As I mentioned in a previous post there is a feeling of change in the air, as the seasons slowly shift. I feel a pressing need to store up all the remaining sights and sounds of summer. One way of doing this is to linger a little longer in the fields of wildflowers. This touch-me-not and salsify caught my eye.
Rock Dove is another name for this bird, that most of us call the common pigeon. You see them all over the city, but we were in the country, in the woods, which made their sighting more unusual. They were the only two pigeons around, so perhaps they were a breeding pair. I had the time to really look at them as they perched in this natural setting and found them attractive, not a quality I usually attribute to this breed. More dove than pigeon these two.
These photographs are the first I’ve ever taken of this woodpecker. I have not seen one in our local woods although they are said to be quite common in our area. We spotted him while on a road trip earlier in the summer. The bird was a handsome one but tricky to take because of the light conditions. I had to open up the shadows, remove the colour cast and adjust the luminance and saturation. He was quite close to us and our presence didn’t bother him so we managed to make the most of our brief encounter.
This female mallard was drying off after a swim but those wayward feathers would not be tamed. She is moulting like many other birds at this point in the summer. It’s a vulnerable time as she can’t fly until her feathers are replaced. They’re excellent swimmers though and the lake provides a lot of reedy waterways to escape to.
I have had few opportunities this summer to see or photograph Great Blue Herons. In fact we’ve seen fewer birds of any kind this year. This handsome bird, although a distance from shore, was not hiding in the reeds so we were able to get clear photographs. I hope for more sightings as I have to get my fill before the cold weather sets in and the herons head south.
I noticed the muted background before I really saw the flower rising against it and was struck by the start of the slow change to fall. I walked a little further and saw this Maple, always the first tree at the reserve to change colour every year. We’re still under heat advisories and the days are long but the slow approach of fall has begun.
Continuing with my Thursday blog theme of trying out the Fuji XT-1, I took these flowers with the same lens (23mm). I didn’t really think to use a wide angle lens on flowers but I tried it and was quite pleased with the results. I’ve only ever worked with one camera at a time, a DSLR but with a Fuji in my future that’s going to change!
