Wet and Super sharp, Rose thorn.

At home

I wasn't going to upload more photos today but this hawk showed up and let me get a few photos. It moved around so I am posting 3 shots from different positions. This is in my backyard, Yakima County, Washington. This adult bird has now stopped by 3 consecutive days. IMG_6971

April 9th_2019

Forgive me when I post too many photos of the grouse!

On April 9th 3 friends and I drove south of the city to a Sharp-tailed Grouse lek. I hadn't thought about the degree of difficulty that might challenge me in climbing over the stile with a knee replacement. I really struggled so I do not think I will be returning to see the grouse in future years.

Thanks for your visits, comments and faves! They are all appreciated!

Photographed at home, Yakima County, Washington. As always, I have difficulty distinguishing juvenile Sharp-shinned and Cooper's Hawk so I could be incorrect. If the same bird, this bird has been here 3 times already this morning. I photographed it twice but still haven't got a photo that doesn't have distracting branched in it.

IMG_4500

Calidris acuminata, with Least Sandpiper in foreground.

Morro Bay salt marsh as a 6.2 ft. tide was receding,

Seen from marina boardwalk,

Morro Bay, California

The bird had been found the previous day at about high tide by Kilian Hampl and identified by Will Knowlton. This species breeds in northeast Asia and after a long migration, winters in southeast Asia and Australasia. A few birds migrate down the other side of the Pacific Ocean and it is considered a rare autumn migrant in North America.

My friendly garden hawk keeping a eye on the bird feeders

www.texastargetbirds.com

Yesterday I had an opportunity to spend the morning out at Smith Point for the hawk watch and it ended up being a great experience with plenty of raptors seen and photographed. This young Sharp-shinned Hawk flew right over us at close range and definitely checked us out.

_MG_0127-web

Accipiter striatus

Sharp pocket computers, PC1350 and PC1360. These were the only two PC13XX models released by Sharp in 1984 and 1987. Both had 4 lines of 24 characters and were very capable in their day for BASIC programming, graphing, etc.

The key differences between the two were increased memory, an additional RAM port, as well as improved BASIC and faster CPU in the PC1360.

A group of 6 sharp-tails showed up in the yard today and feasted on sunflower seeds under the feeder.

WSOR brings a loaded grain train down the CN through Ackerville.

WAMX 3871

WAMX 3870

WAMX 4172

WAMX 4173

shot with an olympus om-d e-m10 mark ii—720nm infrared converted—and the 14-42mm electric zoom (ez) kit lens--with a raynox dcr-250 close-focusing diopter

Another small flock of sandpipers flew in.

shot with a fujifilm x-s10 and a 7artisans 35mm f1.2 mark i lens

Have a mouth as sharp as a dagger,

but a heart as soft as tofu.

(Chinese Proverb)

Weekly Theme Challenge - Something Fluffy

Looking close... on Friday! - Combination of Soft & Sharp

(photo by Freya, edit by me)

Thanks for views, faves and comments!

Shot as a JPEG, as the camera was still in factory default settings!

... alternative

Cooper's Hawk

Accipiter cooperii

A visitor to my back yard early this past fall. I think it sees me, I am lucky to have not spooked it.

So, Sharpie or Coop? The top blocks of the retaining wall it landed on are about three inches thick, putting the bird at roughly 12-14 inches head to tail. The tail appears to be rather squared off, plus the streaking looks more like Sharp-shinned rather than Cooper's. All things considered I'm calling it a Sharpie. What do you think?

CORRECTION: A couple sharp-eyed Flickr friends provided evidence that this hawk is a Cooper's, not a Sharp-shinned. See the comments below. I stand corrected.

View large

Grand Traverse County, Michigan

Former Southern SW7 8202 was providing the motive power for the excursion train at the Southeastern Railway Museum in Duluth.

IMG_0511 2023 07 09 file

after the rain......

On this day I had been invited to visit my friend Barb who lives in the Millarville area. She has many feeders and quite a bit of garden as well as a greenhouse. There was lots to see! The evening before had been quite chilly providing lots of dew on the flowers.

This Sharp-shinned Hawk was chasing after the Blue Jays. There was constant commotion as the Jays chased it around and around.

Thanks for your visits, and comments! They are all appreciated!

I found this bird in my backyard yesterday (10/31) eating a Halloween treat. The prey may have been a Dark-eyed Junco. Unfortunate for the junco but the hawk has to eat. Although it is hard to tell from the photo the hawk was under the canopy of a shrub on a dark mostly cloudy day so the shutter speed was slow and the photos are not as sharp as I would like. Yakima County, Washington. IMG_9526

Sharp-tailed Grouse are frequent visitors to my bird feeder. They nibble on the sunflower seeds that fall on the ground under a big evergreen tree. Unfortunately there is a very domineering little red squirrel who seems to think that he is the czar of the bird feeder and he comes flying out of nowhere to chase them away.

(taken from a window)

Manitoba - Canada

Sharp Shinned Hawk had an unsuccessful hunt in the yard. Maybe next time.

Coyote teeth, very sharp also. Taxidermy.

Werribee

Victoria, Australia

Plumed cockscomb (Celosia Argentea) DSC_0073

I found this beautiful Plumed cockscomb (Celosia Argentea) JPEG Version growing in a rice field. This Photo was taken with my Nikon D5300 camera and Nikon 105mm Macro Lens on 13 August 2024. This image was taken in Akiruno-shi (あきる野市), Tokyo, Japan.

Nikon D5300

Nikon 105mm Macro Lens

f/10

Aperture priority

Focal length - 105mm

1/200

Tripod used

Flash and diffuser used

Manual Focus

Cable release used

This image is the property of the photographer and cannot be used, printed, downloaded, or reproduced in any way for either personal or commercial use without prior written consent of the photographer.

for the Macro Mondays challenge “Sweet Spot Squared” (September 19th 2016)

I like a little sharp and tangy taste with my sugar, so I chose raspberries ;o)

Finding and shooting the sweet spot!

I've got 3 macro 1:1 lenses now - but when I started out there was only one to fit my new Sony NEX-6, and it was Sony's eMount 30mm/3.5. That was March 2013, and I learned macro work through that lens for the next 2 years. So that was the lens I chose for this challenge.

I shoot macro in Manual, and have never explored the 'sweet spot' before - so I followed Janet's directions and used Aperture mode and shot all 17 F stop settings the lens has on two 2cm raspberries. I scattered sugar granules of various sizes both in front and behind the raspberries, to give me an idea of just how the overall image sharpness changes with the F/stop change.

Comparing the shots I used Janet's direction again: "You will be looking for the shot that has the sharpest details with as little blurring as possible". I thought it would be simple - F22 is the inevitable choice to offer minimal blurring, while keeping the subject in focus.

But I found a puzzling oddity. From F16 through to F22 the sharpness of the background elements increased, but the sharpness of the 'in focus' elements fell off. I repeated the experiment with a strawberry (a much larger subject) and the same result emerged - past F16 the 'in focus' elements of the shot suffered!

I went online to see if I could find an explanation. And the trusty B&H website came through with an article:

www.bhphotovideo.com/explora/content/rules-thumb-finding-...

I needed to compromise and take 2 or 3 stops back from F22 to find the best balance. There was little to choose between F16 and F18. This shot uses F16. And yes - I did then crop the original shot I used, to highlight the main raspberry, and leaving out most of the background sugar 'scatter'.

I hope it hits the sweet spot with you too :o)

Following on from the discussion Where do you draw the line? I've taken an old credit card as my guide, which is 3"x2" and added measures in cm too. I do SO hope that this will become the standard for Macro Mondays! My 2 raspberries are set on this 'new' format for my regular establishing shot in the first comment field

My 2016 Macro Mondays set: 2016 Macro Mondays

My Food and drink set: Food and Drink

This hawk is a frequent visitor to the yard and at times spends hours waiting for the birds to come in to feed

Just look at the toes on those feet.

Tigre / Argentina

[EXPLORE - 2014-04-08]

Album of Argentina: www.flickr.com/photos/tabliniumcarlson/albums/72157711999...

Album of "explored" photos: www.flickr.com/photos/tabliniumcarlson/albums/72157634980...

Scanning the surroundings from a high tree branch at sunset.

Pretty sure this is a sharp-shinned hawk Accipiter striatus, just guessing. Another possibility might be a Merlin, though this bird's head is not quite shaped right, nor does it have any 'eyebrow' mark, as a merlin might (but not always) have.

I just don't see either of them often enough to know.

This little (crow size) raptor has been hanging around my little pond for several days, swooping rapidly from under cover likely grabbing little songbirds.

We first noticed the flickers completely disappeared from our backyard, including the mating pair, as well as an unusual disapperance and silence for long stretches of time, from other songbirds.

Perhaps the result of this bird taking the opportunity to ambush feed on the numerous little songbirds that have arrived.

Sharp and soft

Located : Between Kamisakaemachi station and Otani station on the Keishin Line of Keihan Railway.

Osaka, Otsu-shi, Shiga pref.

京阪電気鉄道京津線 / 上栄町駅 - 大谷駅 間

長安寺地蔵堂前踏切にて撮影

滋賀県大津市逢坂2丁目

Voigtländer 40/1.2

This was an experiment to see how altering the settings on the camera affected the sharpness of the bee.

Macro of this Bosen Thistle.

Arancio Altas Lamborghini Aventador LP 700-4