A fishing vessel at Thorup Strand in Denmark

The Sword-billed Hummingbird is a charismatic species from Andean South America. It is found from Venezuela and Colombia in the north to Bolivia in the south. The species belongs to a monotypic genus, Ensifera, and is quite different from all other hummingbirds; metallic green and bronzed overall, with a black bill that is slightly upcurved and longer than the body length. This is the only bird species with a bill length that exceeds the body length. When seen perched, the species usually holds its bill quite upright, presumably because of balance issues stemming from this long and relatively heavy structure. Picture taken at Zuro Loma, Ecuador.

Have a Peaceful Travel Tuesday!

Thanks a lot for your visits, comments, faves, invites, etc. Very much appreciated!

© All my images are protected under international authors copyright laws and may not be downloaded, reproduced, copied, transmitted or manipulated by any means without my written explicit permission, including the use on websites and similar medias. All rights reserved. Please contact me at thelma.gatuzzo@gmail.com if you intend to buy or use any of my images.

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Member of Nature’s Spirit

Good Stewards of Nature

I dearly love finding dandelions in my garden, whether they are the yellow flowers or the soft puffs of seeds ready to take to the wind. Generally I leave the dandelion there (unless I am removing weeds, and then I say goodbye to my little friends). However, this one time I decided to break the dandelion puff off of the stem to take inside the house for a photo session. The moment I removed the puff, the bottom of the stem curled into these two tightly wound circles. What a treat!

The common sunflower (Helianthus annuus) is a species of large annual forb of the daisy family Asteraceae. The common sunflower is harvested for its edible oily seeds which are used in the production of cooking oil.

The Helianthus annuus has a variety of purposes e.g. food for livestock, bird food, and planted in domestic gardens for aesthetics. The Helianthus annuus is known for its multiple flower heads, whereas the domestic sunflower often possesses a single large flower head atop an unbranched stem.

In the binomial name Helianthus annuus, the genus name is derived from the Greek ἥλιος : hḗlios 'sun' and ἄνθος : ánthos 'flower'. The species name annuus means 'annual' in Latin.

Common sunflower was one of several plants cultivated by Native Americans in prehistoric North America as part of the Eastern Agricultural Complex. Although it was commonly accepted that the sunflower was first domesticated in what is now the southeastern US, roughly 5,000 years ago, there is evidence that it was first domesticated in Mexico around 2600 BCE. These crops were found in Tabasco, Mexico, at the San Andres dig site.

The earliest known examples in the US of a fully domesticated sunflower have been found in Tennessee, and date to around 2300 BCE. Other very early examples come from rockshelter sites in Eastern Kentucky. Many indigenous American peoples used the sunflower as the symbol of their solar deity, including the Aztecs and the Otomi of Mexico and the Incas in South America.

In 1510, early Spanish explorers encountered the sunflower in the Americas and carried its seeds back to Europe. Of the four plants known to have been domesticated in eastern North America and to have become important agricultural commodities, the sunflower is currently the most economically important.

THANKS FOR YOUR VISIT AND FAVES

ON THE REACTIONS I WILL TRY TO RESPOND BACK

Sunrise at Ponta de Caracaraí, Rio Arapiuns, an Amazon tributary, Santarém, with our boat, Don Giuseppe anchored for the night.

~ aziza "likey?"

For Judy.. Just because:)

After reading all the good things you guys wrote about my work over the month of march I am truly touched.. thank you so much my beautiful friends.. I wouldn't have done anything without your constant support and inspiration:)

HGGT to you all

Explore# 327

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flower (Daisy) stem .....rip detail where I pulled the single bloom

from the multiple bloom stem.

“Macro photography lets us look at familiar details in an unfamiliar way.”

Bryan Peterson

spirea macro from the back

Dandelion macro

Baby euphorbia plants with attractive red stems, growing in beach sand, on Kangaroo Island.

360/365 -Around the house - Day 360

Art created from my photos | Creative Flowers | Spring | Yellow Flower & Stem #abstract

Shrooms with long Stems are reaching for the Sunlight.

And shades of orange

Dotted Stem Bolete / Flockenstieliger Hexenröhrling / Neoboletus erythropus

For Macro Mondays' "Halloween" Theme.

The stem is about 2" (50 mm) long

HMM

san francisco, california

Stem

Detail of the reproductive structure of plant in the family Equisetaceae, showing rounded vertical ridges on stem

At Audley End Gardens.

Waiting for the dusky night, the function is lost by the twilight

+LITERALLY+

[] HaMeD!caL []

Connection - Macro Mondays

The apple is approximately 3" across.

SOOC

#65 Daisy

IMG_6166c 2024 01 29 file

Indoor Tulip stem with sunlit accents....Morning Sunlight seeping through the window blinds.

for Macro Mondays. Compared with the large bowl, the long stems on my posh wine glasses seem very slender and fragile, and I always take great care when handling them.

The five other glasses are reflected in this one stem.

an unplanned work of art

seen in my kitchen sink

last August.

I was "admonished" (not seriously) by an acquaintance yesterday for not using my Hasselblad enough, so today I accepted the challenge to make some images with it. This frame made use of the 0.5 Proxar closeup filter.

Film: Ilford FP4+ (lovely stuff) processed in iffy Xtol.

I was packing the car for a camping trip when I noticed this Blow Fly clinging to a daisy in the flower strip between my house and driveway. Had to take a few minutes and set up a shot. It was a cool morning and my subject was very still, and luckily no breeze to sway the flower stem. I added a 1.7x teleconverter to the macro lens for a little extra working distance.

Photographed in Val Marie, Saskatchewan. Don't use this image on websites, blogs, or other media without explicit permission © 2014 James R. Page - all rights reserved.

For Macro Mondays - Glass

Wine glass stem

Some old stems in a wood in Günztal, Bavaria

Panorama made of 3 pics

I was out early one morning with only the big lens, looking for wildlife. No luck there, but I was very glad I noticed this frost on these red stems. I don't know what the plant is. I've been bringing my macro lens every day since, but frost this nice doesn't happen very often. Siskiyou County, California

Looking very bare, the semaphore masts at North Orleans on the Hoosier Sub.

Thank you for your appreciation, Gail

Bougainvillea spectabilis grows as a woody vine or shrub, reaching 4.6 to 12.2 m with heart-shaped leaves and thorny, pubescent stems. The flowers are generally small, white, and inconspicuous, highlighted by several brightly colored modified leaves called bracts. The bracts can vary in color, ranging from white, red, mauve, purple-red, or orange. Its fruit is a small, inconspicuous, dry, elongated achen.

Spanish Name: Bugambilia, bugambilias, buganvilla

English Name: Great bougainvillea

Scientific Name: Bougainvillea spectabilis

Family: Nyctaginaceae

Genus: Bougainvillea

Age: 40 years

Location: Benicássim

Province: Castelló de La Plana

Country: Spain

Continent: Europe

Date: June 2018

Clean stem glasses are stored upside down in a bar. A play of warm light, shadows and reflections. The impression of cleanliness.