Nature Photography (Formally Spring is in the Air)

[Doug Watson]

Well I can't complain too much, it's the first time I've had to shovel this year and....
It was just enough snow to make everything pretty. Just got back from a 3 mile hike with the dog.

Very pretty, this has been the second year in a row where we haven't gone X-country skiing (not my fault this year). I haven't been in the bush at all.

[Gwangi]

Well I can't complain too much, it's the first time I've had to shovel this year and....
It was just enough snow to make everything pretty. Just got back from a 3 mile hike with the dog.

Very pretty, this has been the second year in a row where we haven't gone X-country skiing (not my fault this year). I haven't been in the bush at all.

This was my first legitimate hike in a couple months. The last one was on Christmas eve in fact, I was out catching snakes and salamanders! Since November though the dog has gotten stuck in three different leg hold traps so until the trapping season ends we're sticking to trails and less adventurous places. Mostly it's just been too muddy to do much hiking though, the snow is actually a nice change of pace for this year. Still can't wait for spring though.

[Doug Watson]

The last one was on Christmas eve in fact, I was out catching snakes and salamanders! Since November though the dog has gotten stuck in three different leg hold traps so until the trapping season ends we're sticking to trails and less adventurous places. Mostly it's just been too muddy to do much hiking though, the snow is actually a nice change of pace for this year. Still can't wait for spring though.

Catching snakes and salamanders on Christmas eve, that won't happen up here too soon.
I have to say I hate traps of all kinds, if I ever found any I would disarm them. We are lucky that we have our Greenbelt nearbye that is a sanctuary where we hike and ski so no traps allowed, the same goes for Murphy's Point since it is a Provincial Park. In all our years we have never had a dog caught in a trap, I would be Royally ticked off. We have had to deal with skunk spray and porcupine quills but no traps thank goodness.

The day after the big snow we had a short squall. I love it when we get these big fat flakes but so hard to get a good photo. Its really nice when you see big mammals like deer moving through big flakes like this, almost otherworldly.


This morning was very busy at the bird feeder, lots of Cardinals, Jays, Sparrows, Chickadees and Juncos.
And just to show I wasn't making it up here is a Slate Coloured Junco at our feeder. Normally they grab the stuff the other birds knock to the ground but this year at least one has taken to perching on the feeder.

[Gwangi]

The body traps that kill the animal quickly bother me less (though scare me more as a dog owner) than the leg hold traps. Even though I hunt and fish I have too much empathy to inflict that kind of fear on an animal, and if all you're going to harvest is the pelt it's really just so wasteful. I recently came across two skinned coyotes and a fox dumped along a road. Completely intact save for their fur. This trapper really couldn't find a use for any other part of the animal? Hell, even a quality coyote skull can fetch you $30 or more. It's a wasteful and shameful practice.

Just this winter there was a local teenage girl who's dog got its neck stuck in a body trap (Conibear 220) while she was walking it along a fence line, on a leash no less. She watched that dog die while waiting for help to arrive. She just wasn't strong enough to get the trap open herself. When her father walked the fence line later that day he found 10 more of those traps, all illegally placed along a fence, that was along a road. It's makes me scared to take my dog anywhere, even in the off season. When my dog got stuck in those leg hold traps I had never seen so much fear and panic in an animal before. The first time it happened I got her free and she immediately got stuck in another! Luckily she is a large dog and the traps didn't do much damage aside from some swelling. These are the same places I explore for snakes, frogs, and salamanders. The same places I photograph wildlife. The same places I'll be taking my daughter someday. You would think these trappers would be required to set up a flag or something nearby to indicate that a trap is there, but they don't and aren't obligated to by law. This is public land mind you, but it doesn't feel very public during the hunting and trapping seasons. Then it becomes a war zone and a slaughter house.

[Doug Watson]

The body traps that kill the animal quickly bother me less (though scare me more as a dog owner) than the leg hold traps. Even though I hunt and fish I have too much empathy to inflict that kind of fear on an animal, and if all you're going to harvest is the pelt it's really just so wasteful. I recently came across two skinned coyotes and a fox dumped along a road. Completely intact save for their fur. This trapper really couldn't find a use for any other part of the animal? Hell, even a quality coyote skull can fetch you $30 or more. It's a wasteful and shameful practice.

Just this winter there was a local teenage girl who's dog got its neck stuck in a body trap (Conibear 220) while she was walking it along a fence line, on a leash no less. She watched that dog die while waiting for help to arrive. She just wasn't strong enough to get the trap open herself. When her father walked the fence line later that day he found 10 more of those traps, all illegally placed along a fence, that was along a road. It's makes me scared to take my dog anywhere, even in the off season. When my dog got stuck in those leg hold traps I had never seen so much fear and panic in an animal before. The first time it happened I got her free and she immediately got stuck in another! Luckily she is a large dog and the traps didn't do much damage aside from some swelling. These are the same places I explore for snakes, frogs, and salamanders. The same places I photograph wildlife. The same places I'll be taking my daughter someday. You would think these trappers would be required to set up a flag or something nearby to indicate that a trap is there, but they don't and aren't obligated to by law. This is public land mind you, but it doesn't feel very public during the hunting and trapping seasons. Then it becomes a war zone and a slaughter house.

I once found a spot at the end of the road where a trapper had dumped hundreds of skinned muskrats. The pile was about 6 feet in diameter and about 3 feet high, totally disgusting.

Can you imagine how traumatized that girl is. I still can't think of my own dogs being put down out of compassion with out reliving the pain. Since the traps were illegally placed I am guessing there was no way to trace the perp, that is a shame, he should have paid for it.

[Gwangi]

I'm pretty sure despite the illegal placement that the traps still had the information tags they're required to have on them but I'm not certain, I would have to re-read the news story. But this had just happened after my own dog's third run in with a leg hold trap. Now I've reached a paranoid level. We hike in a lot of places, who knows what some jackass has setup out there. I can't imagine what that poor girl went through. I panicked when my dog got stuck but luckily regained my composure and undid the trap. By the time it happened the third time I was almost complacent to it. Like "oh look, another trap, can't walk here anymore".

There are a couple dump sites around here too, mostly deer pelts and guts. I've never come across something like hundreds of muskrats. I would be mortified.

[Newt]

Nothing ruins a good barefoot wade like finding a beaver trap. Luckily I haven't stepped in one yet!

Those photos are beautiful, Gwangi! Down here we are having a reprieve from the snow. I went wading in an upland seep-swamp a couple of days ago and found egg masses of wood frogs and mole salamanders (the real deal, Ambystoma talpoideum) and spermatophores of Ambystoma species, as well as active larvae of A. opacum (which gets the jump on its congeners by laying eggs in the fall), and plenty of isopods and amphipods. We're due for more cold and ice and snow, though; I hope some of those egg masses survive.

[Gwangi]

Nothing ruins a good barefoot wade like finding a beaver trap. Luckily I haven't stepped in one yet!

Ouch! I can't even imagine. Just finding one would be scary enough. But if it was warm enough around here for wading barefoot there shouldn't be beaver traps set. Not that there wouldn't be, just that there shouldn't.

Those photos are beautiful, Gwangi! Down here we are having a reprieve from the snow. I went wading in an upland seep-swamp a couple of days ago and found egg masses of wood frogs and mole salamanders (the real deal, Ambystoma talpoideum) and spermatophores of Ambystoma species, as well as active larvae of A. opacum (which gets the jump on its congeners by laying eggs in the fall), and plenty of isopods and amphipods. We're due for more cold and ice and snow, though; I hope some of those egg masses survive.

As beautiful and magical as it was out there, what you're describing is what I'm really waiting for. I have a GoPro now, and just got my monopole for it yesterday. I can't wait to film some underwater amphibian action. Not long now, especially if it warms up again.

[Newt]

It's wading weather for me as long as the water is liquid, but even if it weren't, beaver trapping has no closed season in Tennessee. A couple of times I've been waist-deep in murky or duckweed-covered water with essentially zero visibility beneath the surface and noticed a dead beaver that, on closer inspection, turned out to be caught in a trap. That and broken glass are my two big fears when wading. Still, barefoot wading has a certain charm that cannot be replicated in waders - and besides, in the depths of summer the last thing you want to wear is a pair of rubber overalls!

[Halichoeres]

I admire your gumption; I'm way too paranoid to wade barefoot. I always use waders, even in the tropics. But maybe I should say ESPECIALLY in the tropics.

[Doug Watson]

It's wading weather for me as long as the water is liquid, but even if it weren't, beaver trapping has no closed season in Tennessee. A couple of times I've been waist-deep in murky or duckweed-covered water with essentially zero visibility beneath the surface and noticed a dead beaver that, on closer inspection, turned out to be caught in a trap. That and broken glass are my two big fears when wading. Still, barefoot wading has a certain charm that cannot be replicated in waders - and besides, in the depths of summer the last thing you want to wear is a pair of rubber overalls!

You are braver than me, broken glass, clam shells and fishing lures are a common hazard up here so when I wade around in the water chasing snakes and turtles I wear water socks. They are like a rubberized ballet slippers with a  rubber sole. They aren't as heavy as a shoe but at least protect the bottoms of your feet. They do give more of a barefoot feel.

[Doug Watson]

Got excited this morning when I saw what I thought was a pair of Purple Finches at the feeder. Turned out to be a new bird for me thanks to someone in NY back in 1940. A pair of House Finches (Haemorhous mexicanus). Talk about a hardy invasive, imagine a bird from Mexico adapting to our cold. Also for that reason has to be one of the dumber birds. If my relatives came from Mexico and some one dumped me in this cold I'm high tailing it back south!
Pretty bird but apparently they may be displacing our native Purple Finch and the invasive House Sparrow.

When they weren't at the feeder they were eating the seeds off of my Mock Orange.

[Gwangi]

In the lakes we have zebra mussels to contend with, they'll slice you up pretty good. Aside from that all the things I worry about stepping on if I'm barefoot are human garbage. Pity.

[Doug Watson]

In the lakes we have zebra mussels to contend with, they'll slice you up pretty good. Aside from that all the things I worry about stepping on if I'm barefoot are human garbage. Pity.

Our Rideau system including Murphy's Point is also infested with Zebra Mussels I forgot about those. So far boaters up here have done a pretty good job of cleaning their boats after they have been in infested waters and so far the land locked lakes I know have not been affected. Knock on wood.
and the Zebra Mussels are a product of human stupidity as well.

[Gwangi]

Our Rideau system including Murphy's Point is also infested with Zebra Mussels I forgot about those. So far boaters up here have done a pretty good job of cleaning their boats after they have been in infested waters and so far the land locked lakes I know have not been affected. Knock on wood.
and the Zebra Mussels are a product of human stupidity as well.

Yes they are. There is nothing like looking underwater in a lake carpeted by invasive zebra mussels, where the only plants you see are invasive Eurasian water milfoil, and the fish swimming by happen to be invasive common carp. 

[Doug Watson]

We just got back from a combination business trip and vacation. My wife had a conference in Vegas so we spread it out and I tagged along. Started out in California hit the two zoos in SanDiego, Disneyland then rented a car to drive to Nevada. Stayed in Boulder City, Nevada and took in the Hoover Dam, Valley of Fire State Park and Lake Mead Conservation area.
Here are some shots from the Valley of Fire and Lake Mead. We drove through the Valley of Fire, stopping now and then to walk some trails.

It actually rained in the desert while we were there, this is a rainbow over Lake Mead


The Valley of Fire State Park has a photo op at every turn. If it looks familiar it has been used in many movies and commercials. I thought for sure with five species of rattlesnakes that I would finally find a venomous snake in the US but once again I was snake bit, no snakes of any kind. It was kind of cool the day we were there started in the 50s Fahrenheit and only got up to 65, plus it rained.

These red sandstone formations are from 500 mya.







This is the kind of weather worn nooks that I was poking around in for rattlesnakes but I came up empty.


There were two trails with petrified logs from 150 mya this was the biggest log on one of the trails. The logs were protected by chain link fencing.

[Doug Watson]

Here is some of the wildlife we saw in the desert. We saw four Desert Bighorn Rams at the Hoover Dam at dusk but unfortunately there was no room to pull over and get a shot.

White-tailed Antelope Squirrel, these guys were everywhere. Size and character wise these were very similar to our Eastern Chipmunk. It was amazing watching them chase and fight with each other at the Hoover Dam. They were running along cliffs with 500 foot or more drops if they missed a step and they were oblivious. This one in in the desert in the Valley of Fire.


Here is one sharing a rock with a White Crowned Sparrow. We have those up here in the summer.




White Crowned Sparrow


House Sparrows are alive and well in the desert unlike here where they seem to be on the decline.


Black-tailed Jackrabbit. I spotted this guy under a rocky ledge. I tried not to disturb it but it got up and moved off after a while.



Raven, these were everywhere as well. They don't seem as large as ours but they have the same chiselled good looks.



Mourning Doves, I guess these guys can live everywhere.


This is an interesting shot. I was originally taking the shot for the Gambel's Quail, then I spotted the lizard at the top. The lizard was in the middle of running away so I never got closer, I think it is a Side Blotched Lizard. After I got home I looked at the shot and was amazed to see the humungous bug on the white rock between the male and female quail. It looks like it might be a blister or oil bug but I am not sure, anyone have any ideas.

Another shot of the bug just to the left of the female quail. she seems to be eyeing it.


It is amazing what can grow in these extremes.


A nasty looking cactus.

[Doug Watson]

Spring is in the air. The day after we got back from Nevada I spotted these two Robins on the front lawn. The Canada Geese are back in numbers and the Red Wing Blackbirds were singing yesterday.

[Halichoeres]

That jackrabbit shot is amazing! All the years I lived in the Southwest I never saw one that didn't flush more or less immediately, unless I was watching it from indoors.

[Doug Watson]

That jackrabbit shot is amazing! All the years I lived in the Southwest I never saw one that didn't flush more or less immediately, unless I was watching it from indoors.

I was surprised how close I got. I think it was hoping that I didn't see it since it was hunkered down under an overhang. I got to within around 15 feet from it before it got up and even then it didn't bolt it slowly hopped about 20 feet away and stopped when I stayed put. Maybe it is used to tourists.