Whatever Wednesday – Page 3 – Circadianreflections Blog

Whatever Weds.-This & That

October 16, 2024October 16, 2024Posted in PhotographyTagged Birding, Comet C/2023 A3(Tsuchinshan-ATLAS), Daybreak, Emerald Bay, Fall Colors, Halloween, Lake Tahoe, Nevada, Pope Beach, Red-tailed Hawk, Sunrise, This & That, Whatever Wednesday57 Comments

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.

©Deborah M. Zajac | http//circadianreflections.com Image

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…

Whatever Weds. Tawny Pennant

September 25, 2024September 24, 2024Posted in Insects, Nature Photography, Whatever WednesdayTagged Dragonflies, Insects, Nikon, Pinellas Co Florida, Tropical Pennants, Whatever Wednesday26 Comments

PLEASE DO NOT USE MY IMAGES WITHOUT EXPRESSED WRITTEN PERMISSION.

I was recently in Pinellas County, Florida visiting my Mom and Step-father and I did some birding too. While birding I always keep my eyes open for other things in nature like this Dragonfly.

I think it’s a Tawny Pennant-Brachymesia herbida. It’s in the Tropical Pennant family. If I’m wrong and you know what it is please let me know!

I think he looks like he’s wearing an early pilot’s helmet, eye goggles, and smiling at me. Hamming it up for the camera I suppose.😊

Nikon D850| Nikkor 500mm| PS CC

more to come…

Whatever Weds. This and That…

August 14, 2024August 13, 2024Posted in Astro Photography, Bird Photography, Hummingbirds, Photography, Rufous Hummingbirds, Whatever WednesdayTagged Corn Flower Leaves, Crimson Columbine, Delphinium, Lupine, Perseid Meteors, Rufous Hummingbird, Watercolor Painting, Whatever Wednesday, Wildflowers40 Comments

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Here’s some of what I’ve been up to lately starting at the beginning of the month with a birding walk up in the mountains above Lake Tahoe. The wildflowers were in bloom. Here are a couple of favorites I saw.

©Deborah M. Zajac | http//circadianreflections.com
Delphinium

©Deborah M. Zajac | http//circadianreflections.com
Crimson Columbine

A beautiful view from the trail with Lupine, and Cornflower leaves in the foreground.

©Deborah M. Zajac | http//circadianreflections.com
*View from the hike*

There were all sorts of juvenile birds being taught how to forage that morning. I saw Young Cassin’s Finches begging their parents for food, and the parents trying to encourage them to forage on their own, and young White-crown Sparrows foraging with their parents, but the highlight for me was the juvenile Rufous Hummingbird perched on a branch. That was a first for me.

©Deborah M. Zajac | http//circadianreflections.com
*Rufous Hummingbird-immature*

On Monday I got up at 2:45AM to go on my back patio to see if I could spot and photograph any Perseid Meteors. I very nearly went back to bed as there were still clouds from the day before in the sky.

I saw 3 great fireballs streaking across the morning sky, but one was completely out of my frame. One just looks like a streak with no fire ball that was disappointing, but it has a green tail, and one was just partially in my frame. The others I photographed are pink and green. Which I think are from the Aurora Borealis that was visible here. I missed the peak of that. I slept through it.

Here are two images of Perseid Meteors I photographed.

Look how close that fireball came to being in my frame! See it left side bottom edge? There’s another meteor below center as well.

©Deborah M. Zajac | http//circadianreflections.com
*Fireball just out of my frame plus another meteor*.

©Deborah M. Zajac | http//circadianreflections.com
*Perseid Meteor Streaking over No. Nevada…pink and green too.*

And, I’m still painting. I just finished a big painting for me at 9×12 inches of the Le Moulin de L’Abbye in France. I used a photo from a book called Hotels de Reve en France that I picked up years ago from a Little Free Library. I’ve been sketching from this book for years, but have been afraid to actually add paint out of fear of messing it up. I drew it freehand which took me hours, because drawing is so hard for me, but I am improving! Practice really helps. Anyway, I transferred the drawing to drawing paper so if I did mess it up I could half the drawing time by tracing it. This time I was determined to add paint!

Here’s that painting.

watercolor painting

The reference photo from the book Hotels de Reve en France.

I also made the boys some little handmade sketchbooks. I hope they fill those pages up!

The weather is cooler and the smoke from the Calif. fires has cleared so I’ll be out birding later this week and getting my morning walks in outside.

This is getting long so I’ll close with I hope your week is going well.

Nikon D850\ iPhone 14Plus

more to come…

Whatever Weds. Purple

July 31, 2024Posted in birding, Birding in Nevada, Hummingbirds, Whatever WednesdayTagged Birds in Flight, Birds in the Wild, Hover, Purple, Tail Feathers, Whatever Wednesday, Wings57 Comments

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Black-chinned Hummingbird-male

Nikon D850| Nikkor 500mm PF-E

more to come…

Whatever Weds. A Starlit Night

July 10, 2024July 10, 2024Posted in Astro Photography, Night Sky, Night Sky Imaging, Starry NightTagged After Dark, Astronomy, Milky Way, Mono Lake, NASA, Nikon, Other Worldly Locations, science, Space, Starry Nights, Stars, Summer, Tufas, Whatever Wednesday38 Comments

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It’s that time of year when I yearn to be out imaging and gazing at the night sky. A friend and I went back down to Mono Lake to do just that. Thankfully, we didn’t have any clouds to worry about.

The lake is really high eliminating a lot of the beach area we learned from our camping trip last month so, we knew to take our tall boots because standing in the lake might be our best bet for imaging. We scouted in the afternoon and found this spot. When we were leaving for dinner we ran into a Ranger who told us she would be giving a talk on the summer sky and constellations that evening on the beach and invited us back to attend it. We said we’d be there. The talk was a fast 2 hours. It was great hearing the stories the Native Americans tell about the stars and how they named the constellations and how to find them . The talk ended just after 10PM which was perfect as the Milky Way was already visible and we had some time to get to our spot in time for the Galactic Center to rise. The Galactic Center is the central region of our galaxy. The best months to photograph the Milky Way in the Northern Hemisphere are from May to August when the Galactic Center is highest in the sky and the weather is usually better in the warmer months.

We were standing in water to photograph this scene, but it wasn’t very deep, and the waves were gentle so we didn’t have to worry about a big one coming along and getting into our boots. 😊

I got home about lunch time yesterday, unpacked, got the car washed, and then started getting ready for a visit with my son and daughter-in-law. I’ll be on and offline for a bit. I hope your week and summer are going well.

Nikon D850|Nikkor 20mm F1.8G|

more to come…

Whatever Weds. Happy 4th of July!

July 3, 2024July 2, 2024Posted in Holidays and Observances, Photography, Whatever WednesdayTagged Fourth of July, History, Independence Day, National Anthem by the Gaither Vocal Band, Songs that tear you up, Whatever Wednesday36 Comments

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I want to wish everyone in the States a Happy 4th of July!

He-Man and I are going to watch the fireworks up in Virginia City this year for something a little different. I hope your holiday is a very good one!

*Patriotic Turtle seen on my walk this week.*

Let Freedom Ring!

Grab a tissue!

more to come…

Whatever Weds. Whirling Butterfly

June 26, 2024June 26, 2024Posted in Cultivated Flowers, Flower Photography, Fuji X-T3, Photography, Whatever WednesdayTagged Bokeh, Close up Photography, Flowers of Summer, Whatever Wednesday, Whirling Butterfly Plant, White Flowers31 Comments

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From my yard. Its Latin name is Gaura lindheimeri.

“It’s a perennial flower that produces airy, wand-like stems adorned with delicate, white star-shaped flowers that resemble the wings of a butterfly”.

White Cabbage butterflies and bees love it. I love it because it’s really hardy. I don’t do anything to it but trim it heavily in the fall.

Fuji X-T3| Fujinon 16-80mm@80mm

more to come…

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