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A hodgepodge collection of subjects from the commonplace to the unusual...
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Another season and yet another group of cats chose to use my backyard as their playpen / summer home.
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Another season and yet another group of cats chose to use my backyard as their playpen / summer home.

DSC_9291 baby and momma

springcatsmy backyardStaten IslandNYC

  • DSC_1885 spring scene at the botanical gardens
  • Fury ferns
  • DSC_8377 view from behind the glass
  • From big cats to little ones
  • Another season and yet another group of cats chose to use my backyard as their playpen / summer home.
  • DSC_9376 picture frame
  • DSC_9395 itty bitty kitty
  • Now tell me she does't know how to mug for the camera. Here's my neighbor Ava again, this time with her dad Cliff playing in the backyard as they often do.
  • DSC_2124 flowering tree at Clove Lake
  • Early morning at Clove Lake
  • One of the things I made certain to do on my first visit to Clove Lakes in nearly a year, was to see if that nesting pair of Heron's I photographed last spring came back to this same spot to nest again, and to the pleasure of endless onlookers, they had. From the many regulars to the lake I'm told this is the 5th straight year they did so. Before that they nested in a tree further up the lake that is almost impossible to photograph, and with my limited equipment would have been totally cut off from the nest. Using my trusty old 300mm f4.5 Nikkor and my matching TC-14 1.4 tele-converter, I captured the nest just like I use to capture nature shots 25 years ago in the days before digital camera's and auto focus tracking. Focusing yourself is a lot more taxing, but oh so much more satisfying when you succeed. And this lens combo still takes great pictures. Even better ones will follow when I pair them up with a newer Nikon camera that doesn't have an anti-aliasing filter.
  • Cats find the darndest places to sleep in.
  • Opps, sorry to wake you.
  • It's been a while since I've come here to Snug Harbor. One place that I've captured several nice nature shots in the past is the marsh area. Last fall during my last visit here I captured a pair of mallards mating. And one of my all time favorite turtle shots was at this same location.<br /> <br /> Today I had set up camp by the small waterfall which runs under a pair of foot bridges that spans the marsh. When I turned around what should I see hunting for insects and other small inhabitants of the shallows, but this green heron.
  • Grabbing my 70-300 zoom lens, I slowly spun around and started capturing shots. Eventually I went back for my tripod, still sitting by the foot bridge, so I could use my 300mm f4.5 and matching 1.4x tele-converter, which can't be hand held, as they are both manual focus optics that I've been using since the late 80's. Image wise my 300mm f4.5 ED-IF still runs circles around my 70-300mm nikkor, as capturing wildlife from a distance is what Nikon engineers designed it to do, so after capturing some photo's with my afore mentioned zoom, I thought it would really be great if I could get some photo's captured with the one true lens in my arsenal made for this type of situation, if only I could get everything set up in time before the heron took flight.
  • I was almost certain this little fellow would fly off before I got my tripod and long range lens set up. But happily I was wrong. Keeling still for so long to capture the bridge scene no doubt caused him to see me as no threat. So I stayed on my knees and moved as little as possible to keep the shots coming. Even with my knee pads on, my knees were crying out in pain (my left knee ached so badly I couldn't even stand up when I was done, and fell back to the ground). But I did get a lot of nice shots to help ease the pain.
  • DSC_2930 spring time at Blue Heron pond
  • DSC_3834 Wave Hill wild gardens
  • Last spring while I was taking pictures at the rock gardens at the Botanical Gardens in the Bronx, I ran into a really nice gentleman named Barry. He visits there regularly every year. We had a very pleasant conversation. He asked me if I'd ever been to a wonderful place called Wave Hill. It sounded very nice. I kept a mental note to come and visit it in the future. Now one year later on this rainy day in early May I worked my way up here from my domicile in Staten Island. It was worth the trip.
  • How amazingly beautiful is this plant!
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