During lunch break walk at work, I have encountered this little fellow. He flew by and sat on the macadam right next to me – a very conspicuous bright green jewel on the grey dull road. It was really tiny – about the size of a thumbnail. And of course I did not have my camera and macro lenses on me, so you have to do with this rather poor pictures made with my phone.
© Charly, all rights reserved. Click for full size.
© Charly, all rights reserved. Click for full size.
Forestscape by photographer Manuelo Bececco – source
Once or twice a year I get down on the forest floor to take a few photos of the tall trees in our wee Carolinian Forest. I love the perspective. I’m not the only one it seems who like to look up. Italian photographer Manuelo Bececco has created a stunning group of forest photographs by pointing his camera up.
“In the middle of the woods, I seem to see everything in my own way—giant trees or branches that form barriers, irises of the eyes,” Bececco tells My Modern Met. “These are things that I only see in my mind and that I can sometimes turn into photographs.”
Photographed across different seasons and different times of day, the forest’s changing ambiance is expertly harnessed by Bececco. The Italian photographer is able to use the light, and the mood it generates, to his advantage and capture a mystical moment in the quiet of the woods. This forest photography is deeply personal for Bececco, as each photograph is inspired by an important time in his life. And for him, it’s been a pleasant surprise to see how well it’s been received by the public.
I’ve included a few of his photos here to whet your appetite, but I encourage you to check out the link at My Modern Met to see the entire grouping. Mr. Bececco has captured not only the many moods of the forest, but also the deeply felt emotions that being amongst such giants elicits. My thanks go to rq for pointing this story my way.
Forestscape by photographer Manuelo Bececco – source
Forestscape by photographer Manuelo Bececco – source
Forestscape by photographer Manuelo Bececco – source
©Giliell, all rights reserved
©Giliell, all rights reserved
Just a cute baby, not much to say.
Forest Rooster greets us at the entrance to the trail. ©voyager, all rights reserved
This morning Jack and I went to a forest trail a few miles outside of town to the east. We don’t come here often because it’s full of mosquitoes, but it’s still early in the season so I thought we’d take the chance. We did see a few mosquitoes, but we didn’t run into any swarms and neither of us got a single bite. This trail is a lot different than our familiar wee forest path. It’s a mixture of conifer and hardwood with several large open areas and a big pond covered in lily pads. It’s also protected by a large, aggressive forest rooster who did not like the looks of Jack.
It’s been a while since we’ve had a spider posting, but Nightjar has brought us some dandy shots to make sure we stay current.
Tiny spiders seem to be about as busy as I am this spring, the few times I’ve gone out with the camera I’ve come across one or two doing spidery things. Here’s a selection from the past few weeks!
Photos are below the fold. [Read more…]
Well, technically it’s urban geese. This came in from Chigau and it made me smile.
This morning, downtown Calgary – no zoom on the camera, if I had swung my purse, I could have taken the pair.
©Chigau, all rights reserved
False Solomon’s Seal, ©voyager, all rights reserved
The day started out rainy, but by noon the sun was shining in an azure blue sky and the day was warm and inviting. Jack and I took ourselves off to the woods and we had a lovely, slow stroll whilst chatting about this and that and listening to the birds sing. We marveled at how quickly things change at this time of year. The white trilliums are still blooming, but the red ones have vanished and so have the happy white flowers of bloodroot. Other things are growing madly. The mayapples have become umbrellas and they’re full of buds. The false Solomon’s Seal is in bud, too, and leaves of many kinds are sprouting up along the entire forest floor. Jack took extra care to sprinkle pee where it was needed the most and by the time we’d gone all the way around his tank was empty and he was doing the air-pee. All in all a brilliant day.
Part of the floodplain at our park. ©voyager, all rights reserved
Can anyone tell me what the man in these photos is doing? Jack and I encountered him at our local park yesterday. He was slowly walking from one side of the creek to the other along a measuring tape laid out between the banks. He would move a step or two and stop, then fiddle with his machine and look up to the sky for a while and then fiddle with his machine again until he was satisfied with something and then he’d take another step or two and repeat the process. At the rate he was moving it would take him an hour or more to cross our wee creek. I suspect it’s related to the flooding you can see in the first photo. Two years ago they removed the concrete barriers lining the creek and naturalized the banks. It was an all summer long project and it was quite picturesque when completed. Since then, though, the area around the creek floods easily and essentially makes large areas of the park unusable.
I would have stopped to ask him what he was doing, but the children in the photo were tossing stones into the creek that kept landing close to the poor man and the 2 adults in their group let several minutes pass before stopping the action. I thought the fellow
really didn’t need anyone else annoying him. Also, I didn’t want Jack to go into the creek because the last time he did he came out smelling like a sewer. We watched for a while and finally came home with my curiosity piqued, but not satisfied. If you have a clue or a notion about this endeavor I’d sure appreciate it if you’d share.
That’s curious.©voyager, all rights reserved
Very curious. ©voyager, all rights reserved
What’s he looking for up there? ©voyager, all rights reserved
From the Zoo as well.
©Giliell, all rights reserved
©Giliell, all rights reserved
©Giliell, all rights reserved
Our tree this week comes from Lofty.
A backlit picture of the persimmon tree sporting its last few autumn leaves before this Sunday’s storms blew them all off.
©Lofty, all rights reserved
The Canopy Cometh ©voyager, all rights reserved
The canopy of the forest is filling in quickly and soon all the light that’s been fueling the growth of spring flowers will turn to shade or bits of dappled sunlight. The trilliums are still blooming madly, though, and we even found a few red trilliums still hanging on. The Jack-in-the-pulpits have sprouted up all over and I can’t recall a year that there have been so many of them. They’re everywhere and some of them are huge. It seemed to take forever for spring to arrive this year, but the woodland flowers are obviously very happy with the conditions.
Open for Business. ©voyager, all rights reserved
A red trillium is a rare sight once the white trilliums bloom. ©voyager, all rights reserved
Jack-in-the-pulpits ©voyager, all rights reserved
©Giliell, all rights reserved
From our recent visit to the zoo
Bella, a very friendly Rhino Iguana, ©voyager, all rights reserved
Sorry to be absent the past few days. My adventure to Michigan put me into a crash cycle and it’s been slow climbing out. I’m feeling closer to normal today, but the brain fog is being stubborn and persistent. I hope I can string together a few sentences that make sense to tell you all about my amazing experience.
Content Warning – There are photos of snakes ahead. [Read more…]