Archiving my Twitter, Facebook and other social network activity
A #swallowtail #butterfly, photographed using the classic technique of desperately following it with the camera and clicking the shutter when I hope it’s pointing vaguely in the right direction to at least catch it in frame and it probably won’t be in focus anyway but with luck it’ll at least be identifiable and…hey, not bad!
(Otherwise I’ve basically given up trying to actually aim at butterflies when they’re flying.)
Western Tiger Swallowtail
Sign at a local bar/club/lounge on a partly cloudy day.
This is the same place that proclaimed “We missed some of you!” when they reopened after the winter pandemic surge shutdown.
I think they’ve mostly been doing “patio” dining in the parking lot, but inside gathering spots have been slowly reopening over the last month or so as case rates plummet in California and vaccination rates climb.
I saw several monarch butterflies at the botanic gardens up in the hills yesterday, but no more than about three at a time. Numbers have dropped drastically over the last few years.
#photo #butterfly #MonarchButterfly #nature
Not a claw, though it looks remarkably like one. It’s a chunk of iceplant partly buried in the sand.
#photo #blackandwhite #sand #plants
Evening primrose and some kind of brome in the open space near a bike path.
#flowers #plants #EveningPrimrose #nature #photo
Probably a Cooper’s Hawk, spotted on a walk this afternoon. It flew up to a telephone pole, alighted there for a few seconds, and as I was trying to line up a shot with the camera, it took off again, then flew a few houses down the street to perch in this tree.
I also posted a closer crop on my *ahem* @AddHawk account
This #bluebird was perched near this tree, possibly even on the same post, but the moment I snapped the shutter, it flew up to a nearby roof. So I tried to get a decent angle on it, and was about to walk away when it flew back to the tree, landing on this post, grooming itself for a few moments, and then stopping to look around.
Who knew a hawk could be a #birb?
Spotted in a park. Probably a Cooper’s Hawk.
I heard a lot of chirping from this tree, and saw a cluster that looks like it could be a nest near where this hawk was standing guard. It just kind of looked around the whole time even as I walked past the tree. If it was standing guard, it must have been able to tell I wasn’t a threat.
Statue of Ramona Quimby, one of several inspired by Beverly Cleary characters in Grant Park in Portland, Oregon. Photo from a trip in 2013.
TBH, though, Atlas Obscura got better photos than I did
#statue #BeverlyCleary #Portland #photo
First time I’ve noticed one of these birds, but they’re apparently all over North America: A Northern Flicker, a type of #woodpecker.
(I was kind of annoyed that it was on the shaded side of the tree, but I can’t really blame it. The late afternoon sun was really bright.)
A couple of Black Phoebes spotted in the cherry grove.
Some days I spot a lot of birds at these gardens, some days (like on this one) I mostly just hear them. Though I was at least able to *see* some red-tailed hawks circling way up in the sky, even though I couldn’t get any photos of them.
On Photog.Social
On Flickr
On Flickr
On iNaturalist
On iNaturalist
Cherry blossoms are coming in at the local botanic gardens. They have a grove with multiple different cherry trees in various stages of waking up for spring (some with a few flowers, some with more flowers and leaves, some still bare), and a few scattered trees elsewhere in the garden – some of which are already covered. But the tree in the fourth shot isn’t even in full bloom yet!
#nature #trees #photo #sakura #cherryblossoms #garden
This fox squirrel was hiding at the base of a bush in a city park. As I approached, it ran up a nearby tree and then paused a few feet up.
#squirrel #photo #nature #animals
On Photog.Social
Full photo on Flickr
I went back through my photos and found one where you *can* see the green on the male wigeon’s head!
Here’s a male and a female, plus a coot. The coots were scattered around the entire pond, while the wigeons were mostly at one end (probably not coincidentally, the end where people were more likely to stand around tossing bread into the water. Right next to the sign saying not to feed the birds, especially not bread.)
#birds #wigeon #nature #photo #coot
Nice small collection of unusual photos of Martian landscapes from Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter at Daily Overview. I don’t know what the blue triangle thing is.
The description doesn’t say, but I’m guessing most of them are false-color or exaggerated.
(Images originally from NASA)
https://www.getrevue.co/profile/dailyoverview/issues/mars-reconnaissance-orbiter-433906
Call your doctor if you experience double wigeon.
There were SO MANY wigeons at the pond that day. A lot of the males were making this whistling sound like a squeaky toy and making a big display of flapping their wings. Duck waving, I suppose you could call it.
The males’ heads also had this green iridescence, but I couldn’t capture it.
#birds #nature #photo #wigeon #duck #swimming
I saw a few dozen wigeons swimming in the pond as well. Some of them were swimming in male/female pairings, while some of the males were making whistling/squeaky noises and displaying their wings.
I had such a hard time getting a shot of this Yellow-Rumped Warbler. It kept hopping from one twig to another as I tried to aim the camera, and actually hid behind some branches for a bit. But I finally got it!
