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Monday in Nature, 8 January 2018


Leslie Reid

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Basic Guidelines: In the strictest sense, nature photography should not include "hand of man elements". Please refrain from images with buildings or human made structures like roads, fences, walls. Pets are not permitted. Captive subjects in zoos, arboretums, or aquariums are permitted, but must be declared, and must focus on the subject, not the captivity. Images with obvious human made elements will likely be deleted from the thread, with an explanation to the photographer. Guidelines are based on PSA rules governing Nature photography which also cover the Nature Forum. Keep your image at/under 1000 pixels on the long axis for in-line viewing. Note that this includes photos hosted off-site at Flicker, Photobucket, your own site, etc. We post one image per week.

I had a two-slime-mold day a couple of weeks ago. One of the two was kind of ordinary, as slime molds go; it looked a lot like tapioca. And then there was this one. What you’re seeing here is about a 24 mm x 32 mm swath of Sitka spruce log, with the slime mold Ceratiomyxa fruticulosa var. porioides being consumed by a filamentous fungus. I came back a few days later and there was no evidence left of either one.

 

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Leslie, thanks for starting the thread. Nature is amazing, and thanks for capturing that in your opening image.

 

Mandarin Duck in flight, at the Elk Grove Regional Park near Sacramento, California. Mandarin Ducks are native to the eastern part of Asia, in Japan, China and Russia. This duck is not captive but is fed by people visiting the park, such that he has incentive to hang around the park. Most likely he has either escaped or has been released from captivity in California.

 

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Didn't notice any. Would the noise at ISO 2200 not mask possible moire?

ISO 2200 is pretty high. Moreover, since this is a straight-on, frontal image, only a small area is in focus. It is very unlikely to find moire under such circumstances.

 

The chances are much higher at base ISO and with a side view of the bird feather such that more area is in focus.

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Update on the first photo!

Laura W. gave me a heads-up that this isn't a Ceratiomyxa after all, so I'm back to "something eating something on a spruce log." Which is part of the allure of the myco-world: I'm always enticingly close to the unknown (whether it be because I don't know it or because no-one knows it--there's a lot yet to be discovered out there, and still more to be learned)

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