Bugs and Flowers

There's a little nature park down by the river near my hotel in Dublin, Ohio, where I found a few flowers and a bug or two after a nice little thunderstorm.

Birds and Bees Weekend

There's not much story to tell, other than riding around hoping to take pictures of smaller things this weekend.

The first part was Friday afternoon south of town at a local state park, where I was continually watching for rattlesnakes.  Thinking (maybe my imagination was going wild)  I heard a light rattle, I changed directions and in doing so, a large Jackrabbit hopped across the trail and scared me.  I believe I've seen deer that size in south Texas.  Anyway, the only slinking thing I positively saw was a couple of lizards.

In a small cluster of flowers, there were quite a bit of honey bees gathering pollen.

Saturday afternoon, I rode up into the mountains east of town near Sunspot.  Way out in the boondocks, I was attracted to a small waterfall near where a group of ATV enthusiasts were camping.  This time, I figured if I fell off the side of the thing, somebody might be able to rescue me.

The best part of the whole thing was a patch of gypsum weeds and thistles growing in the delta of the falls.  Dozens hummingbirds of a couple of different varieties battled for the choice flowers.  I was totally absorbed it it and shot birds until it was really too dark to be doing so.

All of these pictures were taken with a Nikon D7000 with a Tamron 60mm prime lens.  As for the bird pictures, I was not able to get very close so most of the pictures have been cropped from a larger shot, as much as 400%.

Here's a few.

 

 

 

I am not sure what this was.  It was much larger than the Hummers 

and looked quite a bit like a parakeet.

 

 

 This is not a bird but some kind of huge insect.

 

As I mentioned before, dark came much earlier than I wanted, so I left and drove slowly, being careful not to hit any of the several deer that stood on the edge of the road.

Beautiful sundowns as usual.

 

Warm Spring Day In Tennessee

While yesterday was less than wonderful with temperatures ranging from the high 30s to the low 50s with gray skies, today was a gorgeous day. 

This afternoon, I explored local things near my hotel. One being something called the Old Stone Fort which is really an Indian mound but that's another story.

I walked some trails along the Duck River, managing to only fall flat of my face only once without breaking me or my camera. The tragedy could have been sliding off a 25 foot cliff into the waters.  It didn't look that deep but it was probably pretty cold and I wasn't ready for a swim.


Wild flowers were coming out along the rivers edge causing bugs to be out as well. While lying on the ground taking close-up pictures of some flowers, I had the uneasy feeling I was being watched.  I snapped off a couple of frames, slowly go up and saw a couple of Geezers (that would be someone my age or older) looking at me as if I were some kind of (please be kind in the comment section) nut.  I got up and nodded to them as if I were doing something important and headed back up the trail.  I suppose they don't see people wallowing around on the ground eye level to a dandelion very often.

It was a nice day.  I think there's even a full moon out tonight.