How Lucky Was That?

    Sunday morning I went out very early with my camera. Each time I step into the woods I remind myself that I never know what I might see. This might be the day I photograph a four hundred pound bear or a fourteen pound bobcat. Either of those would be a big "first" for me.

    I settled down with my back against a tree and waited patiently, trying not to fall asleep. Soon I heard a dog barking in the distance. A small herd of deer came crashing by. They were in passing gear and the only photo I took was too blurred to show anyone.

    Fifteen minutes later the dog came by, panting heavily and laboring to climb a hill. She was in 4-wheel drive low and clearly posed no threat to the deer. I thought about getting up from my hiding place to take her picture just for fun, but you might think that was silly.

    The woods settled back down and so did I. In the woods, if you are quiet and still a squirrel may let down his guard and come within camera range. Last year a squirrel leaned so far out from his branch high above that he fell to the ground at my feet with a thump. He nearly gave me a heart attack. 

    On this Sunday morning a little male squirrel scampered through the leaves to check me out. I took his picture, but you have seen plenty of squirrels and I didn't think you would want to see another.

    It was almost nine o'clock and beginning to look like another day in the woods with nothing to show for it. Grand Baby and his mother were coming for coffee and I did not want to be late. I began working my way slowly back to the house while checking the ground carefully. I hoped to see a fawn that might have been left sleeping under a tree while his mom went in search of her breakfast.

    I was almost home when I discovered a blackberry bush growing wild. What a great find! Every wild animal loves to eat blackberries. I stopped for a few minutes to look through my camera lens and think about how I could exploit this new location on my next trip into the woods. A movement to my left caught my eye and so I swung my lens around to catch something I have never seen before. It was a little hummingbird collecting white fluffy material from the weeds to add to her nest.

The average hummingbird weighs eleven grams or less than the weight of five pennies. So this is a very small "first" for me.

Backstroke

Don't you think this guy looks like he is doing the backstroke?

Authors of photography books and magazine articles teach the rules of composition. They teach us that animals should be on the left side of the photo facing toward the right because most of the world reads from left to right. They recommend that there should be space on the right for the animal to gaze into so that he doesn't look crowded. Somewhere in each book or article they always include a statement that it is okay to bend the rules once in a while.

I think this is one of those times.

Photos of Hummingbirds are harder to get than you might think. Oh sure. "They move quickly and might turn out as a blur." you are thinking. That's only part of the story.

Imagine that you take the cardboard tube out of the center of a roll of paper towels. Now imagine that you are watching Forrest Gump compete with the All-American Ping Pong team. You place your eye to the tube and your vision is instantly narrowed so that you can see only one small part of the scene at a time. This is similar to the way the world looks through a camera viewfinder and it is the only method you have to follow that speeding ping pong ball as it flies back and forth between the contestants. Kinda hard isn't it?

Now you know why some of your Hummingbird photos will have no Hummingbirds in them at all.

Not only that, but is is hot. Really hot. And humid. Ninety four degrees with forty six percent humidity. Before you take your camera outside you will need to place it in a plastic bag. Set it on your porch for a few minutes and let it warm up. The plastic bag prevents it from fogging up like a bathroom mirror during a hot shower.

Plan on wiping off the view finder of your camera with your tee shirt occasionally as every time you put your eye up to it you will cause it to steam up.

And boy are you going to sweat. Oh, sorry. Women don't sweat, they perspire. You are going to perspire a lot. Perspiration is going to run down your face and the small of your back.

Next your arms will begin aching from holding a heavy camera and zoom lens steady for several minutes while you try to get just the shot you want.

But when you are done one of these guys will be frozen in time and you will see him jamming on brakes to avoid a bumble bee, or sticking his tongue out, or with a drop of sugar water from your feeder on the tip of his beak. Suddenly it all seems well worth the effort.

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