Ok, so I finally made time to head down to the fish pond and sit for awhile. Its been far to long since I made myself do so and even though I didn't get any great photos I’m glad I did.
There’s just something about a nice cool early fall morning that is special out in the woods. The heavy dew clinging to every flower petal and blade of grass each waiting for the sun and wind to dry them. The way the sun seems to take its time to rise above the tree tops. The first leaves beginning to fall and the bright white Birch trees almost seeming to reappear after being hidden behind their green summer leaves.
There where two things that I "relearned" during my visit to the pond today. The first is that when you sit and casually gaze at the wonderful things you see while spending time outside its very easy to enjoy the nature around you without really appreciating it. Some times you’ve got to get right down there and stick your nose in things to really appreciate the true wonder of them.
Picking a small wildflower and glancing at it as you raise it to your nose is nice but every once in awhile you really need to put it up to the old eyeball and study it. Explore every little detail of the petals, stem and leaves. If you stop every so often to take a good hard look at the details of things you admire you may find yourself discovering a truly new appreciation of the world around you.
There wasn’t much in the way of wildlife at the pond today. A small group of Mallard ducks played follow the leader from hiding spot to hiding spot and there was a very brief visit by a couple of crows and a young bald eagle. The visit was so brief that I barely got a photo of one of the crows and missed the eagle all together. Given that the Salmon have started to run up the local rivers that feed into Lake Michigan I don’t expect that I will see much of the adult eagles here at the pond over the next few weeks.
The only thing that was at the pond in any kind of number today were songbirds. This brings us to the second part of my “relearning” for the day. I can sit at the pond and take pictures of all kinds of things. Eagles, no problem. Herons, deer, ducks, swans, crows and kingfishers no problem. Song birds, now that’s a problem.
Every once in awhile you get lucky and one stops in the open but you think I would remember how hard it is to get a clear shot of a small, hyperactive bird though the tangles of branches that surround the pond but apparently I didn’t. This was I’m sure evidenced by my wildly swinging camera lens and the muttered curses that I was glad there was no one around to hear. Of course not wanting to short myself on any possible photo adventures I thought maybe I would try to get a shot of one of these charming little tweeters in flight. Now that’s a whole different ball of wax.
Imagine trying to take a picture of something about the size of a pair of ping pong balls moving at what seems like a hundred miles an hour and that couldn’t fly in a straight line to pass a field sobriety test if it had to. Not as easy as it sounds.
Of course now that I feel challenged to get a good in flight shot of a songbird I suppose I will have to make at least a couple of more trips to the pond in the coming weeks. I get the feeling though that this could be one endeavor that might not end well.
Until next time. Get outside and enjoy the world around you! It might just change your perspective on life.
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