Wednesday, August 31, 2016

8/31/16

So I am posting more birds today.  Waterbirds too which seems fitting with all the rain we have received lately.  :-)  I saw this lovely Swan family on an outing to Tamarac Wildlife Refuge in Minnesota on a rather windy day in June.  The wind was making the lake very choppy but this family did not seem to mind it during their swim.


Tuesday, August 30, 2016

8/30/16

Well, we are cooling down for a few days again, nice.  Good chances for rain even though we are already pretty wet.  We'll see though.  Apparently I am in a green mood the last 2 days as my images are predominantly that color.  :-)  Today's image is from a walk I did around where I live on Friday afternoon.  The road construction has destroyed a lot of the natural area like wildflowers but there are still a few good spots left.  I found this lovely grass in one area and took a few shots.  This is called Green Foxtail Grass according to a website I found on native Kansas grasses.  I love the curve it has and how it is so wispy as well.  It does have the appearance of a bushy fox tail.  :-)



Monday, August 29, 2016

8/29/16

I had forgotten about this image I shot back in June when I was in Minnesota.  I was looking for something else the other day and found it.  Not sure how I forgot as it was one of the best ever shots I had taken of a Redwing Blackbird.  It was sitting and posing very nicely on some dried Cattails in a marsh area of a pond and I was able to get several shots of it.  I am heading back up to the area soon so thought it was appropriate to post today for that reason as well.


Sunday, August 28, 2016

8/28/16

Well we are having a couple of more normal days for August, up around 90 today and yesterday go fairly warm as well.  Cooling off a bit again though tomorrow and the rest of the week.  My image goes back to a beautiful day in Southwestern Colorado and the Durango & Silverton Railway.  This is an image of the train above the Animas River on the famous Highline as it heads to Silverton.  It is moving very slowly at this time so you get a lovely view of the river below.


Saturday, August 27, 2016

8/27/16

Posting a bit late today because I was off doing train stuff for the day.  The railroad has a pond that lots of dragonflies visit.  Today there was also this guy.  He was kind of cute sitting under a leaf after he came out of the water and very green.  


Friday, August 26, 2016

8/26/16

It's Friday!  It's been a long week.  It's rainy too.  Because of that I decided to share some happy Daisies.  These were growing alongside my pond this summer.  It had rained on this day too so the drops behind created some nice spots of bokeh effect.


Thursday, August 25, 2016

8/25/16

So we started out very wet today with over an inch of rain.  Nice and cool too today which is odd for August but I'll take it.  My image is from earlier in the year when the Honey Bees were out an about collecting pollen.  I haven't seen them much so I hope they are finding flowers elsewhere.  This is a capture of 3 of them busily working on the Salvia.


Wednesday, August 24, 2016

8/24/16

So this is an older image that I was pleased to have been able to capture.  I think this is the first butterfly I have caught in flight that turned out really well.  This Imported Cabbageworm was just about to land on a bloom of my Catmint plant when I got lucky with this shot.


Tuesday, August 23, 2016

8/23/16

This is an older image from a trip to Colorado that I never shared.  A lone, dead but still beautiful Cedar tree stands sentinel over the valley in the Black Canyon of the Gunnison.  I loved the colors in this area, quite beautiful.  My favorite photographer, William Henry Jackson, photographed this area in the late 1800s.  One of his images can be found Here.


Monday, August 22, 2016

8/22/16

A lovely day here in Kansas.  Only supposed to be in the 80s this week with cool mornings.  Nice.  I am sharing another bird today.  This week's Bird Poker game is sharing a bird type whose name begins with the day of the week.  So this is an older image I had gotten one winter of a Mockingbird for Monday sitting very nicely in the Walnut tree in the backyard.


Sunday, August 21, 2016

8/21/16

Well, it doesn't feel very steamy today even though my image today is for the Steamy Sunday theme I co-curate over on G+.  I am enjoying this cooler weather we are having instead of the heat.  Only 60F when I got up this morning.  Quite odd for August.  My image today is a monochrome treatment of the locomotive we rode behind at the Greenfield Village in Michigan.  This is Henry Ford's No. 7 near the roundhouse at the village.

There is an update to the Butterfly ID from post 8/11/16 for any followers interested.



Saturday, August 20, 2016

8/20/16

It's a beautiful cool day here in Kansas in August after quite a bit of rain yesterday as well.  Quite unusual for this time of year but after how hot and humid it's been it's quite enjoyable.  Last week I posted a Sunflower field shot and today I thought I would post a close up.  This one I took recently on one that I grew in my garden.  It's obviously of the red variety.  I love how the petals resemble little flames of fire.


Friday, August 19, 2016

8/19/16

So I have been whining about not seeing any large butterflies this summer.  I finally had one that came to visit for a while.  This is a male Tiger Swallowtail that I captured in some afternoon sun on my Buddleja or Butterfly Bush.  I have since seen it flying through the yard but so far have not seen it stopping.  Ah well.  At least I got to capture some shots of it this day.



Thursday, August 18, 2016

8/18/16

I'm sharing another bird today because of the Bird Poker game of Vegetarians and I got this image on Sunday morning.  It isn't the clearest because I shot it through a screen so it has a bit of canvas texture due to the screen.  I am not sure what type it is either with it's all white breast.  It was very cute though.  It would go to the feeder and eat and then come sit on this branch for a while.


Wednesday, August 17, 2016

8/17/16

Having a crazy week.  I felt like a soothing waterfall today.  This is an image from my trip to South Dakota which seems like ages ago but was just last summer.  This is in Spearfish Canyon in the Black Hills and is Roughlock Falls.  It was beautiful with the large main fall in the background and then how it split into the 2 wider falls over the rock.


Tuesday, August 16, 2016

8/16/16

Over on Google + they are playing Bird Poker and the theme is Finches.  I have had this shot for a while now and never shared.  A House Finch in the dead branches of one of our trees in the front yard.  I liked it against the very blue sky.


Monday, August 15, 2016

8/15/16

Well, we are going to have nice cool mornings all week.  I like it.  Only highs in the 80s as well.  Great!  My image today is a Teasel bloom that I played around with the processing.  I think it made the texture more noticeable.  I was trying to grow these and this was the third year they were in and finally bloomed.  However we are having road work done at the edge of our property and they bulldozed them over so I will have to try again.  I think they are cool and interesting flower heads.


Sunday, August 14, 2016

8/14/16

Another lovely day here in Kansas.  My image today goes back to Michigan and the Henry Ford Greenfield Village.  This is No. 7 pulling away from the main station as you enter the Village.  This was Henry Ford's personal locomotive for trips and has been beautifully restored.  I love the blue color.  It's a coal burning locomotive but they run it very cleanly, you hardly ever saw black smoke.


Saturday, August 13, 2016

8/13/16

Looks like beautiful days ahead here in Kansas and cooler too, very nice.  My photo today is one from the past that I have not shared before.  I took this at sunset south of where I live.  I was hoping to find a Sunflower field this year near me but no such luck.  For now I have to enjoy this one from the past.


Friday, August 12, 2016

8/12/16

Well, we got rain last night but it sure did not cool it off any yet.  The air was almost thick this morning.  Yuck, not refreshing at all.  Here's something to brighten the day though.  I captured this 12 Spot Dragonfly hanging out on the Hubster's truck antenna a couple of weekends ago.  He was just happy sunning himself there for a long time.  I loved the bokeh behind it in this image as well made by the leaves of the trees and sunlight.


Thursday, August 11, 2016

8/11/16

We're supposed to get some rain tonight to cool it off for a few days at least.  It's hot so I hope it does cool down even if the rain misses us, it's humid enough already.  Can you believe it, me saying it's OK if it doesn't rain?  LOL  So today's photo I shot this past weekend.  I got this small butterfly on some Rose of Sharon buds.  I need help with an ID.  As you can see it has a definite blue cast to the upper wing but the pattern of the under wing does not match any of the Blue Butterflies I can find.  The only thing I can come up with that it may be is a Duskywing but it seems too light and they aren't normally blue.   Leave a comment if you know, thanks in advance! 

Update:  I have since been told and checked it out, this is a Marine Blue Butterfly.  It is not normally found in this area and that's why I had so much trouble.  It is found in from South America through Mexico up to Southern Texas, Arizona and California.



Wednesday, August 10, 2016

8/10/16

The rain we have had was very nice but not fond of the humidity it brought.  Just walking around in the yard I get soaking wet since the heat is back as well.  This image is from cooler days while I was in Michigan.  We were out to dinner in the town of Dundee.  There is a park by a lovely old mill and this Egret was fishing in the stream.  This was while he was closer to the mill.  It was 4th of July and a couple of times firecrackers would go off and it would startle and go further downstream.  I watched it for a good while before it finally went out of sight.


Tuesday, August 9, 2016

8/9/16

Well, the heat is back.  Yuck.  Humid too.  Here is a Stearman Bi-plane close up that I captured at the Bi=plane Fly-In in Junction City.  Love these planes.  They were Navy training planes and several have been restored and are still flown.  Some give rides.


Monday, August 8, 2016

8/8/16

What a great weekend that was.  I spent most of it outside working in the yard.  Today is our last cool day for a bit.  Heading back into the mid 90s tomorrow.  While working outside I saw that my Milkweed plant had a bunch of Aphids on it and that there were a few Ladybugs too that had come to enjoy the feast.  I captured this one when it sat still for a moment and even came up with a title for it, On the Precipice.  


Sunday, August 7, 2016

8/7/16

Well, it's not even supposed to hit 80 degrees today.  How weird for August but I will take it because later in the week it's supposed to be 20 degrees hotter.  My image today goes back to a day in June in Rollag, Minnesota and the large scale Wagner locomotive I help to operate.  I captured it this day while our young engineer in training was at the throttle and going across the bridge near the new Roundhouse.



Saturday, August 6, 2016

8/6/16

A lovely cool day here in Kansas, how nice for August.  I saw this lovely sunrise on my way to work on Thursday and just had to stop and capture it.  I loved the rays of light it produced and hoped it would come out in the photo.  Sometimes it is worth getting up early in the morning.  :-)


Friday, August 5, 2016

8/5/16

So we got some nice rain again today.  This is so weird for August, usually we are hot and dry and wishing for rain.  It's supposed to be cooler for a few days now too so that's very nice as well.  My image today is of the most perfect Sunflower I have ever grown.  Usually some petals will open a little wacky or a part of it will be bug eaten but this one opened so beautifully.  It was lovely to watch it open and I was glad to have planted some Sunflowers since there is no field around here.  I can still enjoy them in my yard.


Thursday, August 4, 2016

8/4/16

A hot one again today.  Now rain chances for the foreseeable future.  Will be interesting to see what we get.  I got this image earlier this year.  I have seen a good number of these guys around and also Silver Spotted ones but not much in the way of an actual butterfly.  This is an Uncus Skipper that was enjoying the Salvia earlier this year.


Wednesday, August 3, 2016

8/3/16

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I was able to visit a Wolf Park in Indiana with my sis-in-law and her family.  It was a rainy day but we were lucky that the wolves were still up and about.  This is a beautiful Grey Wolf that was up and around and not too thrilled with the rain.  Looked a bit disheveled but still lovely with that great face.  Very cool animals. 


Tuesday, August 2, 2016

8/2/16

While we were in Michigan we went into Detroit one evening for dinner.  I had always seen on TV how decayed and supposedly dying Detroit was.  That is not what I experienced at all.  It probably has some decay in certain areas, all cities do, but downtown Detroit is beautiful with old architecture that is quite interesting and art deco and then in contrast some new style that looks rather futuristic.  I liked very much how this shot of the GMC tower with the MGM Grand as a sliver on the left turned out so that's why I am sharing it today.  The processing I did gave it even more of a futuristic appearance I thought.  I wish I had more time to spend in Detroit, it seemed quite the interesting city.



Monday, August 1, 2016

8/1/16

Well, the first day of August and going to be a hot one.  I captured today's image a while back on a walk out on Konza Prairie.  I always liked this one because it showed the vastness of the prairie and how the birds perch on something high and sing their hearts out to others in the evening.  This is a Western Meadowlark and they are in the Blackbird family and are ground feeders that are usually heard but not often seen.