I spotted this scene in the last half of my commute to work this morning. I hadn't much time but actually turned the car around, parked, and took a few moments to enjoy and photograph the view from a roadway bridge. A river respite.
nature
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The night before last, the humidity of the past week finally blew away. The air is clear and light again and, when the clouds part, we can see lovely, deep blue sky in place of a hazy mess. This morning that deep blue sky played host to a nice display of whispy cirrus clouds. Taking an opportunity to pull into a park on during my commute, I spent a few minutes enjoying and photographing the sky with cirrus for decoration.
Fridays off with not much to do are a good thing. I did not plan to go to Hinckley Lake this morning but the day began too pleasantly to spend much time indoors. I tossed the camera bag in the trunk and headed out. I stopped along the way to watch and photograph turkey vultures, perched on bare tree branches, warming themselves in the early rays of the sun. At the lake, I set off to see what birds {herons} I might see. Checking their favorite haunts from the lakeside trail, I was richly rewarded. In one of those favorite spots, I crept towards the water and peered around the lakeside vegitation. There, a literal stone's throw away, was a Great Blue Heron standing still as a statue. We regarded each other cautiously and I squeezed off a few shutter clicks. The bird was nervous. I was being attacked by mosquitoes. Not a good combination for a photo session. Off flew the great bird but not before I made my catch of the day! There were other beautiful scenes to be enjoyed and recorded as I hiked around the lake. None, however, matched the close encounter with one truly great bird. It was a surprising morning.
When working with nature, don't turn your back… not even for a second! This morning I was strolling to the back of my car to stow camera gear for a quick pre-work visit to Hinckley Lake. As I cleared the corner of the garage I spotted, directly across the drive, a doe deer and three tiny spotted fawn. They froze, uncertain whether to flee and in what direction. Carrying my camera bag, I slowly opened the back of the car, turned and placed my bag inside, withdrew my camera, changed lenses, fired up the camera, and turned back to photograph the scene. Gone! In the space of 30 seconds or less the whitetail family had silently fled the scene to the relative safety of a nearby wooded area. I felt bad about it until I realized my camera lens had completely fogged over and was useless — it had come out from a cool storage area into a warm and muggy world. Ready or not, I'd have missed the shot. {sigh}
I climbed into the car and headed to the lake. Strangely, though Hinckley Lake is a favorite fishery for Great Blue Herons, I saw none. I can usually count on seeing several in the early morning hours when the lake is quiet and human fishermen are scarce. Eventually one of the big birds descended from a tree and alighted in a favorite fishing area, a bit distant for my purposes but at last I was seeing a heron! I watched the bird as it stood still, waded a bit, and stood still even longer. Eventually it jabbed the water with its spear-like beak and produced a minnow which it promptly swallowed. Again it stood. And stood. Tired of staring I examined my more immediate surroundings. Two brilliant yellow flowers –cone flowers– were lit beautifully in the morning sun with a deep green grassy background that made them really stand out. I focused and shot a couple of images. Nice. I turned to see what the heron was doing only to discover that it had silently taken to the air and was already more than 100 feet away and flying close to the water. I'd wanted to at least see and photograph that takeoff and missed it entirely because I'd turned my back for half a minute again.
Repeating, the lesson for the day: Don't turn your back.
We did some utility running around today but eventually wound up at the Lorain County Metro Parks' French Creek Reservation. We took a little hike there on their well-groomed woodland trails. We also visited their temporary exhibit of captive butterflies. The outdoor tent was a bit cramped but it was fun sharing the space with flowering plants, fluttering butterflies, and other interested folks. We ended our outing with dinner at Max & Erma's where we enjoyed spicy black bean burgers with dark green side salads. A long, warm day but a good one!
On our way home from shopping the morning of July 3, She suggested we check out a place in the Summit Metro Parks called Furnace Run. We'd seen the sign at its entry but had never stopped to explore the park. As it turned out, it offers two miles of good foot trails and a fine little pond. The pond, of course, is home to turtles, frogs, dragonflies, and at least one big, black snake! We hiked only one of the two loop trails before the heat began to get to us, then headed for home.
We spent the morning July 4 exploring a relatively new part of the Cleveland Metroparks System. The West Creek Reservation was once a dumping ground for adults and a place of exploration and mischief for youngsters. When a former mayor of Parma (a suburb of Cleveland) threatened to make the "idle land" into a golf course, neighbors and preservationists banded together. A vote was taken. The natural area was saved. After many years of meetings and work the land of woods and waters has been introduced as a place city residents can quickly reach to enjoy for its natural beauty.
We didn't stay all morning in the West Creek Reservation –the trail system is short, unmarked, and being developed– but thought we wanted a bit more hiking. So we headed south to the Hinckley Reservation and one of our favorite hikes — around the lake. Don't get me wrong, we enjoyed that long hike, but add that to the West Creek walk and factor in the day's rapidly building heat and humidity and we'd pretty much had it by the time we got back to the car. In fact, I think I suffered a bit of a relapse of my cold/flu/whatever and felt bad all evening.
Still, in all, it was great visiting new places and old, even on hot days.
I knew it was a Great BLUE Heron but I had no idea! I had the day off due to working all day last Sunday. The day dawned sunny with heavy dew and a bit of haze, perfect for a little nature hike. As I walked a trail at Hinckley Lake, I spooked a heron fishing near the shore. It took flight and, camera at the ready, I squeezed off a series of shots. Examining the images later I was impressed at just how blue the bird looked in the shadow. The reason? It is illuminated almost entirely by light scattered down from the clear blue sky overhead. The next image, recorded less than a second later, shows us a bird of a feather more like what we are used to seeing: blue-gray.
Before Thursday morning, I had never seen a Great Blue Heron fishing in rushing waters. Herons usually frequent the shallows of quiet lakes and streams. They wade slowly along and watch for fish to scatter from around their feet then stab at them with their sharp beaks. This bird stood still, one eye on the photographer, one apparently watching for fish, as river water cascaded over smooth rocks. I'd a little extra time on the way to work and, seeking calm, stopped at one of my favorite natural spots. The heron was a total surprise.
Thursday was a really, really lousy day at work! Started out in the wee hours with a power failure in the server rack, then a yahoo co-worker moved a couple of networked printers before their time putting them out of use, then the HR manager's PC died, and on and on and on. By the end of the day I was stressed out, my body hurt from head to toe, I was angry, frustrated, and I was physically exhausted having stayed up late with observatory programming the night before and scrambling to work an hour early when I discovered there was a crisis in progress. This morning was a time to unwind a bit on my way to the place of Thursday's torments.
One of my favorite local places is a city park in Olmsted Falls. There, amongst hand-carved rocky walls, grow mosses, flowers, and trees. Nearby a river slowly wears down its rocky bed creating the falls for which the town is named. The light and the atmosphere are peaceful there. It's on my way to work.
Several varieties of iris grow there, surely planted by forgotten hands. They glow softly in the early morning light amongst the rock walls.
An unkempt and smelly lily pond is adjacent to the park's tiny parking lot. I was looking for frogs or turtles, and even heard but did not see a bullfrog. Then I noticed the tiny black dots floating amidst the tangles of pond weed… tadpoles! Hundreds, maybe thousands of tadpoles were swimming everywhere. Most were of a very small, deep brown or black variety dotted with yellow. What I thought were bubbles of gas burbling occasionally to the surface turned out to be much larger bullfrog tadpoles! They darted to the surface, gulped air, then dove back to the relative safety of the pond floor!
Before leaving, I strolled to the bridge carrying a street over the river valley and crossed to the north side. There, perched just on the river bank, is a house of enviable location. Still, I got my respite and a bit of stress relief through a much less permanent visit to a tiny city park. One of my favorite places for, now, several decades, David Fortier River Park.
“Whether we and our politicians know it or not, Nature is party to all our deals and decisions, and she has more votes, a longer memory, and a sterner sense of justice than we do” — Wendell Berry
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