I’m Going

Posted on February 28, 2015 by Doug

Phainopepla and the Dragon

Posted on February 27, 2015 by Doug

Ok, so this is one photo I did not submit to the contest. Why?

Was it because I didn’t think it had as good a chance as the others? No.

In fact, I thought it might have a better chance because the Phainopepla is a bird less often photographed.

This image was not among those I submitted because……….I forgot.

Yes, I am a birdbrain.

I have yet to employ a filing system—either on my computer or in my head—that adequately compensates for that. Oh, well.

It just dawned on me yesterday, as I was driving around town, that I had left it out of the mix.

Skykomish River Valley

Posted on February 26, 2015 by Doug

A couple of days ago I submitted ten photo-creations to Audubon’s 2015 Photography Awards contest. I was happy they had an “Art”category this year because, though I do have some pretty nice bird photos, I don’t have any as magnificent as those that typically win this competition. I decided to post my entries here one at a time—there is quite a bit of detail in some of them :-). The first is my homage to the eagles that regularly accent my view of the valley. The fun thing for me with Photoshop is that I can take photos that range from excellent to pretty awful on their own and mix them up to create my own visual poetry.

Bunny vs Squirrel

Posted on February 1, 2015 by Doug

I recently witnessed an interesting interaction between a bunny and an Eastern Gray Squirrel. The squirrel acted as if it had never seen a rabbit and didn’t quite know what to make of it. Eventually, the squirrel determined the rabbit was probably not a predator, but it was certainly competition. The two took turns spooking each other off my patio until the squirrel got very aggressive and the rabbit did an amazing bit of aerobatics (which I caught on camera) to make its escape. While the rabbit waited in the bushes, a Douglas Squirrel came across the lawn to the same bush. The rabbit had its eye on the Gray Squirrel, so the Douglas Squirrel’s arrival was a surprise. The rabbit leaped out of the bush in such an animated fashion that it scared the Gray Squirrel off as well. Unfortunately, I did not get a video of all this, but I put together a slide show of the photos I took through my kitchen window.

Just click the arrow on the right of the image to move to the next slide