There were a great many kingfishers in Peru, and I couldn’t keep all the names straight. Modern photo technology is good enough to track a flying bird, but kingfishers fly too fast and in too dark of light to get a really good shot of one of them in the air, so most of what I got were of them perched.
What do you get when you cross a crow with a parrot?
Someone who doesn’t think this joke is funny.
It looks all innocent until you realize that those are actually missiles and the flower is preparing to take over the entire flowerbed.
The bee is there to negotiate but, as you can tell from its body language, talks aren’t going well.
The top of their heads is green so when they flock together, they can hide from predators by blending in with the limes.
It is, sadly, a rather ineffective strategy.
I’ve mentioned elsenet that I got a new lens to take photos with in Peru (those will be coming soon, I hope (there are an awful lot of them)).
This was the first zoo-related shot I took with it. It’s special in that it is very fast, very long, and very light, which is just what you want. In this respect, nature photography is exactly like fencing. The similarities continue in that it is fencing that this lens is able to foil. (Sorry)
Specifically, it’s the fence that keeps the lion from eating me as I take his picture that I need to shoot through. A fast lens (one with a small aperture number which, just to screw with you, means a bigger aperture) also means that there is a narrow depth of field. See how the lion is in focus, but the plants immediately behind him are out of focus. This works two ways because the fence up near me is also out of focus. It’s so out of focus it’s basically not there anymore, and the result is an image that looks like it was taken in Africa instead of in Wisconsin.
The early worm has a bit of a crap deal, actually.
If you look closely, you can see the the seal’s head it coming out of the water, but the body is bent. This is due to refraction of light as it exits the water … and the fact that seals have necks.
There have been rumours of a fountain of gold for centuries. Alas, these three explorers found the fountain of rock first.
Fur absorbs water. Think how much deeper the water would be if it weren’t full of monkey.
Ever notice there are no anthocyaninic pine trees?
That’s because they heard us calling them “evergreens” and traveled back in time to make sure they’d evolve that way.
They also volunteer to come into our houses in the Winter to keep us company, shelter presents, and give our cats places to exercise.
Pine trees are really quite obliging fellows.
“The shadow of your sorrow hath destroy’d the shadow or your face.”
I’m not nearly as much an expert in botanical gardens as I am with zoos, but I’m pretty sure there’s a troll somewhere under there.
Wild macaws don’t much like people and insist on staying extremely far away. This is why I was glad that I brought the big lens.
One trick to a good photograph that mixes architecture and nature is to make is to use flawed symmetry. The lack of perfect balance forces the viewer to stop and consider, just a bit, the imperfections of reality and how, upon further thought, they are preferable to the alternative.
It can be difficult to select the proper mix of dried herbs when preparing a dish. This is why the most discerning chefs use taste testers.
When you don’t focus on them, snakes can be very sparkley.
He was torn. He loved her, he thought, but he also loved his family. He remembered his father’s words, making it clear that he was to work the farm not chase after “some damn glittering fog devil”. She, on the other hand, was wonderful. He’d met her by the lake, seen her dancing in the mist, mere hair-breadths above the surface of the water, shining in the rising moon. When she’d seen him, she winked as she sank out of sight, leaving nary a ripple behind.
He didn’t know what to do then. Part of him wanted to run away, remembering the stories his gran had told about witches in the woods, but part of him wanted to dive in after her.
He settled for coming back the next day, or maybe he’d stayed. He couldn’t quite remember, his mind’s eye full of the soft flow of hair, the flick of a wrist, the quick glimpse of a toe.
That morning, as he sat by the lake waiting for the sun to rise above the mountains, he felt cold and damp, as expected, but he also felt strange … uncertain whether to call out or hide behind the boulder, uncertain whether to give up and go home, or to go home, bring back a boat and row out to meet her. Then he saw her eyes gleaming in the distance, staring deep into his.
He lost track of time as she danced and, again, vanished.
The next day … perhaps later on the same day … he thought back to his gran’s stories, about the young men and the women of the village that had vanished. He knew that it has something to do with the people in the mist, but so few could describe them to him. He’d only ever heard about people that saw them from a distance. He knew he had to talk to his gran … eventually. Maybe he’d wait just a bit more.
His gran couldn’t tell him anything that he didn’t already know. She mentioned that someone she had cared about when she was his age vanished, but that it was OK because she’d met his paps, and eventually come to have his father. She warned him away from the lake, like she always had as far back as he could remember. He didn’t listen though.
She’d danced closer then before slipping away from his sight as he was dazzled by the bursting sun. He remembered running for home to talk to his father, though it felt as though part of him remained behind. His father swore at him, but that was nothing new. He was reminded of his mother’s disappearance, of his paps’ disappearance, of everyone he’d known all too briefly and how, in each case, they’d been seen near the lake and then never again. The only way to be safe was to stay in the town, and work. “Just work!” his father said, not knowing why it was so hard for him to understand, but then, his father had never seen her dance.
The next thing he knew, she was dancing again, and he was lost in thought, thinking of differences in the lives he could live. He thought of safe lives … working the farm as his father wanted, seeking his fortune in the city as his gran wanted, getting a berth and sailing the sea as he used to want, building a cottage and starting his own farm. Or, of course, raising the nerve and stepping into the lake. All this he was thinking and almost didn’t notice when she danced ever nearer, reaching out, touching his forehead.
He saw green.
——
His gran and father sat in the old run-down house, staring at one another, but seeing neither. They hadn’t heard from him since he ran after that hare into the woods, ignoring their calls to return. They couldn’t chase him down, he could run far faster than either of them could anymore. All they could do was stand, out of breath and watch him run off in the direction of the lake, days ago.
Meanwhile, there he sat, alone with his branching thoughts.
Question mark snakes follow the Coriolis effect.
In North America, they look like: ?
In South America, they look like: ¿
Near the equator, the effect is smaller and both marks are used.
It’s easier for some than others to participate in Movember.
The hardest part of getting shots like this is erecting the force field around the perch.