A few Great Egrets on a hot sunny day.
I will always take the ‘nice to see’ type images, even if they are ultimately deleted or just archived.
These are the peaceful side of wildlife images.
Great Egret Sunny Day
Little Blue Heron On The Hunt
This time of year a Little Blue Heron has vivid breeding colors. Their head and neck can be almost magenta.
Also their bill has a blue / purple shading.
During the rest of the year they are slate blue. Very dark and frustrating to photograph because of it.
This is about as close an opportunity as I have had so far this year. That is unusal having a rookery just down the road. I’m hoping the population increases soon. If not we might have a very slow July and August.
Lazy Summer Day, Alligator
Colors, reflections, and a big ole gator !
I was walking on an old rice field dike when I shot this. At first I just gave a quick glance at him and kept going. Reconsidered and stepped back for the shot.
Nothing of high drama here, but this is what we see, as is.
Glad I did.
Anhinga Black & White
Click the image to enlarge, there is a small warning sign telling people to beware of Alligators. Really…there were a bunch floating around waiting for him to dive in.
Red Head
He didn’t stay there very long so this is it. A quick couple of shots.
Tricolored Heron By The Marsh Grass
I could not have asked for a better location. Really I couldn’t because I didn’t know it would show this good.
I had been grumbling about the day out in this marsh being unproductive.
Now that I have finally gotten to working on images seems I was wrong.
I really like this set and I believe a few more from other places around the marsh came out pretty good.
I probably won’t stop mumbling while we are out working though. Can’t help it.
A Little Botany Bay
In keeping with past articles showing some details of where we shoot, this is Botany Bay a wild life management area. It is part of the ACE basin we have documented in the past (325,00+ acres).
There is an ocean beach here, this being the edge of the basin facing the ocean. However, it is a 45 minute walk to the beach and it is gone at high tide. Recent hurricanes have changed the landscape considerably.
Above, one of the dirt roads that run through the area. This one passes the ruins of an old plantation, only the brick foundation remains.
Landscape here changes between woods, marsh, and finally open tidal inlets.
The above image is from the banks of a tidal inlet, this is low tide. Wildlife is plentyful, click and enlarge above to see a few Heron and Egret moving through the shallows.
This shot is taken from the same spot, same inlet. The ‘rocks’ here in the fore ground… oyster shells, millions. This is covered during high tide. Oh yeah, careful walking out here. Little Fiddler Crabs are a carpet under foot.
Once the tide is up the depth is high enough for the Dolphin to come up stream and feed here.
Next visit I should try for a few more wide shots, it’s a wonderful place and different than most of my other ‘haunts’.
Sunflowers, Bluebird, Hot As ___
It is not the ‘official’ calendar summer here. But this is sub-tropical weather. You can tell by the size of these flowers.
We had parked the car under big thick trees along a canal, when we came back and started the car… 103 degrees (39.5 C). After a short drive it did drop to 85 F.
No wonder the pack felt like a bag of rocks.