Point

for One Word Sunday: point

Lens-Artists Photo Challenge #142 – You Pick It!

Ann-Christine gives us the choice today to pick what we’d like to share and her beautiful flowers can literally be picked. What do I have here in Arizona? Since our move just over a year ago, other than cacti, I’ve been mostly taking photos of birds, so here are a few recent favorites.

Let’s drop in at the Riparian Preserve and see what we can find. A harrier hawk is always fun.

“He imagines a necessary joy in things that must fly to eat.”
― Wendell Berry

“In order to see birds it is necessary to become a part of the silence.”
― Robert Lynd

Then there’s the spoonbill who came during one of the storms in the south and has been here all winter. Here it’s balancing on one leg while looking astonished. Is that like rubbing your stomach and patting your head at the same time? Pretty in pink but what a big mouth!!

may my heart always be open to little birds who are the secrets of living ~e. e. cummings

There are lots of spectacular birds but there are also the cute, more approachable ones that you might see in your yard.

Wherever there are birds, there is hope. Mehmet Murat Ildan

If you’re a fish, you’d prefer to see this haughty cormorant perched on a limb rather than in the water where they run silent, run deep, run deadly.

Tomorrow, the birds will sing. Be brave. Face life. ~Charlie Chaplin

A pod of pelicans arrived towards the end of last year and a few have stuck around. I didn’t realize that pairs like this fish and swim in tandem, for all the world like synchronized swimmers. Of course the swimmers don’t usually eat fish while performing, at least I hope not!

And now it’s back to the weekend. I hope you’re enjoying yours.

Fun with editing

These bushes growing in the water and providing great reflections attract me for some reason. Then I got to playing with editing and this is the result. Happy Tuesday.

Up ahead

One of the paths at the Riparian Preserve.

for SquareUp 1.27.21

Upright

for SquareUp 1.26.21

Bathed in light

Winter pomegranates

Playing with editing again at the start of this new year. Winter looks different in the Southwest…and feels different, too. Yesterday I was sitting on our back patio reading and basking in the sun. Of course it’s in the mid-thirties when I get up in the morning, but it’s generally managed to edge into the mid-sixties or higher by mid-afternoon. Since I can’t have snow, I guess I’ll take it. 🙂

Friday flowers…rustic

In Descanso Gardens, even the small places are attractive.

Backlit

Everything is black and white

Although when in the sleepy pod the first day I saw them these American pelicans looked, with the exception of their exceptional beaks, completely white, on this day they were showing off their underlying black decorative touches.

“Life is better in black and white!”
― Avijeet Das

“When you photograph people in color, you photograph their clothes. But when you photograph people in black and white, you photograph their souls!”
― Ted Grant

Does this count for birds, too? Stretch those wings!

“The most colorful thing in the world is black and white, it contains all colors and at the same time excludes all.”
― Vikrmn, 10 Alone

Little photo bombing snowy egret in the background.

Photo bombing again, but in aggressive cormorant black. Doesn’t the middle pelican look as if it has its proverbial hands on proverbial hips in annoyance?

It’s also Pearl Harbor Day here in the U.S. as well as my mom’s and good friend’s birthdays. Can you imagine living in California and having your birthday on Pearl Harbor Day? Not the best birthday my mom ever had!