Showcasing the beauty of Mother Nature
After seeing this challenge, I decided to go through the photos I took of fish eagles throughout my last trip to Southern Africa. I saw them from a lot of different vantage points, including from above, which is a unique way to watch birds.
I hope you enjoy!
For some time, I have been wanting to have more structure to my blog posts, a schedule to keep me from posting three things in one day, then nothing for a week. This weekend, I think I have come up with a workable plan. So before I get on with the photos for today, I’ll fill you in on what to expect in the coming days and weeks.
Since I have moved, I have been a bit lazy getting out with my camera, concentrating instead on editing the mass of photos I brought back from my last trip. I’ve really been missing being out with my camera, so I am going to start a weekly Sunday post titled What I’ve seen this week. Hopefully with this I can get back to wandering around with the dog and my camera, getting pictures of the local birds (and hopefully some deer or a moose too!).
Some of the fabulous bloggers I follow regularly post Monochrome Monday and Wordless Wednesday posts, and I am going to add those two as regular items, as I always enjoy seeing what others come up with.
Tuesday and Thursday I will dedicate to creating posts for the photo challenge that interest me from that week.
Friday and Saturday I am going to leave free to post whatever I have felt like shooting or editing that week.
Please feel free to leave a comment as this progresses and let me know if the new, more structured format works.
Since I am doing some housekeeping, this is a perfect time to mention that I have signed on with Fine Art America. I still have my Smugmug account, and over the coming months, will determine if I will focus on one, or keep both. Links to the two sites are below. Any of the photos the I post here, that I have added to the sales site, will have a direct link included below the photo. As always, if there is something you are interested that I have not yet added, please let me know and I will make that happen.
And with that, no one to the first instalment of What I’ve seen this week.
Wednesday was supposed to be a very strong evening for the aurora, but the near full moon made it very difficult to see much of anything. I did manage to catch a couple photos though.
This morning I took my camera out while walking with Spencer, and as we were heading home, heard some vigorous chirping and turned back to see if I could see who was making all the noise. It turned out to be two juvenile and one adult hairy woodpecker. The sky was very dull and the light was really not in my favour, but it’s another new bird species for me.
That’s all for this evening. I hope everyone has had a great weekend.
We had a new bird in the yard yesterday, and after some searching, I believe it is a red crossbill (female). I wish the photos were a bit sharper, but I got these with my zoom fully extended from some distance away; I was more concerned with identification than having a perfectly sharp photo. The crossbill is a year round resident of my area, so hopefully I will get more opportunities in the future.
I just came across this photo of a saddle-billed stork, which I think is a stunning bird. I feel a bit mean now calling one of it’s relatives creepy (see this post if you missed it Photo Challenge: Creepy
I guess truth be told, I don’t find the maribou stork creepy per se. It’s more thinking back to kids stories about storks bringing home new babies. I can only imagine a small child seeing one of these birds after hearing one of those tales, and then spending time being terrified about what might actually show up at home.
Whether they are really creepy or not, here are a few photos of maribou storks, creeping through the Okavango Delta in search of dinner.
A new visitor stopped by the yard this morning! I fired off quite a few shots from the porch, mostly so I could ID the bird, and then wandered closer. He or she didn’t mind my presence, and continued working up and down a couple of birch trees, picking off tiny insects. The red-breasted sapsuckers are a summertime visitor to my area, according to my bird app, so I am very grateful for the opportunity to view and photograph today.
Here are my photo’s for the travel theme- grey.
On our second day in Damaraland in Namibia, our guide Chris was doing his best to locate the desert adapted elephants for us to view. We were driving through a dry riverbed, going in a direction that seemed to be completely opposite to where the elephants tracks were headed. Since I couldn’t make heads or tails of the ellie tracks that crossed back and forth, this way and that, I kept my eyes out for birds and other animals.
A short distance from the vehicle, I spotted a martial eagle perched in low branch above the sandy riverbed. Chris quickly stopped the vehicle so I could get a quick shot, assuming as I did that the bird would be gone in a moment. Lucky for me, the eagle was very interested in posing for photos that morning, and sat still while the vehicle moved ahead, and then moved past it, so I could get photos from all angles. I do really seem to have great luck with bird photos when I least expect it (and we did carry on to locate the ellies too).
Here is my photo for Cee’s new Colourful World challenge. The colour of the week is lime or bright green. This little bee eater, perched amongst the bright green leaves of several different types of plants, seems a good fit.
Partway through our game drive on our last morning at Chitwa Chitwa, I spotted a fairly large bird in some trees a short distance from the vehicle, and our guide Surprise quickly realized that it was a hawk that had been successful hunting. We headed closer but the hawk was definitely not too comfortable with our presence and headed for a new tree as soon as we got too close. After that happened twice, we moved on to allow him (or her) to enjoy breakfast in peace.
It was such a cool sighting and I am very grateful I was able to capture it.
Have a great evening!
