animals photography

Second “X” stories voting reminder . . . and fox

The “X” stories voting block is chugging along and nearing the halfway mark. This is the second reminder and . . .

. . . crap! Is this Super Bowl weekend? Lemme check . . . yup! That means I’m wasting my time posting this. No, wait . . . I’ll work under the assumption that football fans are not big readers during football season (and likely during the rest of the year), so they weren’t going to see this post anyway, what with cheering various criminals and thugs as if they were heroes.

But, for the reading public, no matter how you come to the stories, if you are a reader of our stories and someone who votes, thank you in advance for casting a vote for your favorite of the three. Links to the stories and the poll for voting for “Alphabet Challenge X-Stories” are HERE(link). Votes will be accepted until  Noon (Central Time) on Tuesday, February 16th, 2021.

So, fox . . . .

There’s a fox in our neighborhood that seems interested in approaching people, even when they are walking large dogs. I don’t know if it’s an idiot, young and immature, or all three. Two days ago, it was in my yard. I snapped a few photos (143) and recorded one video.

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First “X” stories voting reminder . . . and deer

The “X” stories voting block went live a few days ago . . . and this is the first reminder to potential readers and voters (hence the title).

As usual, if you like a particular story, in addition to voting for it — and if you feel like it — forward it to friends and family (and also ask them to read the other stories in case they don’t agree with your opinion).

No matter how you come to the stories, if you are a reader of our stories and someone who votes, thank you in advance for casting a vote for your favorite of the three. Links to the stories and the poll for voting for “Alphabet Challenge X-Stories” are HERE(link). Votes will be accepted until  Noon (Central Time) on Tuesday, February 16th, 2021.

So, deer . . . .

These photos are as fresh as they could be, literally just harvested from my camera, and captured during an impromptu drive through the nearby refuge.

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White-breasted Nuthatch and a “V” stories voting reminder

The “V” stories voting round is really struggling to keep up with previous rounds. However, this is understandable given the time of year and all the stuff going on.    

For them who still take the time to read our stories and vote for their favorite, thank you in advance. Links to the stories and the poll for voting for “Alphabet Challenge V-Stories” are HERE(link) Votes will be accepted until  Noon (Central Time) on Tuesday, January 5, 2021.

So, on Christmas day I had the opportunity to get a few close-ups of birds I don’t see at my house.

Look to the left . . .

That is a White-breasted Nuthatch (LINK). It may not be recognizable at first glance because people are probably used to seeing it hanging head-first on the side of trees and feeders. Occasionally, even hanging upsidedown under branches.

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See Gull and a “V” stories voting reminder

The “V” stories voting is still stalled as people recover from their Christmas stuffing . . . and get ready for their New Year’s Eve drunken reverie. 

For them who take the time to read our stories and vote for their favorite, thank you in advance. Links to the stories and the poll for voting for “Alphabet Challenge V-Stories” are HERE(link) Votes will be accepted until  Noon (Central Time) on Tuesday, January 5, 2021.

So, I stopped my car not ten feet from this seagull, turned off the car’s engine, rolled down the window, and waited to capture a sequence of photos showing the gull launching into flight.

Below are the photos I shot as I waited for the gull to take flight. it never did, by the way, and I just got tired of waiting and left.

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Just a quick reminder about “C” stories

I know, I know . . . the less-than-twenty-out-of-sixteen-hundred-plus-subscribers who were going to vote already did so. But, just in case a few more readers stagger in here . . .

. . . there’s only another week before the “C” stories voting closes. I suspect most people who had any intention of reading them have already done so, but just in case, you can vote for them HERE as well as find links to the stories so that — you know — you can read them before you vote.

Right, done with that.

I’ve mentioned before that sitting in a car with the engine running seems to play tricks on the Nikon Cameras VR feature. Pretty much every time I’ve attempted snapping photos with the engine running, even if I don’t lean on anything in the car (other than, you know, having my gluteus maximus planted on the seat) the photos come out blurry. I’ve done tests with the car running and the car not running, and it’s a real thing.

I mean the camera messing up is a real thing, not my ass . . . although, my ass is also a real thing but not relevant to this discussion.

Click for a larger version.
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Almost Wordless Tuesday

Almost every day I spend time sitting outside, on the patio, camera on hand and a coffee by my side, hoping to capture something interesting. This post is about boring photos from my patio.

OK, one photo is from a quick drive we took . . .

The rest are all from our patio . . . wait, let me check . . . nope; I thought there might have been one more from somewhere else, but that’s not the case. 

Most of these are shot with the 70-300mm lens at full zoom. All of these are lightly processed and cropped in Lightroom from the JPG files that are saved with the RAW files. Meaning, but for some minor tweaks, they are about what you get out of the camera. The camera is the D7500 . . . almost makes me want to rethink shooting RAW, but I’ll probably still do it. 

OK, enough words . . . here’s the gallery of a bunch of photos from the last five days or so.

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