Today's walk report: 071015

Catching up... again.

For the most part it's been too hot for walks within a time frame for capturing under decent light, so while there has been plenty of walking there's been little picture taking. Here's what I've got from the last several weeks...

053015...

Male mourning dove (Zenaida macroura) in an olive tree

Immature rufous hummingbird (Selasphorus rufus)

Tagetes lemmonii

A red-eared slider (Trachemys scripta elegans) rests near a water lily

Flame Skimmer (Libellula saturata) dorsal view

and ventral view

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Checkered grass skipper on Salvia Microphylla

Another round with Crassula perforata

A southwestern fence lizard

Drying pods on some agave

Tagetes lemmonii

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Female Anna's hummingbird (Calypte anna)

A pair of red-tailed hawks squawking up a storm 

 Red-tailed hawk in flight #1

and #2 still squawking

The BIG story, despite it lacking as a photo offering. Frankly I was too in awe to get much in the way of photos, besides most of the action would have had me shooting into hopes and prayers. Let's face it butterflies in flight are a tough subject.

This is a pair of monarch butterflies mating. The show before this landing was spectacular. The pair first circled above me, inches apart from each other, like a small butterfly tornado flying upward as much as 30 feet. But that wasn't dramatic enough--they then coupled IN FLIGHT, flew as one and landed in this bush. Next they took flight linked together for a hop to another part of the bush less than 2 meters from my camera and remained conjoined for close to two minutes. Finally they flew off as one once again over the bush and out of view. It was one of the most beautiful courtships I've ever seen!

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Another agave soon to blossom

This is some seriously chomped upon cacti. I'm going to assume this was done by a hare but whatever it was, how it got past all of those spines is amazing.

A female rufous hanging out

Lesser goldfinch in Salvia uliginosa

This was a another first, the American bullfrog affectionately known as Kevin, mostly above water and in the open, catching the day's end on a rock. We've seen Kevin before both here and here.

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We're just about home and I spotted this wacky flying little butterfly. About the size of a dime it was too small and its flight too erratic to see just how pretty it was. Finally it landed and I had just enough time to get a close-up lens onto a 70-300 mm zoom.

Dainty sulphur butterfly (Nathalis iole)

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Female  Blue Dasher (Pachydiplax longipennis)

Female rufous hummingbird

Another Female rufous hummingbird

and the same bird in a different location, probably checking me out

That's all for now... check back soon and remember, comments are usually welcomed while corrections on flora and fauna IDs are most appreciated.

Today's walk report: 021614

Sunday double header.

Say what?!?

That's right, starting with a very quiet late A.M. matinée walk to the garden...

Gulf Fritillary or Passion Butterfly (Agraulis vanillae) on Lantana.

I named these two Eric and Docken.

Then there were the turtles again. Which one is Yertle?

These two, I named Eric and Docken.

Unknown moth on Tagetes lemmonii.

This is an unknown, I'll ID later, I promise. These flowers are tiny. Shot at 300 mm with a Canon 500D close-up lens.

Some variety of Banksia, an Australian native.

More Tagetes lemmonii.

Possibly a Wrentit. There were 4 of them, drove me nuts trying to get a shot off.

The mallards flew in midway into our visit. I named them Eric and Docken. It just seemed fitting.

Some aloe. I was testing how close I could get without a Canon Speedlite 430EX II.

Bee on Cistus x hybridus, aka, White Rockrose.

More Cistus x hybridus.

Delosperma cooperi.

Special request from Docken.

Back home from walk #1 and another Docken request. This rose bush has always been in front of my house it's almost 60 years old.

Walk #2...

We decided to do an early evening walk to catch the sunset.

As it turned out, most of our entertainment came from these two calves way down below the hillside we were sitting on. They were frolicking quite a bit but the real fun came when they both took off after a nearby gaggle of geese which were grazing in the same field. It was a lot funnier than you might imagine.

Sorry about the picture quality but I wasn't anticipating something like that.

Meanwhile... not the most spectacular sunset but we enjoyed it.

Today's walk report: 012814

Color lights can hypnotize...

There were some mysterious visual disturbances today for about 1 km 1/2 way or so into the walk. It's hard to describe stuff like this but the sunlight seemed overly bright and rather strobe-like, almost a flickering, along with a little bending. I was wearing sunglasses, the same ones I always wear. I thought at 1st it was perspiration pooling up on the rims of the glasses and light refracting off of that--but it wasn't. Stuff like this happens and if you freak out it only exasperates the situation and naturally there's a certain amount of confusion combined with questioning, you just have to keep it in check. I seemed fine otherwise. I've experienced hallucinations, visual disturbances like this in my life so I could understand it. I also know what it's like to pass out, I wasn't going there. I took an inventory and decided I was okay. Still.. strange. It went away. I actually sped up during the process, not wanting to conk out where I was. Funny though, about midway through the episode Led Zeppelin's Dazed and Confused from the album How the West Was Won started playing. That's not the 1st track on the album but it was 1st to come up--appropriately timed on my iPod. It's a 25:25 blowout version too. Funny, 25... for you Zep fans,you'll get the "25" connection.

Moving along...

Photos, more of the same sort of game plan as yesterday. In part this is due to the ease of going out with just a 60 mm macro lens and not bothering with the weight and overall encumbrance of a long lens and other accouterments. I enjoy shooting with this lens and it went over well yesterday. It also makes me focus on defining my subject, it's more cerebral in that way.

Once again starting with the red cosmos (Cosmos bipinnatus) outside the front door and now fully open.

Purple alyssum, off the driveway.

Another "inside rose." I really like the contours of the petals and we don't usually get this close unless to lean in for a smell and then we close our eyes don't we? It's certainly not in this sort of focus anyway.

No ID. I shot this flower last year too.

This is in abundance in large planters on campus. No ID. Again, I shot it for shape.

Tagetes lemmonii, aka, Copper Canyon daisy.

This is rotated 90º counterclockwise, I like it better this way. I shot it like this. The curator of the garden told me what this was, it just went in a few days back but I've forgotten. These are tiny flowers.

Delosperma ice plant, I kid you not, it's that brightly pink.

Bee on some type of Grevillea.

About 2 km past my little episode, this EMT is waiting for me atop the hill. I only waved. This guy comes up here frequently around sunset.

So ends my little drama and hopefully nice pictures for you. I'm having a delicious salmon dinner right now and I shared a bit with Lucy T. Cat. I think part if not most of my issue today was being tired and also I went to bed and woke up this morning with an eyestrain headache. Maybe it was the clam chowder I had for lunch. So enough of this, I'm going to relax now. All in all, the 8.79 km walk was great. I skipped the optional sunset once again because of the circumstances but I'm fine now there was just 6-7 minutes there where I was visiting don Juan Matus.