“A good snapshot keeps a moment from running away.” ― Eudora Welty
opyright ©2024 Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
PLEASE DO NOT USE MY IMAGES WITHOUT EXPRESSED WRITTEN PERMISSION.
Beginning Friday we’ve had rain and snow up in the mountains. I woke up yesterday to this.
It’s the most wonderful time of year!
Happy Sunday Everyone!
Nikon D850| Nikkor 80-200mm\ PS CC
more to come…
Copyright ©2024 Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
PLEASE DO NOT USE MY IMAGES WITHOUT EXPRESSED WRITTEN PERMISSION.
Nikon D850| Nikkor 35mm| PS CC
more to come…
Copyright ©2024 Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
PLEASE DO NOT USE MY IMAGES WITHOUT EXPRESSED WRITTEN PERMISSION.
The two expression this Chipmunk made while I was taking its photo had me chuckling.
I got it!
Uh, what nut?!
Nikon D850| Nikkor 500mm| PS CC
more to come…
Copyright ©2024 Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
PLEASE DO NOT USE MY IMAGES WITHOUT EXPRESSED WRITTEN PERMISSION.
What a week it’s been! It all started on October 10th, 2024.
My neighbor and I rose early to head up to Emerald Bay for sunrise.
The color was earlier than we hoped so, we made a quick stop at Pope Beach to shoot the color and daybreak.
Then we made our way up to a lookout over Emerald Bay to photograph the lake.
Then we took our time making stops along the way home to photograph some Autumn Color.
We saw a beautiful Red-tailed Hawk hunting for breakfast. She caught a Vole but, I won’t gross you out with those images.
Later that evening I saw the Northern Lights for the first time ever. That post is here. It was glorious.
Friday morning I birded with my usual birding group and we had a great morning seeing 40 species of birds. Along with the birds I noticed some spooky Zombie Pirates lurking by the pond. Here’s one.
Saturday morning I was up early and met up with two girl friends to do my first Big Day. It’s a 24 hour global birding marathon put on by Cornell Lab of Ornithology. We didn’t sign up as team or register our day but we, birded from 8AM until after 4PM. I saw 45 species. It was pretty fun day. We posted our sightings on ebird.org so they’ll have our record for their counts and information. Unfortunately, the next afternoon I got sick, and shortly afterwards I was hearing from my companions from the day before that they where also sick. We think the deli we stopped at to have lunch is where we picked up food poisoning. I brought home half my sandwich which I shared with He-Man and yep, he got it too. UGH.
Monday still weak, and very tired I was determined to locate and see Comet C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan-ATLAS) but, I wasn’t in shape to drive anywhere so I just stepped out on my back patio and photographed it there. It’s so cool and it has a great long tail!
What a week! What a month it’s been so far! The Aurora, and the Comet really made my month. Everything else has been icing on the cake.
My tummy is still sketchy, but I’m on the mend and so are He-Man and my friends. I plan to be out photographing Halloween things, birding, and maybe the Comet with a better composition soon. I hope your week is going well. Oh, and watch out for the Zombies and Ghoulies! 👻
Nikon D850| Nikkor 500mm, &35mm| PS CC
more to come…
Copyright ©2024 Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
PLEASE DO NOT USE MY IMAGES WITHOUT EXPRESSED WRITTEN PERMISSION.
With the all the intense Solar activity in the way of flares, and CME’s there have been Auroras are as low as Northern Nevada! I got an alert telling me the aurora was in my town and the KP rating was 8. Nine is the highest rating so I looked out the back door and I could see it so, I grabbed my camera, tripod, and cellphone, slipped into my shoes without tightening up my laces and dashed out the door. I didn’t grab a jacket, or my headlamp I was so excited. Here’s one of the many images I made.
I’ve wanted to see the northern lights since I first learned about them as a kid. I always thought I’d have to travel way up north in the winter to have the best chance of seeing them.
Why is it pink? What causes the colors? I had to look it up because the Northern Lights (aurora borealis), here have been bright pink with some blues and purples, and very little green.
They are created when energized particles from the sun slam into Earth’s upper atmosphere at speeds up to 45 million mph (72 million kph). Our planets magnetic field protects us from the onslaught.
Earth’s magnetic field redirects those particles towards the poles transforming that energy into the dazzling display we call the Northern Lights or in the Southern Hemisphere the Southern Lights (aurora australis).
Most Northern Lights are green but when there’s been intense solar activity the color can be red, pink, blue, or purple.
Here’s a linkhttps://sciencenotes.org/aurora-colors-explained-southern-and-northern-lights/ to Science Notes that explains the Aurora colors in more detail.
I’m hearing and reading that it’s been seen all over the country. That’s so exciting!
Nikon D850| Nikkor 35mm f/1.8g| PS CC 2024
Copyright ©2024 Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
PLEASE DO NOT USE MY IMAGES WITHOUT EXPRESSED WRITTEN PERMISSION.
While birding around a pond in Pinellas Co. Fl I spied this butterfly trying to warm up for the day. Mary knew what it was straight-away when I asked her if she knew what kind it was.
I showed you its best side first. It’s a bit tattered by the end of summer.
Still beautiful though.
“They’re in the brush-footed butterfly family and stay low to the ground because their favorite plants are also low on the ground. They can also be found throughout the southeastern USA, the Caribbean, Mexico, and South America to Argentina. They are white with brown markings and orange margins, and have a small black spot in the center of each of the forewings. Two small black spots on each of the hindwings resembling a peacock’s eyespot give this butterfly its common name. There’s a short tail on the hindwings. Male and female White peacock butterflies don not differ in appearance from each other.” Facts gleaned from
Florida Wildflower Foundation link here. They also say, that, “the White Peacock is smaller and darker in the wet summer months and larger and paler in the drier summer months.” I’m thinking this one has be one of the larger paler ones as it is quite pale.
Nikon D850| Nikkor 500mm Pe-F| PS CC
more to come…
Copyright ©2024 Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
PLEASE DO NOT USE MY IMAGES WITHOUT EXPRESSED WRITTEN PERMISSION.
After several hours of birding my birding partner and I were hungry so went looking for a place fairly close by to have some lunch. We found Quaker Steak & Lube.
This is the only one in FL going by their website. We both had salads and I failed to take a photo of either of them. It was just a Caesar Salad w/grilled chicken. Instead of croutons they served it with Cheese Curds. Now, I thought that sounded gross and would probably just pick them out, but after trying one I gobbled them up! They were warm and slightly gooy and tender on the inside yummy. Mary had the Biker Chick salad. It sounded delicious too, but it was on the sweet side and I was hot and wasn’t in the mood for sweet.
The inside of the restaurant is car themed. Each wing of the interior has a small sports racing car hanging from the ceiling, and lots of car memorabilia like a dividing wall full of MAC tools for fixing cars. I went back a second time for that salad and this time He-Man was with me he said he has some of those tools. Who knew?!
Anyway, I did get photos of the exterior and the doors.
Look at the door pulls. I thought they were neat.
Most of their restaurants seem to be in OH. Do you have one in your city/state? Have you been there?
This post is part of the weekly challenge Thursday Doors hosted by Dan Antion over at https://nofacilities.com/2024/09/26/back-at-osv/
Head on over there to see more doors from around the world or join the craze and add a door or two of your own. 😊
more to come…
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