With the cold weather fast approaching there won’t be many more photo opportunities like this.
When I looked at the photograph on my computer screen I was struck by the background and couldn’t decide whether to make it the focus of the shot or the bee. As I couldn’t choose I thought I’d show three versions of the photograph altered only by the crop.
I believe this bird is a sparrow but I can’t say for sure. For the past month or so we’ve been visiting a wildlife garden as our favourite reserve is still closed after a recent storm. The garden attracts many smaller birds and I was pleased to capture this bird balancing on a twig in the water.
There were a number of sparrows flying in and out of the pine trees just out of range of my lens. This one, on the other hand, perched close by just off the ground. It remained there for quite a while unlike the other sparrows who kept on the move. I believe it is a female White-throated Sparrow.
This giant inflatable jellyfish is suspended inside a glass lantern in the Canadian Museum of Nature in Ottawa, a spectacular looking building in the Gothic Revival style. The museum completed in 1912 has undergone several renovations, the latest between 2004-2010.
The contrasting architectural styles and this extraordinary creature made for an interesting afternoon and the black and white version adds a bit more drama to the photograph.
Wildflowers are fading and no longer quite perfect. I think I might just prefer them now, their colours more muted and their edges not as sharp. The first photo is soft focus and it was the field rather than a particular flower that I chose to capture. The Queen Anne’s Lace has a beautiful woven pattern which is what I focussed on in the second.
Our favourite reserve was damaged in a destructive windstorm storm last week and is closed to the public for the foreseeable future. We’ll miss the beauty of the place and the animals that call it home. In the meantime we’ve been exploring new trails and spotted this white-throated sparrow along one of them.
Mallards are favourite subjects of mine, they’re numerous and very photogenic so I get a lot of opportunities to photograph them. As other birds depart for warmer climates, many mallards brave our winters and I should get more shots of them as the weather changes.
