So let’s see….I was a miserable failure according to the little birds over on the nature trails, so I decided to go out to the boardwalk to see what if anything was going on at the heron rookery.
The sky was clouding over when I got out to the boardwalk.
Every year I try to get out there frequently in the spring to watch the littles grow up. But I never get there enough, and this year I missed all of it.
Perhaps an adult resting after lunch duty.
Cause the littles weren’t so little anymore!
Are the nests empty?
It was about mid-day and most of the feeding activity had apparently already happened. There wasn’t much in the way of adults flying around.
Nope, not empty. They’re just deep and still hold hungry little ones.
But there was still enough activity to initiate a few anxious moments as the teenagers determined if the adult flying in was their adult.
Guess that wasn’t our order, guys.
Disappointment ran rampant.
This nest held four hopeful teenagers. They were keeping an eye out for mom or dad.
I enjoyed watching this mama (or daddy?) heron working on their nest.
Cleaning up the household.
After she got it the way she wanted it she rested a moment, shook her feathers and then sat back down.
Newborns are just so much work!
I think it’s a little late for eggs to still be there but maybe she has some late arrival babies in there.
I hope my partner shows up soon to spell me for awhile.
Mostly the adults just seemed tired of all the noise and chaos.
I swear, these kids need to grow up and take some responsibility for getting their own meals.
I wasn’t getting anything all that exciting when a group of kids showed up and I figured it was time to go.
Everybody’s having a good time, but they were noisier than the birds.
But then I took a few more pictures of stuff…
Hey! Where is everybody?
and as I was doing that I saw this swan flying toward me.
Incoming…
Directly at me, actually,
Really…..INCOMING!!
Until he (or she) was right there in front of me and then overhead. It was amazing and resulted in my favorite shots of the day.
Duck!!!
Things like being in the flight path of a swan make me want to go out there every day. I was definitely smiling as I headed for the car.
Not duck!!! SWAN!!!! (You see what I did there…)
And I smiled some more when I stopped at a little picnic area on my way out of the park. But that will have to wait.
Earlier this week I felt the need to be in the woods, so I grabbed my camera and my new lens and went out early to see what I could see.
Near the park entrance it seemed obvious that Mrs. Osprey didn’t want her picture taken as she sat low in her nest so I moved along.
Gotta respect a mother’s wishes.
“I haven’t showered in days and it’s early in the morning. Give me a break!“
As I walked toward the nature center and the beginning of the trails I realized I hadn’t thought to bring the birds anything to eat.
Well, I thought, they’d have to get over it.
Darn, I’m being attacked! Run for it!
I hadn’t taken into account I was the first car in the parking lot and that it had been raining for two days so people hadn’t visited these hungry birds in awhile. I was instantly attacked by an angry mob of red winged blackbirds as I rounded the corner. I heard their wings first and then felt one bounce off my head. Then another. They were everywhere.
I thought I was in a movie, and not in a good way.
“Look lady, hand over the seed and nobody gets hurt.“
I swatted some of them away and moved faster down the trail, blackbirds following closely.
I had managed to get out into the marsh, with only a few blackbirds circling my head, when I heard a Baltimore oriole singing his heart out.
Hiding behind a couple of leaves.
He seemed to be celebrating the sun as he sang in the morning light.
Then he moved out into the sunshine to show off.
As he sat there singing he began to preen, as if he was singing in the shower.
“Just need to get that little bit of leftover gnat out of my armpit…”
He was fun to watch and the blackbirds got bored and headed back up the trail to wait for their next victim. They could only hope that person wasn’t such an airhead.
Though the blackbirds had given up, other birds had not. A little titmouse quietly asked if it was true, that there was no food.
“Seriously? There’s no food?”
I felt bad, but I had to tell him the truth. I had forgotten his breakfast. I was amazed at how quickly he abandoned me, once he realized I was a waste of time.
I wandered off to look for other pretty things to photograph. I figured it probably wouldn’t be a bird kind of day given I was a bird feeder failure.
I had to stop and enjoy the view.
I felt lucky that the iris was in bloom and so very beautiful.
Golden iris in the morning light.
But while I was focused on the iris, my eyes glued to the viewfinder trying to get just the right composition, I heard wings again. And again I felt something largish bounce off the top of my head.
“Hey lady!! What’s for breakfast?”
The male red-bellied woodpecker was miffed that I wasn’t offering anything to eat. And he wasn’t afraid to tell me off either.
“Seriously???”
I told him I was sorry, but I didn’t bring anything. And I went back to photographing the iris.
There were the obvious yellow iris, but also these delicate, smaller, purple blooms as well.
Off to the right of me I heard a big uproar. Turns out Mrs. Red-bellied wasn’t happy either.
“Hey Mr! Get to work and bring home some bacon or this relationship is over!”
I wasn’t sure if she was mad at me for forgetting or him for being a bad provider. Either way she wasn’t getting anything to eat. He jumped to and got to work finding her something…anything!
“Now where did I store that fat ant from last fall?”
He looked everywhere.
How about some nice lichen, sweetie?
“This might be a nice change of pace from the stuff the lady usually brings.”
In between his forages for something natural to feed his demanding wife (who kept on complaining. Loudly.) he’d come back and dive bomb me for being such a disappointment. I kept looking for pretty things to photograph.
My artsy image from this walk.
He followed me almost all the way around a big loop, complaining and doing flybys. Eventually I moved out of his range and settled into a more peaceful walk.
What?? No food???!”
Of course most of the other inhabitants of the woods were equally stressed by my lack of responsibility. I promised them I would never ever forget to bring their snacks again.
“Inconceivable!”
I probably should just pack a snack bag for them and leave it in my car to be more prepared in the future.
“I would think you’d be more thoughtful, Lady!”
Feeling remorseful I headed over to the heron rookery to see what was new. I figured the herons wouldn’t be mad at me given I never feed them.
“And don’t come back here without lunch!”
But I’ll tell you all about that in the next post. I have to say a couple of my favorite images happened over there!
Penny here. Geeze people, here I am having all sorts of adventures and mom and my aunt take off camping for a couple days and get to post about it for years. Ok. For days.
This is my studious look. I think it works.
But my point is, do I get to post? No I do not. I have not been given access. Until now, when mom finally gave into my pressure. I told her I won’t sleep in her stinking tent until she posts about all the fun stuff I’ve already done this month!
We went to Katie’s park for our annual photo shoot.
I know my friends have been wondering what I’ve been up to and let me tell you I’ve been really busy! And most of what I’ve been into isn’t going to get me into trouble either! Win-win!
Mom likes a good head tilt, and I try to oblige.
First off, as most of you know, my sister Angel Katie always had a spring yellow flower photo shoot with mom. Well, she told me all about it and I demanded equal yellow flower opportunity. I’m pretty sure it’s in my contract with my folks. So mom took me over to Katie’s park one day early this month.
Mom says I did really good. I thought it took way too long.
Are we almost done, mom?
Then when my Aunt Beth was here we stopped near some other yellow flowers and mom grabbed a few pictures. By then I was an expert at being a model, so it didn’t take long at all.
I think the sun was in my eyes that day.
My Aunt Beth and mom and I also went on quite a few walks in different parks. We all had the best time with beautiful blue skies and hardly any bugs!
Aren’t I cute?
I got to show Aunt Beth several of my own personal parks and especially how well I can sit for the camera. As long as there were treats available, of course.
I look kind of small, don’t I.
She was very impressed.
And THEN, the most exciting thing! I got to go on a walk with my Aunt Beth and my Mama S and my mom and even my doggy mom Vivian and her roommate Oliva!
Mom asked them to walk up this trail to set us up for a photo.
It was amazing! Three shelties all going for a walk together. I tell you what, we caused lots of heads to turn when we all walked by!
It wasn’t easy to get the three of us lined up.
OK, so sometimes I was a little rambunctious, and Mama S had to tell me to straighten up. After all, I’m still a baby…right? Oh…what….no? Not so much?
Sometimes a girl’s just got to leap for joy.
Well, I guess I’ll start acting more adult tomorrow, but that day I had so much fun! I got to share one of my favorite parks with my three moms and my aunt!
Yep we had a great time walking together.
I’m so grateful that Mama S brought her girls along on this walk! I promised her we’d do it again soon!
That’s my mom, Vivian next to me (I’m in the center) and her bestie Olivia on the right.
And then, still in the month of May, I got to go on a play day with my friend Lance! I can’t even begin to figure out how mom and dad managed to get this much fun stuffed into one month!
Let’s see. When I left you last my sister and I had driven a few hours north, scoped out a potential night sky photography site at a lighthouse, and set up our campsite at Harrisville State Park.
The view from our campsite.
The purpose of this three night camping adventure was to capture the Milky Way in darker skies than those around my house. I’d made the three night reservation six months ago in order to get a prime Lake Huron shoreline site.
I was sure that at least one night would have clear skies.
A view of the lighthouse from about where we planed to stand later that night.
Based on weather forecasts it looked like Monday night/Tuesday morning was my only chance. So we set our phone alarms to get us up at 2:00 a.m. and in the early morning darkness we drove the few miles to the lighthouse.
We quickly found the “X” we had drawn in the sand earlier in the day and began to set up shop. But while I was lengthening the tripod legs I noticed a light way out on the horizon, shining just above the bench I intended to use as a foreground. The light bothered me because it was so bright.
See that light in the middle of the horizon? It was a lot brighter than it looks here. The orange is light pollution.
I took a couple shots but didn’t like what I was seeing.
Too much light from towns to the south.
I decided to shorten the tripod legs in an attempt to hide the light behind the dune. I sent my sister over to the bench so I could try to focus on it, intending for it to be in the foreground which would be stitched together with another image with the focus being the stars.
She’s walking back using the red light. You can still see some of that bright light on the horizon to the right of her.
That didn’t work, I couldn’t focus on her at all, so I gave up that theory. Plus we were too far away from the bench and if I moved closer there would be that darn light out there on the horizon.
I decided to just try for a single image, nothing I had to stitch together later, just practicing getting the stars in focus. That worked and I took several of the same image so I’d have some spares to practice stacking when I got back home.
You can see the bench, but it’s really small and there’s too much light pollution.
But all the time I was focused on the Milky Way I’d been distracted by the lighthouse to my right. The grounds had a single large light on the other side of the building which was lighting up the side of the tower. I thought it was beautiful and wanted to get a shot of that even if it wasn’t a Milky Way image.
I started to move the camera around while not realizing the shutter was still open.
So once I was done with the multitude of stackable images of the Milky Way, and feeling disappointed in the images I had so far, I turned the camera toward the lighthouse. And the first test image I took I realized included a small part of the Milky Way!
How exciting, it was possible to get the Milky Way and the lighthouse in the same image! Quickly I shifted the camera to the right. And this is what I saw:
Nikon Z6ii, 20 mm, iso 3200, 12 seconds.
The yard light they had perfectly lit the tower without being obscene. I had enough time in between flashes of light to get the image because there was so much other light around. And by moving to the right I had eliminated most of the ugly orange light pollution that blasted out over the lake.
I was thrilled.
The rest of the night I worked on getting the best composition, and then taking multiple shots to stack later. I think I was also trying to get one image with the lighthouse in focus that I could use as a foreground to be blended with my best sky shot.
To be honest I don’t know if I did that. I haven’t looked closely at all the images yet. I fell in love with the single image I’m showing you now and sort of stopped looking after that.
It’s such a great reminder of the entire adventure.
If I don’t end up doing anything more with these I’ll still be happy. I need to read the study guides in my online class to learn how to do blends where part of the image is from one shot with the foreground in focus and the rest of the image is from a sky shot with the stars in focus. It can’t be that hard. Right?
Right???!
So what did we do the rest of our three nights at Harrisville? Well…this has gotten too long already so once again you’ll have to wait and see. But I don’t think anything we did the rest of our time there will top that first night.
Hint: There were no more clear skies, day OR night!
When I’m out shooting the stars I don’t feel the cold. My sister, who was patiently waiting for me was marching up and down the beach trying to thaw her toes. I didn’t notice the cold until we got back to the car, and then I realized I was cold to the core.
We got back to camp about 5 a.m. and headed to our tents to get one hour of sleep before the 6 a.m. sunrise which we wanted to photograph. But we were both so cold all we did was shiver in our tents, even with our electric blankets, as we waited for the sun to come up.
The first hint of sunrise.
And after we got a couple shots with the sun rising we scurried to McDonalds to get a hot cup of coffee and a breakfast sandwich. It took a couple hours before we were ready to head back to our tents for a nap.
It was pretty but we were too cold to appreciate it.
Warm was good.
So Monday night/Tuesday morning was the highlight of our camping adventure. Would it be worth it to stick around Harrisville for the rest of our reservation? Hard to say. When I get some more time I’ll show you around town.
Six months ago I reserved a campsite on the shores of Lake Huron during a new moon cycle, intent on doing some Milky Way photography. Many years ago Katie and I camped at this state park and I remembered a lighthouse located just a few miles north that might work for night photography.
This is the Sturgeon Point Lighthouse.
My sister drove all the way up from Alabama just to go with me on this photography adventure. Last Monday we set out early in the day so that we had time to scout out the lighthouse location for potential night shots.
My sister noticed this split in color on the lake.
You see, the weather didn’t look promising beyond Monday night. That’s what happens when you have to book something months out. Weather is always the unknown element. We expected a clear night Monday, but rain and cold Tuesday and Wednesday.
We discussed going back home Tuesday if it was miserable.
Monday was a beautiful day.
And we knew we’d only have one night to get the Milky Way. So we needed to be ready.
The lighthouse was just as I remembered it, standing tall on the shores of the Great Lake. We wandered the beach looking for something interesting to put in the foreground.
The bench might look fun under the Milky Way.
Eventually we decided we needed to be quite a bit behind the lighthouse in order to be shooting Southeast where the Milky Way would be. We found a place that might work, tucked low behind a small dune, and made a big X in the sand so we could find the spot in the darkness of 2 a.m., our planned shoot time.
Probably not this angle though.
Then we explored other places on the site, including Baily School which wasn’t open, but we got an interesting shot through the window anyway.
A school room from back in the day.
We wandered down the beach to the south, thinking maybe the rocks out in the water might be interesting. Even if we didn’t end up shooting there at night, they made a nice, minimal, image in the sunshine we were enjoying.
Maybe we could light paint this rock.
Eventually it was time to go check into the campground. If all three days were as nice as Monday we’d have a wonderful time. If only.
Our campsite, right on the shore, was small, but we managed to make it work.
Maybe the weather forecasts were wrong.
We did note that of the handful of people camping along the shore we were the only ones in tents. Perhaps we were a touch too early in the camping season.
The view from our camp site looked promising.
Not to worry, we each had electric blankets and we were confident that we’d be fine. This was not our first spring camping experience.
Our beach. Though it was too cold to swim.
So…you might ask…what happened on Monday night? Did we leave our nice warm, snuggly beds to drive up to the lighthouse at 2 in the morning? Or did the waves lapping on the shore lull us back to sleep after our alarms rang?
Mom says we haven’t had internet for a million years. Ok, maybe it only FELT like a million years, maybe it was just about a week.
Mom told me to sit on this bench. So I did.
Anyway I’ve been to lots and lots of parks lately ’cause mom and dad are getting stuff done on the house and I tend to bark a lot while stuff is being done on the house.
But mom! I’m not sure about sitting next to a BOY!
Plus mom says it’s really nice to have the time to go to parks and work on my behavior issues. Seriously mom? Does it look like I have behavior issues?
Deuce seemed to tolerate my curiosity, but I don’t think he was thrilled to sit next to a GIRL either.
I didn’t think so.
Mom says she has some really nice pictures of me that she will share with you once she gets them edited and stuff. Which could be a million years from now.
Or a about a week.
Pictures in this post were taken by my Aunt Karen, Deuce’s mom.
Hard telling with mom.
Signing off for now, your photography model and exemplary citizen,
I was at Kensington last week. We were lucky enough to find the red-headed woodpecker and his friends on this walk.
They don’t care about you, dove, they just want to see me!Hey, settle down woodpecker, they left enough stuff for all of us.Yea, I guess you’re right. I feel bad about my behavior now. Sorry, man. Help yourself.We can still be friends…right?Hey blackbird, I was just telling the dove that there’s enough for everybody.I’ll just take mine to go.Sometimes I forget it’s not all about me.
Mom told me you were all waiting for me to tell you about my day(s) of adventure. I thought I had delegated that to her, but you know how hard it is to get good help these days.
You have to cross the railroad track to get to my park!
So I guess I best get to the telling.
Mom?Are you going to take pictures of me all day?
Mom and Dad are having some work done in the food room. Given that’s my favorite room in the whole house I tend to keep a very close watch on things going on in there.
Mom says I get under everybody’s feet and somebody’s going to get hurt.
It was a windy morning!That made me kind of nervous.
Plus did I mention I bark very loudly and for a long time if anyone uses a power tool in my vicinity? Uh huh. So Mom decided she and I needed to go on an adventure all day, or until the nice men with the power tools vacated my property.
Mom said in addition to the wind, the light was really beautiful.Huh. I thought it was ME that was beautiful.
We went out early in the morning and our first stop was MY park! Did mom tell you I have a park named after me?
What is it with mom and wanting me to sit on stuff?
Well, it’s not official or anything. Not yet anyway. I know Katie has a park, and I’m really happy that now I do too! It’s a new part of a big park, and you have to walk over a railroad track to get to it.
Mom doesn’t like crossing railroad tracks.
That creeps mom out, but I told her not to fixate on it and just keep moving. Geeze. Sometimes mom is a wimp.
There’s a pretty little kettle lake back here.
It was windy the morning we were there, and cold, but I was having a great time exploring until mom tried to walk with me into the woods. I’ve told her and told her I don’t really like being in the woods. And that day there were leaves blowing all around and trees creaking and stuff.
Did I hear something back there?
Well mom finally got the idea that I wasn’t happy there and we went back out to an open part. I liked that much better. But the wind was getting worse and it was cold and mom said we needed to move on.
We spent some time in the car warming up and then mom took me over to 7 Lakes State Park. It’s about 15 minutes from our house and a park mom has never explored before.
Mom found lots of interesting stuff to photograph at this park!
A sign there said it was called 7 Lakes because a developer dammed up a river and it flooded 7 small lakes into two bigger lakes. Then the developer decided not to build on the property and sold it to the state for a park.
This is a real pretty state park!
It’s real pretty. There’s lots to explore there, but this time we just walked out on the earthen dam. Mom took lots of pictures that weren’t me.
There was a little island out there with some geese swimming in the open water.
Then on the way off the dam mom asked me to stand on some big rock. I thought it was more fun to stand with just my front feet on the rock. Mom thought I was pretty cute that way too.
There are trails and lots of things to explore at this park. We’ll be back for sure!
Like this, mom?
Then, since the tool guys were still in my food room, mom took me to a third park, about 30 minutes away. It’s near a library where she used to work. We’ve been there once before.
I’m not sure about this bridge mom, there’s water under it!
Somehow this park always gives mom uneasy feelings. She doesn’t know why. She says she never sees any other people there, but the day we were there we met a nice young couple out walking. It was getting late so we only did one small loop. I was getting tired of posing, but I stood on the bridge for her, and then on a log. But I wasn’t happy about it.
I don’t really want to sit here, can we go find some food instead?
I was so happy when dad texted mom that the tool guys were gone and we could go home. I’ve never been to three parks in one day before! It was fun but it was exhausting!
Last picture of me today, mom!Promise?
During the day we drove around a lot too, and mom figured out I’m a pretty good rider on long drives. She says she is glad about that because someday we’ll go on a big adventure together!
Bigger than three parks in one day mom? Wow! I can’t even imagine that!
Mom even managed to find a barn on our adventure!
Oh – it turns out the tool guys weren’t done with the project so mom and I had to leave home again on another day this week. I’ll have to wait to tell you about that day, cause I’m still pretty exhausted and need a nap.
I bet you’re exhausted just reading about our adventure day!
It’s a pretty cool barn, I can understand why she stopped.
Change Is Hard 