Monday in Nature, 9 October 2017

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.

 

There seem to be two kinds of mushrooms that are impossible to walk by with out making a photograph. The first is red with white spots. The second is the opposite (Hydnellum peckii; I found this one yesterday at Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park).

 

Whooping Crane at Necedah National Wildlife Refuge in WI a couple weeks ago. Need to do some post processing to sharpen it.

Prickly pears.

Prairie dog in Colorado - what a cutie. At one point it jumped up and I captured it as well. But this pose looks more adorable.

 

It looked for a while as if we would have not fall color, and it was late starting, but exploded nearly over night. For a start here as the old timers say, "the swamp maples are turning." Things in swamps tend to turn first, but of course there is really no such thing as a "swamp maple." My wife, an erstwhile horticulturist, always gets a kick out of this, and has surmised that there is a hitherto unidentified subspecies of maple, the "Acer Bogus."

 

Here is a fine specimen of Acer Bogus (alternate spelling Boggus).

There seem to be two kinds of mushrooms that are impossible to walk by with out making a photograph. The first is red with white spots. The second is the opposite (Hydnellum peckii; I found this one yesterday at Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park).

My first reaction was why Leslie posted an image of ice cream cones to Monday in Nature?

 

Nature is certainly interesting. Nice image.

 

BTW, thanks for starting the thread. I noticed that we had another duplicated start. Thanks to everybody's effort for starting MiN. If we can quickly converge to one thread, as we did today, that would be great. I'll try to clean up any duplicates quickly.

American white pelicans feeding

 

Here is a stand of mushrooms surviving in a field of lichen found high up in L'Anse aux Meadows, adjacent to the first known Nordic settlement in North America.

 

The Nords sailed to North America over 1000 years ago, beating Columbus by about 500 years, and established a colony there. Today their longhouses and out buildings have been recreated on the site of the original foundations.

 

I used a D800E and an AF-50mm 1.4 lens.

 

My first reaction was why Leslie posted an image of ice cream cones to Monday in Nature?

 

My first reaction was dessert! We Canadians have just celebrated Thanksgiving this weekend with many of us having today off as 'Thanksgiving Monday'. I initially thought Leslie's image involved something delicious involving cranberries, as turkey dinner isn't complete without them!

Blue Heron in Dallas, Texas

Eastern Sierra Fall Colors

Another from Yellowstone National Park, about two weeks ago. Made about 6:30 on a very chilly evening. One can see traces of the previous nights snow on the trees in the background.

 

We watched this bull in the woods -- he seemed to be trying to get his harem to follow him -- for roughly a half hour before he finally came out into the field where the ladies were.

 

JATO (jet assisted take-off)

 

JATO - Jet Assisted Take-off by David Stephens, on Flickr

JATO (jet assisted take-off)

 

JATO - Jet Assisted Take-off by David Stephens, on Flickr

Only $6000 Sony A9 can capture image like this:)

 

Cloudy sky in high wind.

My first reaction was why Leslie posted an image of ice cream cones to Monday in Nature?

 

One "common" name for this is strawberries and cream. I've only seen a similar species once, while doing birding field work, and quickly gathered those with me to see it. They were all amazed to hear that it was fungi. It's in most mushroom books, but looks even better when seen in the wild. Fungi that produce exudates are spectacular and wonderfully photogenic. Nice shot.

My first reaction was why Leslie posted an image of ice cream cones to Monday in Nature?

I initially thought Leslie's image involved something delicious involving cranberries

One "common" name for this is strawberries and cream

It did look almost good enough to eat! (...what could possibly go wrong?)

 

This was a 3-image focus-stack with a macro lens--the fungus was about 6 cm wide. It was a day rife with toothed fungi--five other Hydnellum species [one with equally photogenic orange exudate (H. cyanopodium), another with red, and one with the most delightful fragrance I've ever found in a mushroom (H. suaveolens)], two Phellodon spp., and a Sarcodon. I do believe mushroom season has arrived on the northern California coast.

Another from Blackwater NWR

 

 

Edited October 10, 2017 by tom_kessler