Samaras or Helicopter Seeds (Last post of 2018)

I have always been fascinated with helicopter seeds. As a child we called them whirlygigs. The official botanical name of this type of seed is "Samaras". Samaras are the winged seeds produced by maple trees. They are a really cool way for a tree to disperse their seeds upon the wind. It's so much fun to toss a handful of them into the air and watch them come spinning down. Here is a macro image of one of them from our recent hike where we passed under a grove of Big Leaf Maples. I photographed it in window light with my Canon EOS 7D MkII camera and a Tamron SP 180mm F 3.5 DI Macro lens. The camera settings used were AV mode, ISO 400, F 3.5 at .5 sec. God's love and blessings to all of you during the coming year, chris