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American beeches (Fagus grandifolia) and other northern hardwoods at peak autumn color.
I've licensed this photo as Creative Commons 0 (CC0) for release into the public domain. You're welcome to download the photo and use it without attribution.
Best wishes to everyone for a very happy holiday. May you all catch beautiful light in the coming new year.
Tenryu-ji Temple (天龍寺)
Tenryuji is a Zen temple in the Arashiyama area of Kyoto. It has been ranked first among the city's "Five Great Zen Temples".
The temple was established in 1339, and like many other temples burnt down several times over its history. The current buildings date from the Meiji Period. Muso Soseki, the temple's founding abbot and famous garden designer, created Tenryuji's landscape garden which, unlike the temple buildings, survived the many fires and is considered one of the oldest of its kind.
Tenryuji has been designated a UNESCO world heritage site in 1995.
How to get there
Tenryuji is just a few steps from the Keifuku Arashiyama terminal station. The small Keifuku trains connect Arashiyama with the Ryoanji/Kinkakuji area and Shijo-dori.
The JR Saga-Arashiyama Station is a 5 minute walk from Tenryuji and is served by the JR Sagano Line (San-in Line) with frequent trains that take about 15 minutes to Kyoto Station.
How to get to and around Kyoto
Hours and Fees
Hours:8:30 to 17:30 (until 17:00 from late October through late March)
Closed:No closing days
Admission:500 yen
Jane Gray's house is located at the edge of Athens, Missouri. The house is referred to as the Widow Gray's house in the recounting of the Civil War battle of Athens. Time has taken a toll on this small Greek revival house that witnessed history.
I captured this leafy scene while visiting the annual Red Barns Spectacular car show at the Gilmore Car Museum on August 3, 2019.
View my collections on flickr here: Collections
Press L for a larger image on black.
Common Hawk-Cuckoo
The common hawk-cuckoo (Hierococcyx varius), popularly known as the brainfever bird, is a medium-sized cuckoo resident in the Indian subcontinent. It bears a close resemblance to the Shikra, even in its style of flying and landing on a perch. The resemblance to hawks gives this group the generic name of hawk-cuckoo and like many other cuckoos these are brood parasites, laying their eggs in nests of babblers. During their breeding season in summer males produce loud, repetitive three note calls that are well-rendered as brain-fever, the second note being longer and higher pitched. These notes rise to a crescendo before ending abruptly and repeat after a few minutes; the calling may go on through the day, well after dusk and before dawn.
The common hawk-cuckoo is a medium- to large-sized cuckoo, about the size of a pigeon (ca. 34 cm). The plumage is ashy grey above; whitish below, cross-barred with brown. The tail is broadly barred. The sexes are alike. They have a distinctive yellow eye ring. Subadults have the breast streaked, similar to the immature shikra, and there are large brown chevron marks on the belly. At first glance they can be mistaken for a hawk. When flying they use a flap and glide style that resembles that of sparrowhawks (especially the shikra) and flying upwards and landing on a perch they shake their tails from side to side. Many small birds and squirrels raise the alarm just as they would in the presence of a hawk. The sexes are alike but males tend to be larger.
They can be confused with the large hawk-cuckoo, which, however, has dark streaks on the throat and breast. Young birds have a pale chin but young large hawk-cuckoos have a black chin.
During summer months, before the monsoons, the males are easily detected by their repeated calls but can be difficult to spot. The call is a loud screaming three-note call, repeated 5 or 6 times, rising in crescendo and ending abruptly. It is heard throughout the day and frequently during moonlit nights. The calls of females are a series of grating notes. Common hawk-cuckoos feed mainly on insects and are specialised feeders that can handle hairy caterpillars. Caterpillar guts often contain toxins and like many cuckoos they remove the guts by pressing the caterpillar and rubbing it on a branch before swallowing it. The hairs are swallowed with the caterpillar and are separated in the stomach and regurgitated as a pellet.
The common hawk-cuckoo occurs in most of the Indian subcontinent, from Pakistan in the west, across the Himalayas foothills, east to Nepal, Bhutan and Bangladesh and south into Sri Lanka. Some birds of the Indian population winter in Sri Lanka. In the hills of central Sri Lanka, ciceliae is a resident. It is generally resident but where occurring at high altitudes and in arid areas is locally migratory. It is found in the lower elevations (mostly below 1000m) of the Himalayas but in the higher areas, the large hawk-cuckoo tends to be more common.
The species is arboreal and rarely descends to the ground. Its habitat includes garden land, groves of tree, deciduous and semi-evergreen forests.
The call of this bird has been popularly transcribed as brain-fever in English (in some old books, this name is also incorrectly used for the Asian koel). Frank Finn noted that [H]is note, however, fully entitles him to his ordinary designation, whether from its "damnable iteration" or from its remarkable resemblance to the word "brain-fever" repeated in a piercing voice running up the scale. Other interpretations of the bird call include peea kahan in Hindi ("where's my love") or chokh gelo (in Bengali, "my eyes are gone") and paos ala (Marathi, "the rains are coming").
The call "Pee kahan" or "Papeeha" is more accurately represented by the shrill screaming "pi-peeah" of the large hawk-cuckoo Hierococcyx sparverioides, which replaces the brainfever bird along the Himalayas and its foothills.
The brainfever bird's call may be heard all through the day, starting early before dawn and frequently during moonlit nights. A novel by the Indian author Allan Sealy is named after this bird.
Double exposure taken with a Diana Baby 110 camera. Lomography Tiger film.
These were taken for to accompany an interview I gave to Lomography Magazine about using 110 film in 2021.
www.lomography.com/magazine/346937-analogue-advocate-tony...
One of the largest of London's private squares, designed and laid out by John Nash, dominated by plane trees said to have been planted in 1817 to commemorate the allied victory at Waterloo two years earlier. Other trees of note include a tulip tree (Liriodendron tulipifera) and weeping silver lime (Tilia tomentosa 'Petiolaris')
An original and unique feature of the garden is the Nursemaids' Tunnel, an early pedestrian underpass connecting the Square to Park Crescent. The tunnel passes under the busy Marylebone Road, allowing families to promenade safely through both gardens without worrying about the noisy public throng passing overhead.
The combination of Park Square and Crescent was designed to form a transitional entrance feature to Regent’s Park, leading the visitor from the formal Nash streetscape of Portland Place in the south, to the green and picturesque landscape in the north. It was described as a 'sort of vestibule' to the new royal park. New gates and railings have been installed to original designs.
The gardens retain most of their original Nash layout and have been managed continuously from their inception by an organisation specifically set up in 1824 to carry out this task, the Crown Estate Paving Commission.
[Open Garden Squares website]
Human called it 'The Forbidden Tree' when in fact thy Lord named it 'The Tree of Life'
x Have a Blessed Tuesday!
Lions sitting on trees is a common site in Tarangire, not so in the Serengeti or in Kenya. Although the novelty wears off after the first few sightings, it is always exciting nevertheless to see one or more lions on trees.
I couldn't decide whether to keep this in color or convert to b&w, so I did both.
Tarangire, Tanzania