I’ve done a lot of work in my garden this year and I’m very proud of my vegetables! I had to get some nice close-ups of these peas before we ate them all! Unfortunately the garden got whacked pretty badly by a fierce hail storm a few days after these peas were picked, so I’m not expecting much else out of the garden. A few things may survive, but my onions and cucumbers were extremely badly damaged. I’m still hoping it all works out, but only time will tell…
Sometimes you get the shot you want, sometimes you get the butt!
I was doing some work in the garden (I have a plot in a farm field on the prairies East of Calgary) when I noticed a young coyote saunter across the field and duck behind the barn. I immediately grabbed my camera and trotted over to the barn, hoping to find the coyote hanging out behind it. Sure enough it wasn’t far away, but unfortunately we saw each other at the same time. Coyote’s are almost always wary animals and this one was no exception. It immediately turned and ran away. I managed to fire off a couple of shots, but this side of the animal wasn’t quite what I was hoping to see.
I’m finally getting around to posting a few more images from my trip to Algonquin Provincial Park in Ontario in June… We camped at Booth Lake for two nights and on the day in between we paddled into McCarthy Creek. It’s really more of a long and winding marsh than a creek as there really is no current to speak of. And other than a narrow channel of open water in the middle, the entire creek is covered with tall grasses and marshy weeds as far as the eye can see. And there are millions of Water Lily’s.
I really mean it when I say millions of Water Lily’s. They are everywhere! Their delicate white flowers gradually open in the light of the day and then close down again in the late afternoon. This is nice on a canoe trip because you can sleep in, have a leisurely camp style breakfast, and still be on the water with plenty of time to enjoy the scenery!
Having said that, the Lily’s are only open during the middle of the day, and they grow in wide open areas, brightly lit areas. This can make them extremely hard to photograph. The petals of the flowers are brilliantly white and any direct sunlight makes it very difficult to keep any detail in a photo. In the final image they appear as white blobs with no form or contrast. One way to combat that is to shoot them on cloudy days. Clouds make the light much softer with less contrast and allows the camera to capture the extensive detail in the bright white flowers. So the clouds and the rain that we paddled through wasn’t all bad; it helped a lot by giving me a real chance to make some nice images!
I love the way the morning light glows in the prairie fields. These stalks of grain seemed to be reaching for the sun as it rose and the sparkling dew drops added to the mood. The sun rises so early these days and I haven’t been able to get out to enjoy it as much as I do at other times of the year, so this was a pretty special morning for me. Never forget to look around you and appreciate what you have!
My family and I recently camped in Banff national park at the Two-Jack main campsite. Banff is an amazingly beautiful place and we are very lucky to have it so close to us. We really try to take advantage of that as often as we can, but it never feels like we get there enough. Two-Jack Lake is our preferred campsite, but unfortunately everyone else prefers it too. Two-Jack Main is much larger and we ended up staying there instead. Although it does not have a lakefront view, it has plenty of campsites and it is a very nice place to stay.
Two-Jack Main is in the middle of the Minnewanka loop and it provides easy access to the town of Banff, Johnson Lake, Lake Minnewanka, and of course Two-Jack Lake. The loop is pretty much a sure-fire location to find Bighorn Sheep; I’ve only driven the loop (or hiked at Lake Minnewanka) once without seeing them, and they usually show up in large groups of a dozen or more.
After finishing a short hike around Johnson Lake without seeing any birds or animals (there were far too many people enjoying the lake), we decided to take the longer drive around around the loop on our way back to the campsite. It was an amazing blue-sky day and the wildflowers were in full bloom. We saw several groups of sheep and a few of them even stopped to pose for us!
