Spring Is Interrupted for this Wintry Break!

Returned home late Saturday from an excellent Ebertfest film festival - likely in an upcoming blog post. Then awoke Sunday morning for falling snow! My immediate reaction was to go out to catch some Spring flowers in a fresh coating of snow, but it didn't stop! It literally snowed all day, nearly to sunset. A nice, slushy snow just perfect for snowballs!


I went out a number of times to catch the flowers, mostly daffodils and blue scilla as the snow blanketed them. The crocus are long finished, and there wasn't much else around in my yard. But it kept falling and falling... I wouldn't have dreamed enough would come down to bury everything, but then it did!


By late in the day it had slowed, and even stopped for periods, but then picked up. I figured there was about 6" of accumulation, but the official St Charles numbers were than 8.3" had fallen! In the scilla shot at left, you might spot my footprints as I tromped through the scilla patch. And at right a red trillium is barely recognizable in its blanket...


The next morning dawned clear and bright. The weatherman advised that "you can shovel the snow yourself, or wait a few hours for nature to do it for you"! Sure enough, temps in the 50s erased all but a few bits by mid-afternoon!  At left is the view of the Fox River from my back yard, and at right, Canadian Geese footprints preserved in snow...


I perhaps should have done a time-lapse of the snow disappearing, but was content just recording the flowers re-appearing after the 24-hour blanket of snow had dissipated. All indications are that the Winter break was brief and Spring's arrival will now continue!

Hints of Spring!

Am back to the Midwest at "Ketelsen East" to enjoy the emergence of Spring! It looks like I arrived with perfect timing - there are mostly shades of brown and gray, trees bare, temps still definitely on the cool side after Tucson temps have been flirting with the 90s! But there are definite hints that the new growth of Spring isn't far away! Just a couple meters from the house, in fact, growing up in bits of asphalt piled high by the snowplow clearing the roads in my absence, are some beautiful crocus flowers. Shown here at left is the biggest plant - barely reaching 3" (8cm) tall, so I needed the macro lens for these shots!




And as soon as I shoot the yellow crocus above I notice some slightly smaller white crocus too! I had to check with my neighbor Elaine on the ID - I've not sure I've been early enough to catch these beauties in years past. She claims she has some purple crocus in her yard, but I've not been there to catch those yet.  I like the gentle pale yellow trim on these white flowers - they were kind of hard to spot with the brown grass background, but there were quite a few plants scattered about.






As I mentioned, the temps have been cool, and the flowers close up as the temperature drops as sunset approaches. The photo at left (same yellow crocus as above) was taken shortly before sunset, and today, with temps never going much above 40, I think they stayed closed all day! Lows tonight will be 24, so hope they survive the hard freeze tonight - will check on them tomorrow...

Note that most all of these photos were taken with the macro lens, and in order to extend the range of sharp focus at these considerable magnifications, several shots taken at different focus settings were taken and combined in Photoshop. Known at focus-stacking, they can considerably extend the range of sharpness in these photos...







In my searches for other things just poking out of the ground, I thought the bud at left might be the first sprouting of my beloved Trillium, that I spend time shooting every year. But from my first discovery of these sprouts (only about 1/2" tall) to today, they are starting to reveal their blue colors - Blue Scilla, which will carpet my yard blue in a week or two! Click on the right image for the full-size that shows the appearance of blue colors... Will try to keep an eye out for new members of the Spring population!

Feathered Friends - Family Too!

Years ago, Melinda and I stopped by Mississippi Lock and Dam #13 north of Clinton on a cold January day. Most of the River was frozen over, but just below the lock, the flowing water kept ice from forming and the trees lining the far side were filled with bald eagles! Well, at least a couple dozen, where they had retreated to feed on fish and rest up for the next hunting pass over the open water. Hoping to see more, last weekend I returned to Lock & Dam 13 to see what I could see.


Well, there was nary an ice cube, nor any eagles fishing anywhere that could be seen. I had resigned myself to driving 2 hours for nothing, when another car of eagle-watchers came by to look and noted they had seen some 15 miles to the north near Sabula! Shortly after, my sister Linda and her husband Lauren came by to join me, so we loaded my camera gear in their car and headed north!

We'd been given explicit directions where to go, and sure enough, there were a group of bald eagles on the far side of the slough. Not very close, but you could tell what they were with the 500mm lens I'd brought along! Most appeared to be young birds that still had brown heads or hadn't completely transformed to white heads. At left the juvenile on ice was being bothered by the older eagle. At right, this youngster had just swooped down for a fish, but came up empty-clawed!


We were set up in a campground on the south side of the island where Sabula is located. Once parked, we noticed an eagle sitting in the tree next to us! Shown at left, I suspect its another juvenile bald eagle. He didn't pay much attention to us, but we got a pretty good look.

Besides the eagles, there were a few other species. I spotted a very-tardy in departing Great Blue Heron, but he rounded a bend and I lost sight before getting a snapshot. There were a couple flocks of Mallard-looking ducks, looking like they were expending so much energy in flying, wings beating furiously! I'm thinking they were more prey for the eagles if they lost their taste for fish! Got the image of a large group of them at right, in front of a couple tugboats in dry dock...



A couple of my siblings were meeting us for dinner at Manny's in Fulton, IL, and with the extended trip to Sabula, we departed late. Manny's is a pizza and wings place quite popular for the locals. Wasn't much in the way of lo-carbs that I'm partaking in lately - about the only choice was a Caesar salad with grilled chicken. It was great! At left, that's brother Brian at left, Sister Kathy in the middle and Linda at right. Brother Jim was occupied that night and Baby sister Sheri now lives in Alabama.  Our meetings always seem to revolve around eating, but at least we get together regularly! It was a fun daytrip!

More Butterflies!

Not that I want to bore you with more, but this is a mostly timely post! It was just last weekend that I went to the Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum and my favorite part, the Judy Istock Butterfly Haven. Nearly 3,000 square feet of over 40 butterfly species. Of course, I enjoy them as macro photo subjects, since they are normally feeding and distracted enough to get close! The museum was quite nice, with "live" displays from the Chicago Herpetological Society with several species of snakes and lizards, and some other displays from work being done behind the scenes of the museum.

But as for butterflies, I used my Canon 6D with the 100mm macro, ring flash in front and an additional 3cm of extension tubes to extend the close focus range of the macro. It was great to just have to worry to get close to focus as the flash meters itself off the camera detector, so a near-perfect exposure every time! Unfortunately, the guides to the Haven's inhabitants do not list all species carried, so I made a guess here and there, and some others were not identified. Also, these are the exotic species from around the world brought in for their colors, so not many locals you would see outside the walls...


Just inside the door they've set up a buffet table for the butterflies, consisting of rotting fruit, that always had several species enjoying. Click the exposure at left and you can see all their proboscises deep inside the soft fruit feeding... At left is a blue morpho, whose iridescent blue color on their inner wing is seen past the partial near wing. At center is I believe a juniper hairstreak. The rightmost remains unnamed...

A few steps further and there were a striking pair of mating butterflies. Unfortunately not identified in the guide, and they stayed connected for the whole hour I was there! Note the subtle coloration difference, and also how the upper butterfly has one purple wing and one blue!


Shooting most of them was easy if they were distracted by feeding or otherwise resting. There was this huge butterfly called a Caligo Memnon or a Pale Owl butterfly. It was resting on a tree trunk and had to be over 15cm (6") wingspan. Supposedly the eye spots are supposed to scare away predators, since they rest a lot being as huge as they are... Also shown at right is a close-up of the head and abdomen showing the subtle color variation in its hairs...



One of my first "captures" was the scarlet Mormon. Evidently it has some red on its hidden lower wing or along its abdomen, neither of which are seen here. What is interesting is that in the close-up at right, what looked like grey in its wing is actually a combination of black and white pigmented scales in its wings, here at least partially resolved...



Surely one of the most colorful butterflies in the enclosure, other than the iridescent blue morpho that never seemed to rest, was the red lacewing. Shown at left, it has an amazingly complex coloration on their wings and hail from southeast Asia.




Another striking color combination was the pale green and tan of what I THINK was a juniper hairstreak. I love the appearance of their eyes - some differences in appearance from species to species. I wish I knew more about it and also wonder how we look to them!




Finally another brightly colored butterfly is the tiger longwing, native from Mexico to Peru. Mostly I include it here as I love the close-up of its head showing the curled-up proboscis - way cool!



Well there you have it. I have more, of course, but these are my favorites. The best thing is that the Haven is open all winter long, so if I get tired of the snow and cold this coming season, I know where to go where it is warm and humid and these guys will be there to greet me!

Old Business!

I still have so many photos from my last Midwest trip, that I figure I should post some before I find myself back there again! These are from a visit to Peck Farm Park, an old farmstead that was donated to the Kane County park system and now hosts native prairie patches and learning centers for all ages.

One of the Summer highlights is the butterfly aviary, small, but very popular with families since it is only a $2 suggested donation for entry. I used my Canon 6D with the 100mm macro lens with about a 3cm extension tube, so depending on the focus setting was something close to life size on the detector, much larger on your screen. Along with the ring flash on the front it was pretty much "Point and Shoot" and the photos came out perfect! I used a monopod to steady the camera, but was like shooting fish in a barrel as long as the butterflies were distracted by feeding on the flowers.

Unfortunately, I was also distracted shooting targets, and did not pay attention to the laminated ID sheet that needed to be left behind, so I have none of these IDed... Sorry about that, will try to do better next time!

Walks Around the House

I've been immensely enjoying the Summer at "Ketelsen East", and often go on excursions in the prairie restorations and the woods near home to see what there is to be seen. Sometimes I bring my camera, and when I don't, usually see something that makes me wish I had! The photos here were all taken with the Canon 6D camera and the 100mm macro - a nice versatile lens that works on distant objects as well as focuses up to life size, allowing close ups of bugs or flower details. As a result, you don't need to carry any alternate gear along...

Case in point is a flash of color I spotted last week - an American Goldfinch. As with many subjects, you can sneak closer while distracted feeding. This fellow was distracted feeding on a cone flower, finally getting a morsel you can spot in the last frame. Meanwhile I had gotten to about 20 feet or less allowing me to get a little detail in the shots here.


Similarly, there have been a lot of Monarch butterflies this year. In recent years, hearing the difficulties of their overwintering grounds and massive die-offs, they have seemed scarce around the Midwest. Perhaps it was the conscientious plantings of milkweed plants, but rare is the time I go out and DON'T see them this year. As above, try sneaking up on them while distracted feeding and I got to within a couple feet of this male, here feeding on a flowering Joe-Pye weed. How do I know it is a boy? I thought everyone knew that! Males have a little dark spot on the tops of their rear wings that are pheromone emitters to help locate females. Shown at right are a couple (admittedly lower quality) images showing this butterfly flitting about, clearly showing its pheromone spots (arrowed).

I continue to be amazed at the
biodiversity of the milkweed plant. I've blogged before about the milkweed bug and milkweed beetle and documented the difference. Normally a careful search of a plant will show one or the other, rarely both. On a walk the other day I spotted a milkweed just covered with yellow aphids - not the plant 8" to the left or right, but that one in the center! And there was only the one infested, not a single aphid spotted on another plant. Here is where the macro comes in handy - you can photograph an entire leaf covered in speckles of yellow, or move closer to focus a few inches away for more details. At left I've pulled the leaf back to reveal the underside where the bulk of them were located. At right is a close up of a flower on the plant, showing the sapsuckers working on the stalks of the flowers. You can spot one near center sporting a pair of little wings that will allow it to be more mobile someday. As with most aphid colonies, there were ants nearby that seemed to be in charge, likely feeding on the concentrated sugar water the aphids excrete... Amazing stuff!


On another walk yesterday, closer to
home in the woods, I used the same setup - the 100mm Canon macro, but with 3cm of extension tubes to allow even closer focusing. I also had a flash that attached to the front of the lens that was useful for the shots taken shortly before sunset. First up was a purple phlox near the house. We don't plant any of these, perhaps a LONG time ago, but they are perennials now that show up annually. Interesting flower clusters, but only individuals shown here. While they look flat from their front, they have a long tubular structure attached, shown better at right looking nearly into the sun in a "different" view of them. Both of these are "focus stacks", where multiple images at different focus settings were combined to extend the zone of sharpness. 14 frames were combined at left, 18 at right! The higher magnification provided by the extension tubes required combining more frames.


Similarly for the thistle flower here, 22 frames were combined into this image. While a noxious weed, the flowers are quite striking. I'm not quite sure the type of thistle this is, or if it is, in face a cockle burr. Some of the images I saw online show similarities to both, so am going to leave it unidentified here...







A little deeper into the woods were a
striking yellow flower I've not noticed before! I've been told it is a "Tansy" (Tanacetum vulgare). They are eye-catching both for their little button flowers, and upon magnification, for the pattern of the microscopic substructures of the flowers... In the fading light, 7 frames were combined at left, 18 at right. Note the flowers start with a thin white cover sheet which bursts open as they mature enough and grow into a bloom.


In the fading light I noticed a few little creatures a couple millimeters across on these plants. I'm always on the lookout for new creatures, and with new plants (to me) was the chance for some new little varmints! These will be unidentified for now as they may be nymphs, which are notoriously difficult to identify, but the one at left looks to be a treehopper, and at right a leafhopper. These have a different "look" to them as they utilized the ring flash on the front of the macro for illumination. Of course, with living creatures, you have to deal with movement - managed 8 frames to combine at left, only 2 at right.

As my trip winds down, I won't have many opportunities to visit these friends, so will have to make a point of getting out a few more times!