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Cassin's Kingbird:
Tyrannus vociferans
Late season: Unsual to see this Cassin's Kingbird in December. He loved the barb wire fencing around the treatment pond @ Discovery Park in Pahrump, Nevada in Nye, County.
I usually locate them by their buzzy calls, and by the time I've tried to focus on them, they are gone. This one stayed a few seconds beyond the official Bewick's Wren time limit, and I managed to get one focused shot out of six.
San Francisco
At every fisherman's wharf along the coast, you can hear the sea lions long before you can see them. As for the sights, well, throw in ferries and the ubiquitous seagulls and you have Pier 39 in San Francisco.
On Saturday, we had our first proper walk this year, revisiting one of our family favourites. The circular walk starts at Hound Tor and takes in iconic Bowerman's Nose, the incredible granite stack marvelled at by my boys. The sun came out the minute we were back at the car...LOL.
For those interested in the entire walk, I made a video:
Das Haus des Arztes auf der ehemaligen Leprainsel Curious island.
The doctor's house on the former leprosy island Curious island.
La maison du docteur sur l'ancienne île de la lèpre Curious island.
La casa del doctor en la antigua isla de la lepra Isla curiosa.
This Forster's Tern sped by us at head hight; it was only luck that let me grab a shot. I usually see these guys much higher and farther away, so it was a real treat.
bishop's mitre or bishop's mitre shield bug
Gemeiner Spitzling
[Aelia acuminata]
(explored 25.06.2024)
An iPhone shot grabbed on our walk yesterday, edited with snapseed, repix, and distressedfx
For Slider's Sunday. HSS!!
This one is also form Schwabacher's Landing but at first light.
Very could but worth getting up early.
I battled pneumonia for a while before we got to the US, and now just returned ended up with influenza, not my best Year so far.
Find it a bit hard to find the motivation, looking through my photos and give yours the attention they deserve.
Starting to feel better though and be back soon!
Thanks for looking I do appreciate it a lot.
Have a great weekend!
Norbert
Steller's Eiders are incredibly rare visitors to Britain with just 12 accepted records between the first in 1830 (Norfolk) and the last in 2019 (Orkney). Ten of these records are from Scotland and one record in 1986 was just a wing found on a beach in Fetlar, Shetland. Having said that there were two long-staying individuals; one in the Outer Hebrides 1972-1984 and one on Orkney 1974-1982. I visited the Outer Hebrides in May 1985, the first year it failed to appear, but I finally caught up with one in Britain in 2000 at Hopeman on the Moray coast. On my recent visit to Varanger Fjord we saw several hundred Steller's Eiders. Most of my flight shots are tightly bunched but this flock obligingly spread out. The males are absolutely unmistakeable with their white wings and orange bodies but the females are confusingly similar to Mallards and are probably overlooked. They breed on the north coast of Siberia and in Alaska but Gulf Stream warmed waters of Varanger Fjord are a regular wintering site for them.
This Lesson’s Motmot was hanging out at the edge of a trail while walking around in the Monteverde area of Costa Rica. To our delight it showed absolutely no fear of us and allowed us to get some nice close-ups. He was still happily sitting in his tree when we departed.
Momotus lessionii
_MG_4231-web
Baird's Sandpiper ~ (Calidris bairdii)
Baird's Sandpiper is a first for me in Florida. I drove south to Sarasota to get a look at this rare visitor. A few of us got to see it for a short time before it flew off and we were unable to relocate it.
Thanks for visiting!
Dublin's O'Connell Bridge, named after Daniel O'Connell spans between the night sky & River Liffey, connecting the north & south of the Capital, something to reflect on.
It's #HappyFriday
Cooper's Hawk ~ (Accipiter cooperii )
99/100 times I run into a mid-size brown and white hawk in Florida, it is a juvenile Red-shouldered Hawk. This time I was excited to stumble upon this Cooper's Hawk. I was walking around a lake and not paying as much attention to the trees surrounding it as I should have. I nearly walked under the branch it was perched on. I'm grateful it let me backup slowly and grab a few shots despite my clumsy invasion of its privacy!
Thanks for visiting!
The Craig's Hut was originally a built as a film set "The Man from Snowy River" and has been rebuilt twice since it was burnt down by bush fire. It still represents the rigours of life in the high country and is a beautiful place to visit. The views on a clear day are spectacular.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=if9p1TnDvRY this is a short video clip of the film, where horses leaping cliff and steep rock faces etc. Quite spectacular footage.
it 's hidden inside this changing blue. it comes from the other side of the sea or from that maritime castle that is drawning slowly.
just music. like a walk on the waves.
I was watching that young Mr Shainblum the other day as I dawdled happily over my afternoon coffee. I like Michael’s laid back Californian approach and having only discovered him quite recently, I’ve enjoyed his often rather more abstract approach to his subjects. The long lens shot of the gull in front of the rainbow at the waterfall in the secret canyon left me feeling slightly irritated that for the second time on our trips to Iceland we’d driven past the place and completely ignored it. Next time!
On this occasion, Michael was doing something I recognised all too well – taking endless photos of the sea on front of a collection of stacks as the golden hour settled in. Like mine and Dave’s visit here, Michael was thoroughly immersed in a world of water, trying to capture the streaks on the sand as each wave retreated back towards the ocean. It’s an activity I don’t think I’ll ever tire of, and even though I come home each time with so many photos of exactly the same thing that I barely know where to start the cull, I never find myself thinking “should have stayed home and watched the telly.”
As the Pacific horizon glowed with warm yellow light, our hero, standing in ten inches of seawater as he was, confessed that he wasn’t quite as dry as he’d been when he’d arrived at the beach. “But then again,” he said, “if you’re not soaked after a seascape shoot, was it really a good seascape shoot?” This shard of logic came winging back to me as I crouched midstream in the fast flowing river that seems to change its course across the beach with every cycle of the tides. By now, my tripod had sunk far enough into the shifting gravel bed to stay put. The filter case that I always attach to the little clip on the tripod had a damp bottom. So did I for that matter. I was obviously crouching rather lower than I’d intended. And although I’d bought my wellies along, the water was moving urgently enough to tip a pint or two over the rim of the right boot and fill my sock with an icy January sensation. Michael might soon dry off in sunny California, but on a dark Sunday in the deepest depths of winter in Cornwall, the wet foot would be wet until I got home later. Not that I minded of course – it was proving to be a good seascape shoot after all.
I’ve always been drawn to this river across the beach. One of the prime benefits is that if you get low and shoot across the water, it’s virtually impossible for any of the gazillion footprints in the sand to sully your compositions. As you may know from some of my previous yarns, I really can’t stand having footprints in my images. You probably can’t either – not unless they’re some artful lone creation that’s central to your story. Beaches would be great if I could cordon off a large area that everyone else is banned from, but it seems the local council doesn’t share my views on the subject. So it’s usually a question of arriving at a quiet time when sunset (I can’t get up in time for sunrises – I’ve tried but it doesn’t work), and low tide coincide with one another. Holywell Bay is a fantastic winter destination for seascape photography, but as for summer – well things are far more difficult. I looked at Google Maps in satellite mode to see whether the river has a name (it doesn’t seem to), and that image was evidently taken in summer. Go on and have a look for yourself and you’ll soon see why we leave places like this to our visitors in the warmest months.
Another good reason for donning the wellies and wading out into the stream is that now and again, interesting things happen. Here, a dragon’s back appeared in the flow, shifting and wandering along a straight line of twenty yards or more. For a while, each time I planted the tripod into the riverbed the shapes would move, disappearing behind my composition or chasing too far ahead. Eventually I decided to stay put and wait until the dragon decided to lay still in front of me a while. As you can see, my patience and acceptance of a further soaking was eventually rewarded. I struggled with the colour version of this image. Everything was very brown, and there was no warmth in that patch of bright sky to work on. Not in this moment at any rate, although the scene looked much more pleasing in colour in a later image where very briefly a patch of weak yellow lit the headland. No dragon’s back in that one though.
Later I strolled a couple of hundred yards along the beach and joined my brother Dave, who’d left his wellies at home and was playing chicken with the waves at the shore, displaying a worrying level of confidence as with each incomer he retreated and left his camera mounted on its tripod in the middle of the drama to catch the action. In the dying light, much entertainment was had in these low tide moments while again and again we rattled off our shots as each wave arrived and then receded. I didn’t have to run away though and by now it barely mattered whether or not I was wearing wellies, so I clung to my tripod for each volley of white surf. I’m still looking at those shots. In one I caught a flawless array of perfect white streaks in the foreground, but I’m still not certain of it. No matter how much time I’ve spent checking the horizon, it makes me feel as if the entire scene is leaning to the right. So despite having a number of candidates to accompany the tale of this outing, I went with the dragon’s back. Maybe I’ll post the streaks at some point and see what you think. It may help if you tilt your head to one side a bit though.
This iconic building on the beach at the mouth of the River Rother has been snapped by every photographer and their mother who's have ever been to the coast at Rye! The Red Shed, as its more commonly known is thought to have been constructed in the 1890's and has been in the same family for several generations; its now owned by William Norton who paints it twice a year. Uncle's Shed was used by the shrimp fishermen to store their nets and other kit and now houses a little collection of objects from the days of the shrimp fishing industry; it can be viewed at certain times during the tourist season.
Anna's hummingbirds are found along the western coast of North America, from southern Canada to northern Baja California, and inland to southern and central Arizona, extreme southern Nevada and southeastern Utah, and western Texas. They tend to be permanent residents within their range, and are very territorial. However, birds have been spotted far outside their range in such places as southern Alaska, Saskatchewan, New York, Florida, Louisiana, and Newfoundland.
While the species was originally restricted to the chaparral of California and Baja California, their range expanded north to Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia, and east to Arizona in the 1960s and 70s. This rapid expansion can be attributed to the widespread planting of non-native species, such as eucalyptus, as well as the use of bird feeders, in combination with the species' natural tendency for extensive postbreeding dispersal.
Anna's hummingbirds have the northernmost year-round range of any hummingbird. During cold temperatures, Anna's hummingbirds gradually gain weight during the day as they convert sugar to fat.In addition, hummingbirds with inadequate stores of body fat or insufficient plumage are able to survive periods of subfreezing weather by lowering their metabolic rate and entering a state of torpor.
These little Birds are fully active all year round here on Vancouver Island and start to breed in late December and takes the female 1 week to build the nest.
Click Photo to view Large.
Click image to view larger .
Both Sexes
Length: 3.9 in (10 cm)
Weight: 0.1-0.2 oz (3-6 g)
Wingspan: 4.7 in (12 cm)
Anna’s Hummingbirds are mostly green and gray, without any rufous or orange marks on the body. The male's head and throat are covered in iridescent reddish-pink feathers that can look dull brown or gray without direct sunlight.
Anna’s Hummingbirds are a blur of motion as they hover before flowers looking for nectar and insects. Listen for the male's scratchy metallic song and look for him perched above head level in trees and shrubs.
Anna’s Hummingbirds are common in yards, parks, residential streets, eucalyptus groves, riverside woods, savannahs, and coastal scrub. They readily come to hummingbird feeders and flowering plants, including cultivated species in gardens.
Took this one when I last got my hair cut.. I always have a camera when I go to Vi's House.. If not flowers, it's dogs or her backyard decorations...
Eleven Krefft's Turtles lined up on a sunny log in a creek draining the Townsville Palmetum to Ross River.
These Short-necked Turtles are the only freshwater turtles found east of the Great Dividing Range.
Actually, they'd be all at sea in the ocean without flippers.
I hope it is lighter than it looks for this poor guy. Maybe he's just tired.
Nikon D70 with AF Nikkor 35mm f/1.8
Los Angeles, Southern California
February 26, 2011
This shot from our birding this morning in Mesa, Az. It seems that Bell's Vireo, along with Lucy's Warbler are the most common of the migrants in Maricopa County right now. Unfortunately I did not observe whether this Bell's had a "tail wag" or a "tail bob", which I am told may determine the subspecies. Next time....
Cavia's eten groenvoer, fruit en zaden. Een van de opvallendste kenmerken van cavia's is dat ze net als mensen en de meeste apen omwille van een defect aan het gulonolactone oxidase-gen (GULO-gen) zelf geen vitamine C kunnen aanmaken en dat uit het voedsel moeten krijgen. Hierin wijken ze sterk af van de andere dieren, die hun vitamine C redelijk (bijvoorbeeld: katten en honden -- geiten en leeuwen) tot zeer goed zelf kunnen maken uit hun bloedsuiker.
Cavia's zijn bijzondere diertjes.
Popcornen is het gedrag dat jonge, vrolijke cavia's ten toon spreiden, namelijk springen, hupsen en vrolijk in de rondte springen ( zijn dan gelukkig)
Heel vaak draaien ze in de lucht om hun as of rollen ze om omdat ze hun achterlijf zo hoog de lucht in gooien.
En het heeft zeker overeenkomsten met popcorn die in de pan omhoog springt!
Kasteelpark.
Dragon's tongue ;-)
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Nikon Camera D90 / Macro Nikon Lens, handheld.
HR images are available. All copy rights reserved.
Thank you all in advance for all comments and favourites ..all the best !
Have quite a few Anna's hummingbirds in the garden which are continually seeking to show their authority over the various plants
St. Alban's Church - also called The English Church - and the moat surrounding the fortress Kastellet in Copenhagen.
I saw both the common and Barrow's Goldeneye at Spenard crossing. There was still a large ice sheet across most of the waterway and these guys liked being right at the edge.
Taken 19 April 2018 at Spenard Crossing, Anchorage, Alaska.
It's why we drink too much on Friday nights
Raise our hand in the neon lights
Sweet Home Alabama and Ring of Fire
I could sing along 'til the day I die
Why we break up and fall back in love
Why we roll around in a bed of a truck
Why we all stop when we hear that one and she whispers turn it up...
For a second we're bulletproof
We get lost in a song or two
The world don't move, and all I need is you
Three chords and the truth
-Chase Rice