29 Tuesday Apr 2014
Posted in Photography
On a Sunday more than a week ago, at the Edwin B. Forsythe Wildlife Refuge it was very windy and cold. As I drove by I saw a dozen egrets standing up on a bank of the marshes.
Cold egrets
There were snowy egrets, like this one.
Snowy Egret
and great egrets, bigger but just as intimidated by the freezing wind chill.
Great Egret
Great Egret
A younger one ignored the cold and was actually trying to fish, twisting and slipping on the mud.
Great Egret fishing
26 Saturday Apr 2014
Posted in Photography
Tags
common tern, laughing gull, photography, postaday, ring-billed gull, sandpipers, wed-winged blackbird
Today a friend and I went to the southernmost part of New Jersey on the Delaware Bay. It was too early for the annual coming ashore of the horseshoe crab, which will happen in about two weeks. So we walked on the beach and I was able to take my first best shot of the red-winged blackbird, which some say is the most common bird in North America.
Red-winged Blackbird
There were also other birds of course, such as sandpipers, gulls, and terns.
Sandpipers
Sandpipers are small birds, not much bigger than sparrows, but the terns and gulls were larger.
Common Tern
The common tern is noticeable by its short feet.
Ring-Billed Gulls
Laughing Gull
25 Friday Apr 2014
Posted in Photography
Tags
Our yellow magnolia doesn’t have any leaf, but all of its flowers are open and clearly visible through our windows and patio door. They definitely brighten these first spring days which are still quite chilly if not outright cold.
Here are some shots I took today once I came home from work.
Yellow magnolia blooms
Yellow magnolia close-up
Yellow magnolia macro
23 Wednesday Apr 2014
Posted in Photography
Tags
Sparrows are one of the most common birds seen throughout the world. Because of that, and because sometimes they can be actual pests when they eat seed crops, they are not usually held in high regard.
Since I’ve been photographing birds, I have noticed subtle differences between various species of sparrows, especially when I look at the captured images blown-up on a big screen monitor. Following are some of them, taken over the past three years.
Sparrow on magnolia branch
Chipping Sparrow
White-Throated Sparrow
White-Throated Sparrow
Note that juncos and some finches may also belong to species related to sparrows.
20 Sunday Apr 2014
Posted in Photography
Tags
I’ve been testing my new camera, a Canon SX50, by taking photos of birds. Lacking time to go and find them in the wild, I resorted to putting out sunflower seeds in a dish on our deck. A house finch came by, and here is its picture.
House finch
14 Monday Apr 2014
Posted in Photography
Spring is now beginning to display flowers in their full splendor. Yesterday afternoon, I walked around our yard and took the following photographs, which give you a range of colors, from yellow and green to pink and red.
Daffodils
The wind was fairly strong, and after a while I gave up trying to use my tripod and shot the following without it.
Magnolia
A close look at a magnolia.
Finally, here’s a full riot of them.
Pink magnolias in monochrome
You may like to view the images in full-size by just clicking on them.
12 Saturday Apr 2014
Posted in Photography
For this challenge, I submit the monument to a man who has affected all of our lives: Antoine-Augustin Parmentier a Frenchman who lived from 1737 to 1813.
The potato, a tuber that we now consume throughout the world, was introduced to Europe in 1640. However, it was only fed to animals because it was deemed not fit for humans. It was even rumored to cause leprosy, and the French Parliament at one time forbid its cultivation.
Parmentier spared no effort to persuade the world that the potato is perfectly edible and could indeed be used to stave off widespread famine when other crops failed. He eventually succeeded, and today when “parmentier” is used to describe a dish, it means that it contains potatoes!
I found this monument in his honor in the town of Neuilly, a suburb of Paris.
This statue was in front of the Town Hall (Mairie) of Neuilly.
Town Hall of Neuilly
12 Saturday Apr 2014
Posted in Big Sur, Weekly Photo Challenge
This is my submission for the challenge, a picture of McWay Falls discharging on a secluded beach at Big Sur, CA.
McWay Falls – Big Sur
06 Sunday Apr 2014
Posted in Photography
In Victor Hugo’s Les Miserables, the Luxembourg Gardens (Jardin du Luxembourg) was where Cosette first met Marius, and where the two fell in love. Our hotel was only a short walk from the Luxembourg Gardens, and we visited it twice during our stay. Spring had arrived in Paris and flowers were almost everywhere.
Jardin du Luxembourg
Jardin du Luxembourg – Sunbathers
The Luxembourg Gardens are the gardens of the French Senate, the building you see in these photos.
Jardin du Luxembourg – Tulips near French Senate
In 1937, on the eve of World War II, Jean Terzieff created this sculpture of a woman holding an apple in her right hand: “Avec une grace sensuelle, elle tente d’ecarter les pommes de discorde entre les peuples (With sensual grace, she tries to separate the apples of discord between people).”
La Femme aux pommes
05 Saturday Apr 2014
Posted in Photography
While we were at Vaux-le-Vicomte, there was a group of kindergarten children who were also visiting the chateau. They were good subjects for photography, sometimes even more so than the historical ones.
At first they were playing on the grounds.
Kids at Vaux-le-Vicomte
Kids at Vaux-le-Vicomte
Later on, they got dressed up as the cutest musketeers and ladies as they toured the chateau and participated in a show.
Musketeers and ladies
Lady and musketeer
05 Saturday Apr 2014
Posted in Photography
If you don’t want to contend with the long lines of tourists at Versailles, you should go visit the Château de Vaux-le-Vicomte, about 35 miles southeast of Paris. Louis XIV’s finance minister, Nicolas Fouquet, had it built for himself from 1658 to 1661. However, the king, seeing the splendid chateau and the lavish lifestyle of Fouquet, suspected him of embezzling funds, had him imprisoned, and shut down the chateau. But it gave him the ideas for Versailles.
Louis XIV ordered the same architect (Louis Le Vau), landscape architect (André le Nôtre), and painter decorator (Charles Le Brun) to design and help him build Versailles. In many ways, Vaux-le-Vicomte is a smaller but just as impressive version of Versailles, and it certainly did not disappoint us when we went there.
Vaux-le-Vicomte
This next picture shows the stables of the chateau.
Vaux-le-Vicomte Stables
By the luck of random drawing, I was allowed to go up into the chateau’s cupola and took the following picture of the gardens.
Vaux-le-Vicomte gardens
Here’s an inside look at the cupola wooden support structure.
Vaux-le-Vicomte underside of cupola
There were many design drawings hung on the walls, among which was this one for the cupola.
Vaux-le-Vicomte cupola design drawing
04 Friday Apr 2014
Posted in Photography
Arriving too late to visit Paris’ botanical garden (Jardin des Plantes), we went back to catch a Batobus (hop-on, hop-off boat). While waiting for it in the Tino Rossi garden on the bank of the Seine, I noticed two abstract sculptures of the Musée de la Sculpture en Plein Air. They looked striking even though most people hardly notice them as they walk or jog by.
Abstraction by Marta Pan 1969
This next one is a bronze with an intriguing name, Ochicagogo.
Ochicagogo by Antoine Poncet 1979
01 Tuesday Apr 2014
Posted in Photography, Weekly Photo Challenge
Last Wednesday, we were strolling along the Seine river in Paris when we saw three French soldiers patrolling the area. They took a brief moment to pose for a tourist. Their image below is my answer to this week’s Street Life Challlenge.
Quai de la Seine: Street Life
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