The Friday post on saturday

For the last 2 days the sun has been out after a week of overcast and rainy skies. So, obviously, I've been out shooting. Today's post is going to be  a combination of stuff I was thinking about while wandering the nature trails early this morning at Washington oaks. Today I saw 2 bald eagles on an oyster bed in the Matanzas river, I've never seen 2 on the ground I've seen them in trees but never on the ground. There was also a red tailed hawk in the trees in the gardens today, I was moving into position for a better look and lost him for about 5 minutes, then i heard this chirping noise and I saw a squirrel on the ground, yep, you guessed it, the hawk came in about mach 2. Heres the part you wouldn't have guessed, the squirrel sidestepped the hawk! and the hawk flew off. I never got my camera passed my chest it was one of those wow moments! Later i saw the hawk on a fence looking at the roses.

OK so here's a little story, I have friends that used to have chows and the female chow was a bird chaser, the cool part was that she would chase them when they were in the air. she would see a bird flying over the yard and take off after it till she got to the fence, then she would turn around and come back to me and say, "next time I'm going to get one of those." Today I was shooting at little birds and when one would fly past I would throw the camera up to face, but little birds fly quick, and sometimes my timing is off,  anyway I always tell myself "next time I'm going  get one of those."

Another thing i noticed today was that my camera smells like insect repellent, the camera body is a magnesium alloy but it has rubber and plastic covers and things like that. But i noticed that mosquito's still try to suck blood out of my camera. mosquito's, not the sharpest tool in the shed.

All of us shooters are out now, I ran across one that was doing some great hummingbird pics. He was also settling the great Nikon vs Cannon debate for himself by carrying both brands. His result? stick with Nikon. He had some really nice images, he shoots strictly for himself so he doesn't have a web presence I just saw them on the back of his camera.

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ok the only image i'm going to put up on this one is an adolescent owl. I shot this a couple days ago right after the rain quit
Thanks for reading! Lets go shoot"