the class, passes on the 3200tonne 6M00, Humber Oil Refinery to Kingsbury Oil Sidings working. On the bracket above the passing tanks, Barnetby East's signal is off, of course, but Wrawby Junction's distant is on, possibly indicating a slow speed turnout at the junction ahead. BE20 in the foreground is off, signalling the approaching East Midlands class 158 train, it has a clear run after its station stop. In the background around the corner, above the roof of the box to the right, 2 Network RAil personell are at work, track-side, preparing, I suppose, for the inevitable. In the 3rd, B/W picture, the oils is passing along west and indeed the gantry at Wrawby Junction has the junction signal off for a left-hand turn out towards Market Rasen and Lincoln. In the yard at left, a Biomass train from earlier has paused on its way over to Drax and at left, parked up all the afternoon, Freightliner class 66, 66524 on an empty coals. Its now 15:05 and the signal lights are starting to be more evident on the triplet of gantries near Wrawby box. The 4th picture, taken at 15:30 with the 'Xmas decorations up', as it were, shows another DBS oils train this time with 60020 in charge, this time coming back with empties, the 1000 tonne 6E54, Kingsbury Oil Sidings to Humber Oil Refinery working and is approaching from the distant 'gloaming', passing as it does, an Iron Ore train, this one also led by a DBS class 60, 60074 on the 6T26, Immingham B.S.C. Ore Terminal to the Santon Foreign Ore Terminal at Scunthorpe; this scene, at this time will now look completely different, the semaphores and their soft lights having been replaced by appropriate single head, multi-aspect colour light LEDs' I just noticed, for a change, the shutter speed at 1/160s must have been sufficiently slow to capture the rear 'STOP' light of the Iron Ore train, in the ON aspect; they typically flash at 1Hz; no fudge here! The empty oils has a clear run though the station but for some unknown reason the driver stopped at the platform end, with the Barnetby East BE20 signal in the OFF position allowing a run along the platform to photograph the loco, halted at a clear signal and with the new MAS signal in front of the semaphore, hinged over in front of the loco at the side of the rails ready to stand erect in front of the semaphore... when the time comes. The 5th shot, taken 5 or 6 minutes before our return TPE service arrives, shows Barnetby East's BE49 signal, with both arms at danger, though the upper one will have to clear for the TPE in a minute or two, and again 'approaching in the gloaming' is a DBS but EWS liveried class 66, 66148, hauling the final Biomass of the day, for us, the 4R53, Milford West Sidings to Immingham Biomass Loading Point working with a clear run through the station eastwards to the Humber post; the pictures are now becoming 'noisy' as the ISO is racked up to 2500 from the previous shot's ISO2000. The 6th and final picture of the video. Spent some time on this 'cloned-out' picture and is the view along the lines looking west to Wrawby Junction and its listed signalbox, which can be seen in the distance under the signal gantry along the line on the right. The cloning operation wasn't too easy as the pole, the un-cloned version can be seen at lower right in the picture here-
www.flickr.com/photos/daohaiku/23554709060/
as this almost vertical structure, one of the oddities here as a lot are much worse, went right across three tracks and the the third wagon of the Freightliner, 66524, coal empties. Barnetby East's BE49 signal is now off for the approaching passenger train, our TPE service back in the direction of Scunthorpe, Doncaster and onto Sheffield, so there wasn't much time to hang about. The 3 NR personnel had ambled along round the fence at the end of the platform and appeared to be discussing the fate of the marked, with green crosses, see BE70 at left, BE49 signal post. At this date,m 14 December, it was only 2 weeks away form the Line Possession when all the Victorian Signalling system would be removed over a two week period, commencing, 27th December. Wrawby's distant is 'On', signifying a reduced speed at the junction turn out for the main line through to Scunthorpe; the TPE service won't be held up as it has a 'clear signal' and in not too long a time it will be a case of 'Cleared Signals' as this area becomes the home of the 21st century signalling preference, colour-light LED, multi-aspect/multi-head equivalents to the arrays of semaphores... a significant change to the feel and look of this place in north Lincolnshire...
The remains of a beautiful bouquet of ranunculus that was given to me by a friend over a week ago.
HBW!
Click L for large on black :-)
I've been meaning to shoot Kenn's beautiful bus for literally years now. And finally with a last minute decision, I got some lens time. As usual, very excited to edit and share the other shots!
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The source of David’s River is an extraordinary destination, blending the tranquil beauty of nature with the allure of desert adventure. The interplay of sunlight and shadows on the canyon walls highlights the rich textures and colors of the rock formations, making this spot a paradise for photographers. Its peaceful atmosphere and striking geological features leave a lasting impression on all who visit.