Winter Guest

With the warming spring weather we haven't been using our wood stove very much to heat up the house. Yesterday however there was a brisk fog pouring in off the coast and it sure felt like we needed a fire. It was pretty cold by California standards. I grabbed the wheelbarrow and wheeled it out to the woodpile to get some firewood. While grabbing some logs I was startled by an odd shape under one of the logs as I picked it up. It was in the shadows so I couldn't see it very well. There were some short appendages sticking out from it. My first guess was a bat. Pulling away some of the logs around it I was finally able to ascertain that it was a lizard. Further inspection revealed it was a Northern Alligator Lizard. It was all rolled up in a ball overwintering in our woodpile. As chilly out as it was it could barely move. I carried it into the house and placed it into a jar. This morning I photographed it on a mossy piece of bark before releasing it into a sunny spot on top of the woodpile. When I checked on it a little bit ago it was warm enough to crawl away. God's love and blessings upon your day, chris All images were created with a Canon EOS 7D MkII camera and a Canon EF-S60mm F 2.8 USM Macro lens. #TeamCanon

Return to an Old Standby

I have been overwhelmed with family responsibilities of late so I haven't picked up my camera that often the past few weeks. This morning when I awoke I looked out out on the Little Lake Valley and I was compelled to grab my camera and photograph the scene below. The trees silhouetted by the morning light were so beautiful. What a great way to start my day. God's blessings upon your week, chris This image was captured with a Canon EOS 7D mkII camera and a TAMRON SP 150-600mm F/5-6.3 Di VC USD G2 lens. #WithMyTamron, #TeamCanon

Iconic Crab Traps

On Monday my brother and I headed for a quick trip out to the coast looking for grand subjects to photograph. For lunch we headed down into the Noyo Harbor in Fort Bragg for some delicious fish and chips at Sea Pal. Near the restaurant we spotted colorful stacks of crab traps getting ready to be shipped out. What trip to the coast can be complete without photographing an iconic image of a crab trap? After a great lunch we wandered around the harbor photographing the traps, Sea Lions and some of the fishing boats. Even though the weather was cloudy we had a great trip. God's love and blessings to all, chris #TeamCanon All images were created with a Canon EOS Rebel T1i camera and a Tamron 18-200mm lens. #WithMyTamron

Cloudy Day on the Coast

My brother, Eric visited from Colorado for a week. He is a professional photographer from Estes Park Colorado. He can often be found leading photography tours into Rocky Mountain National Park. While Eric was visiting we photographed a few times in the morning chasing turkeys and deer. One day we headed out to the coast looking for whatever we could photograph. He got some great images of the Black Oyster Catchers. While he was chasing them I focused on some long exposures of the coastline north of fort Bragg, Ca. We both came back happy. God's love and blessings to all, chris #TeamCanon These images were created with a Canon EOS 7D camera and a Canon S- 10-22mm lens. I used a Lee Super Stopper filter and a Lee soft grad filter to enable me to have a 30 second exposure during the middle of the day.

Giants Among Us

Yesterday I finally got around to stacking the last of our firewood. It was from a small pile that was more of a mess of bark and debris than firewood. I had to use a rake to pull and scrape down to find the wood. The wood will be great to burn next fall when it dries out. Not unexpectedly at the very bottom of the pile my rake uncovered a giant. A Pacific Giant Salamander to be exact. It was a good sized one too. Just a little over ten inches long. Bigger ones can get up to twelve inches. Sadly this one didn't bark at me. They can and sometimes do! Not quite the bark of a dog but a guttural sound. I photographed it on a chunk of mossy bark and then let it go. God's blessings upon your weekend, chris Photographed with a Canon 7D MkII camera and a Tamron 180mm macro lens. #TeamCanon, #TakenWithMyTamron

Umbrella Day Gray

The weather has been rather intense. We had winds this last week that blew off part of the shingles and the roofing felt off of a section of our roof. Stuff was hitting the house all night long. In the morning the yard was littered with leaves and small branches. Three Tan Oak Trees blew over not far from our deck. They are currently hung up on some other trees which is good in some ways as if they had fallen all the way they would have taken out our fence. This morning when I woke up it was positively pouring. I decided to try some bird photography anyway. A few birds came but they were way too fast for the shutter speeds that I had available to me. It was pretty dark due to the heavy cloud cover. A couple of Western Gray Squirrels did come into feed at the bird feeder. They were very curious about the sound of the camera shutter and kept looking towards the bedroom window from where I was photographing from. These were some of my favorite images from the morning. God's blessings upon your week, chris All images were created with a Canon EOS 7D MkII camera and a Canon 100-400IS USM v.1 lens. Fill flash was provided by a Canon 550Ex flash.#TeamCanon

Snowy Day Backyard Birds

At the beginning of this week the snow came floating down. By the end of the storm we had just under six inches of snow on the ground. I set up a bird feeder and a perch about eight feet from our back bedroom window. Immediately after I filled the feeder the birds began coming in. Because it's winter I managed to capture all of the most common birds from our backyard. Dark Eyed Juncos, Chestnut Backed Chickadees, Red Breasted Nuthatches and Steller's Jays. I had a great session and the birds enjoyed the free food. God's love and blessings to all, chris All images were created with a Canon EOS 7D MkII camera with a Canon EOS 100-400 IS v.1 lens. Fill flash was provided by a Canon 550 EX flash.#TeamCanon