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Posts Tagged ‘huntley meadows’

Red Admiral in a tree

Posted in Butterflies, Insects, Nature, Photography, Summer, tagged , , , , , , on August 28, 2016| 6 Comments »

Here’s a shot of another one of the colorful butterflies of Huntley Meadows Park. I spotted this Red Admiral (Vanessa atalanta) there this past Friday morning as it perched in a tree. What was the butterfly doing in the tree? It seemed to me that it was simply resting, though I suppose that it might also have been trying to attract a mate.

From a photography perspective, I really like the way that the background is divided into two separate colors, creating a kind of yin-yang effect.

Red Admiral

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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White Christmas?

Posted in animals, Christmas, Nature, Photography, wildlife, Winter, tagged , , , , , , , on December 25, 2015| 5 Comments »

I’m dreaming of a white Christmas, but it looks like it won’t happen here this year, with a high temperature for today forecast to reach 70 degrees (21 degrees C).

So I decided to reprise a more seasonally appropriate shot from a couple of years ago at Huntley Meadows Park. In early January 2014 I spotted this Red Fox (Vulpes vulpes) circling around a beaver pond, not far from where I took my most recent fox shots.

Merry Christmas to all of my friends here who support and encourage me on my journey into photography and best wishes to you and your families as we move toward the start of a new year.

Red Fox

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Daddy out on a limb

Posted in Arachnids, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged , , , , , on June 4, 2013| 9 Comments »

Can a photo of a daddy longlegs (also known as a harvestman) be artistic?

Ordinarily, I would emphatically respond in the negative, but somehow this macro shot that I took of a daddy longlegs, suspended upside down from a branch, came out with a cool, creative vibe to it. I like the way the legs are placed, the way the light is hitting its body, and the way the branch is in focus only in the center area.

I ran across this daddy longlegs as I was walking through the woods and I took the time to set up my tripod and use my 100mm macro lens to get this shot. The daddy longlegs was amazingly tolerant of my efforts and remained in place the whole time, even when I experimented with the use of my pop-up flash.

daddy1a_blog

Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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First spiderweb of the spring

Posted in Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged , , , , , , on April 3, 2013| 5 Comments »

We had a foggy start to one of the weekend mornings and I traveled to my local marshland park with the hope (but no real expectation) of seeing some spider webs. When I arrived at the park, the ground was covered in places with funnel webs, but that was not really what I was looking for.

As I walked along, I suddenly came upon this modestly-sized web. It is not really ornate and is broken in places, but I was thrilled to find it nonetheless. I did not see any spiders, but the web is clear evidence that they are around.

It’s only a matter of time now before I post a shot of a spider!

web2_blog

Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Angry bird

Posted in Birds, Humor, Nature, Photography, Portraits, wildlife, tagged , , , , , on April 2, 2013| 5 Comments »

I am not sure what the other Canada Goose said or did, but this goose was clearly an angry bird yesterday. He seemed to put his whole body into the expression of his strong feelings, from the tip of this tongue to the tip of his tail.

Do they have a goose in the game Angry Birds?  If not, perhaps they should.

goose_tongue_blog

Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Dawn at my local marsh

Posted in Landscape, Nature, Photography, tagged , , , on December 21, 2012| 7 Comments »

One of my fellow bloggers, Lyle Krahn, asked me to take some landscape shots to give readers a better idea of the scenery at the marsh at Huntley Meadows Park, where I have been shooting a lot of my nature photographs.

I don’t have a lot of experience taking landscape-style photos, but I did try to step back this morning and shoot some photos of one of the water areas in the park, where I often see geese and ducks taking off and landing. I took this photo just after the sun had risen today, the day of the winter solstice. In the background of the photo you can see part of a field of cattails, through which a boardwalk runs. There is also a large wooded area of the park and an area with a beaver lodge and pond. It’s pretty amazing to have such a treasure in the midst of a suburban area.

dawn_blog

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Deer in the cattails

Posted in animals, Landscape, Nature, Photography, tagged , , , , , , on November 20, 2012| 8 Comments »

Usually when I see a deer, it turns and runs away, sometimes stopping to gaze back at be from a distance just beyond the range of the lens that I have on my camera at that moment. Recently, however, I encountered a deer that seemed content to look at me as I looked at him. It sounds like a nature photographer’s dream come true.

The biggest challenge was that he was in the middle of a mostly dried-up marshy field full of cattails and other tall growth that made it impossible to get a clear view of the young buck, a white-tailed deer, I believe. It became pretty clear to me that auto-focus was not a viable option—the camera seemed to really want to focus on some arbitrary branch rather than on the deer—so I relied on manual focusing. It was also in the middle of the day, so shadows were pretty harsh. During the protracted period of time that the deer stayed in the same little area, I shot a lot of photos and these are two of my favorites. You’ll note that the deer blends in pretty well with the background. If he had remained absolutely still, I may very well have walked on by without seeing him.

Deer in the cattails

White-tailed buck in a field of cattails

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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