The word prompt from Bren: Macro
You may have noticed I like to get up close to so many subjects it will be hard to pick a few for Bren’s Photo for the Week challenge.
Getting up close with a Sacred Ibis
The Ibis feathers are lovely
This is the flower
Here is inside
The Eastern Water Dragon enjoying the sun
Isn’t the red on the underside skin wonderful
Water Dragons have a serious side
The final installment of This is November. The flowers that appear in November are fabulous. The small native flowers shoot out of the ground for a short time. The garden is resplendent with most of the flowering shrubs a hive of activity as you saw in This is November: The Insects. Enjoy the flowers of November.
You saw the Jacaranda flowers in the This is October: Part Three Did you know that the Jacaranda flower is not only purple but white as well?
Some flowers are just made to be photographed.
A close-up shot of the Blue Salvia which the Lewins Honeyeater was feeding on in This is November: The Birds
A few drops of water and an early morning sun make for wonderful flower photography
The second flowering for some of the Grevilleas
The cactus had so many buds and flowers this year.
When the rain comes, the Crocus add splashes of colour throughout the garden.
One of the Day Lilys I was given by my mate Geoff. There is always a Stingless Bee flying around somewhere.
This orchid was at my besties sons place. An amazing cascade of flowers.
Here is the orchid flower
The Pandorea were flowering high in the canopy
My White Hydrangea has a pink hue
One of the best years for the Silk Tree flowering
The Roses at my besties are magnificent this year too.
And the scent is divine
The little yellow puff balls are everywhere
I love this Hibiscus which seems to have many names – I like Dancing Ballerina
The Lomandra growing on the forest floor has many flower spikes
The new leaves on the Paperbark are fabulous
The Paperbark was covered in white creamy flowers from top to bottom.
Growing in the paddock was a tiny yellow flower about 5mm in diameter. Once I saw this one I then noticed all the others.
The Bottlebrush flowers were their showy best this year. The Pink Bottlebrush flower is the second year it has flowered since planting about 10 years ago.
This is the red Bottlebrush flower I used as an experimental technique late last month
many people wanted to know what the bush looked like. Here is the Miniature Bottlebrush about 1.5M tall
The birds have been fighting over the Black Bean tree flowers
Have you ever seen a Pineapple flower? Now you have. I had no idea they had flowers like this
Last year, I found the Hyacinth Orchid growing in the forest at my place. I went looking again this year to where I thought it was but to no avail. Looking around my garden not only did I find one growing but two!
That’s the last post on This is November. I hoped you like all the posts.
The Tuesday photo challenge from Dutch goes the Photo is Bugs. I have so many bug photos I just had to stop or it would take me for ages to complete the photo challenge!!!
Here is a selection of my bugs. I don’t know the names of all of these so I will leave it up to you to identify the ones you know.
The Centipede who walked through my house.
The Plant Hopper who wouldn’t sit still for a photo in the kitchen
The Praying Mantis on the kitchen window
The Fly with a yellow face
The Fly with the green eyes and biting proboscis
The “birth” of a Cicada on the chook yard fence
The Tiger Cicada on a tree
The Bullants coming to defend the nest
A Beetle on a leaf
An insect marching with purpose across a leaf
A bright red insect on my car
A Mayfly on the wall
An insect stopping for a photo op
Have a search around my blog for lots more insect photos if you want
March was a month of contrasts, a couple of hot days followed by a bit of rain and then Cyclone Debbie came along. I was fortunate not to be in the path of Debbie but on the edge of the system. I missed the strong winds and abundant rainfall. I still managed to have 476mls of rain for March. This rainfall ended the long dry period over Summer when usually the rains come. The total rainfall for March exceeded the total rainfall for the 6 months prior.
The few dry day did allow for some wandering about and finding some interesting stuff. The weather also bought out a good variety of fungi which have their own blog.
So onward to the stuff of March.
Isn’t this little boat the cutest?
The flood waters made the creeks run and the creek at Emerald Beach broke through the sand and flowed to the sea. The strong tannin coloured water gave the rocks an interesting hue.
Rust. As you know I love rust, the colours and textures rust gives to metal.
More rust on the fence around the riverbank park in Grafton.
In Lismore, wandering the back lanes I came across this furnace door that is still in operation at the rear of a cafe.
One of the treasures of Lismore is the street art in the back lanes. The recent flooding of Lismore didn’t damage most of the art works although some may need a bit of a clean and touch up. The following selection is from just one lane way.
The art on the door is perhaps a portend.
The fish managed to swim out the flood waters I am told.
I love this ghostly face.
How clever.
The butterflies in the rainforest.
Speaking of butterflies, I just love photographing butterflies. Of course many a while is spent chasing them around trying to get THAT capture. The Common Yellow butterfly seemed to enjoy time on the ground.
The Small Green-banded Blue butterfly kept trying to hide from me.
I haven’t had such a variety of flies at my place or perhaps I haven’t really taken a close look at them. The yellow face and bottle green body look great.
The green eyes are striking. The long proboscis also lets this fly give you a very sharp sting.
This beautiful Huntsman spider lived in my house for around two months. She has now gone outside I think as I haven’t seen her for a couple of days. Her leg span from front to back or side to side is 16cm. Her body length is 5cm. How big is your hand?
The Fire-wheel trees are flowering.
I have a number of Golden Lycras that my aged neighbour loved. He gave me lots of corms and this year they flowered the best ever. They gave me lovely memories of him. The view from the top.
They looked so lovely in the morning sun.
This Hibiscus was in my parents place and the cutting has lived on at my place filled with abundant flowers this Autumn.
The miniature Hibiscus adds small red spots in the garden
One of the original Hibiscus. This one is in my besties garden. Such a delicate flower. The petals almost look transparent.
Another tiny native flower that I have found around my property. The flower is about 12mm across so imagine the size of the insect that was getting some nectar or pollen.
The Bromiliads had a good flowering this March. They gathered enough water that’s for sure.
I hadn’t seen white Crocus before. Stunning flowers aren’t they?
I have loved the colours of Coleus since I first saw them in my grandfathers garden.
The rain has revived the Lichen.
Wandering around the garden looking for snacks, the Bar-shouldered Dove and Emerald Dove shared the space.
A little Jacky Winter enjoying the morning sun.
The Brown Pigeon sat in the Poinsettia striking a lovely pose.
Not the best angle for a Blue-faced Honeyeater though.
The little Forest Kingfisher sat in the tree looking about then suddenly plunged to the ground. When he resumed his perch, he did the bash bash on the branch to tenderise his snack. It looks like he managed to find a frog in the garden.
The Forest Kingfisher has beautiful colours don’t you think?
Thanks for taking the time to have a look at my March.
So much to do in the next few days. I wanted to get a little bit of my world out there for you to enjoy. I looked at some of the photos and there are some that are recurring from years gone by. I guess that’s what happens in nature. The cycles just keep rolling on. I wonder if you can spot the photos subjects that have appeared before. All of the flower and insect photos are from my besties fantastic garden. I love wandering around her garden discovering flowers and insects.
I took many photos of this tree as the textures and lines are so good. It was so hard to settle on one photo.
The air ferns are increasing in the bush and around the garden. They are so primitive looking don’t you think?
The way the moss just cascades over the old tree trunk, filling crevices giving life to the dead wood of a large tree from the past.
The water vine grew in the fork of the tree long ago and now it looks like the tree has an appendage. The vine is still alive reaching up into the canopy.
The flowers of the Silk Tree aren’t around for long. The birds sure make a mess of the flowers when they come to gather the bit of pollen or nectar the flowers supply.
This hibiscus flower grows high in the tree and sends the occasional flower to hang down adding a splash of red to the garden.
The little balls laden with pollen usually have native bees buzzing around except when I was taking photos.
The delicate blue centres of the white hydrangea are quite stunning when you get close to the large white flower ball.
These tiny daisies are popping up all through the garden. They are about 10mm in diameter.
I love the Cats Whiskers with their purple tips.
I am not sure what this orange flower is called but it makes a bold statement in the garden’s borders.
Flowers aren’t just to be seen in the garden, they are also a source of joy in the house or even in the lady shed.
I can’t find my spider book so I can’t let you know the names of these spiders. This little one is quite small but very fast.
Another tiny spider who sat still for a photo or two then decided that enough was enough and jumped onto the camera.
When we were fixing up the studio I came across a few insects, mainly black ants by the thousands, but this long skinny spider was staying where he was, pretending to be a stick I guess.
There have been lots of dragonflies flitting around my besties garden and mine as well. There have been blue and large red dragonflies at my place, whereas there appears to be a lot of these orange/yellow ones at her place. This one was happily flying around the rainforest near the creek.
This dragonfly is one of the bigger dragonflies in the rainforest.
Back at my place I have been keeping an eye on the Friarbirds nest.
I think the female or juvenile Satin Bowerbird spotted me as I was staking out the bird bath.
The tiny Thornbill didn’t seem to care as it contemplated taking a plunge into the water.
As usual the garden has its resident Easter Yellow Robin. I love the way they seem to enjoy landing on vertical things.
We went to Broken Head for the afternoon. There are always White-bellied Sea Eagles soaring on the currents around the headland.
It was a surprise to see the Sooty Oystercatcher strolling around the beach. It looked a bit tired so maybe it was the first landing on its migration?
The little bit of rain I have had has certainly sent the frogs into a cacophony of a night. I think these tadpoles may be Bleating Tree Frogs as I hear them around the pool.
I think the one on the right may enjoy getting its pictue taken.
That’s all for the time being so if I don’t get to post another blog soon, have a great Christmas. Remember to look after our nature because it’s the only one we have.
This is a quick look at some things I have discovered in January. I have a lot of photos from last weekend but I haven’t had time to sort through them yet, so the final “Things of January” will have to wait for a while. It is amazing what you can find when you stop on the way home, mainly to check out the clouds and mist that was hovering over the Ranges after the storms. I have seen these flowers growing on the side of the road and in the bush around home but have never looked at them closely as they were just purple flowers on a long stalk that seemed to grow everywhere.
February 2017 – New information came in that the flower is a Veined Verbena from South America. Someone doing a search found my blog and the purple flower and let me know what it is, thanks Chris.
This is what the flower, Veined Verbena, by the side of the road looks like close up.
At the back door an industrious wasp set about building a mud tube. I waited for a couple of hours but it never came back to finish the construction.
I am always looking for interesting shapes and patterns in nature. This moth is rather incredible even though it is a bit damaged.
On a drive down to the Clarence River, I came across this Bearded Dragon hanging onto the fence post. I am sure it wanted to run off but sat very still while I took some photos. The left hand side back leg was just hanging free. When I got back into the car, I looked around and he was gone lol.
The Fig Birds have been hanging around for longer than they have in past years. The fig tree in the garden had lots of figs this year but they had already gone when I took this photo. The Euodia hadn’t flowered yet let alone have berries.
This year the Little Friarbirds have been around when the bigger Friarbirds have not been in the garden as often.
While doing a bit of bush regeneration at my besties place we came upon a bush under a large pine tree after we cleared away an abundance of Lantana. Thanks to Dr Dave Watson (@DOCTOR_Dave) who let me know it is a Caper Berry flower. The seed was probably dropped by a bird as there aren’t any other large or flowering bushes nearby. There are some surrounding properties that have planted rainforest plants as well as the thousands planted on my besties property. Beautiful flower isn’t it?
When I went down to feed the chooks, I came across this Cicada emerging from its shell. They are rather prehistoric looking aren’t they?
That’s all for this blog of January’s “item of interest”. Stand by or actually have a seat until the next blog of January’s photos and stuff.
I was thinking of doing a bit of a recap of what’s been happening this year in my blog and Hey Presto, WordPress has done it for me.
Have a walk through 2014 and see if your favourite blog is mentioned. If not hit the like button and let’s see if the stats change for 2015!!!
The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2014 annual report for this blog.
Here’s an excerpt:
A New York City subway train holds 1,200 people. This blog was viewed about 4,300 times in 2014. If it were a NYC subway train, it would take about 4 trips to carry that many people.
I really enjoy discovering new things as well as seeing things through the lens of my camera in a different way. So far this year the rains that are usually around just haven’t come. But the middle of this month there was a good fall of 60mls and the follow-up rain arrived a week later with 15mls. This rain was the best since the 1st June when 22mls fell. The change to the landscape has gone from browns and yellows to a tinge of green and new shoots appearing on many plants.
The new shoots on the Native Wisteria suddenly started to appear.
The Pine Trees new cones came in a variety of shapes. Some in a random way.
With others seemingly more ordered. The Yellow Tailed Black Cockatoos will be pleased.
The plum trees are flowering, some in groups.
While others are singles on the bare branches.
There is plenty of insect activity too. Some plants have evidence of insect activity like these leaves.
Some plants visitors are more obvious. This little beetle was very camera-shy and kept walking away from the camera despite my efforts. Those red legs were very determined to trudge away!
The Raspberries had a mixture of fruits and flowers but mainly flowers. The fruits were hard to find and weren’t all that nice to eat, but looked good.
I had never really looked at Raspberry flowers. They are quite pretty.
The bees seemed to think so as well. They were buzzing around going from flower to flower.
They were very intent on their pollen collecting.
The bees were also drawn to Fireweed. I can see why someone decided that they would be pretty in the garden, not realising what they would end up doing to the paddocks.
As always, there was an Eastern Yellow Robin nearby to see what was flushed out with the weed pulling going on.
While higher up the Little Wattlebird kept an eye on things.
But much, much higher up still, a Brahminy Kite wheeled over head.
During a drive into Ballina, we came across a puddle on a small park where a small flock of Plumed Whistling Ducks were having a good time wandering about.
I have never seen Plumed Whistling Ducks before. They are a very striking bird.
Seeing them really made my weekend. They have great plumage don’t they? Hope you enjoyed a bit of my weekend.
brian
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