Friday, July 22, 2011

Three Rivers Rocks

http://www.threeriversrocks.com/2011/07/slicky.html

Nature Impinges: Surprise ©2011

In Memory of Mr. Richard Burns, Extraordinary Mentor

I grab the new digital camera and head off on the walk. Mr. Burns, retired Forest Service Ranger,  usually walks with me to the Catfish Farm, a private estate, to share the varied bird life and his knowledge of plants and other critters that live around Three Rivers. This day, though, I start out alone, to play with my new toy.

I follow a Domesticated Duck as it waddles toward a pond, taking pictures as we move along. Digital is so forgiving. If you do not like a shot the delete gets rid of it and you move on to the next one. It is great fun to experiment and since Mr. DD is so cooperative and used to having people close, I am able to learn about the camera.


I feel movement cross over my head and to the left. Since I have the camera up to my eye I turn and follow the sound. A Great Blue Heron lands into the pond. Click. Click. Click. No thought. I record the Heron’s movements as it hunts the fish in the pond.

Mr. Burns appears quietly behind me. I show him the new camera. He was a published photographer. Over the years he worked for the Forest Service in many places across the country, a camera always at hand. National Forest and wildlife magazines used his images. He is amazed at the idea of digital. Shoot, delete, shoot. After a while he reminds me I will run out of film if I am not careful and I remind him, there is no film. No stacks of unwanted prints to cull through and store. As much as he likes the idea of digital, there is no way he'd go out and by one of those things. He still carries the binoculars he has owned maybe 30 years. He even tried out the binoculars I bought at his insistence if I was serious about learning to identify birds, realizing how much binoculars have improved, but he wore his old pair until he died. 

At home I put the series on the computer. One image jumps out at me, the very first one.

When others see the image I am told it is a winner. I feel embarrassed. After all, it was the first shot, in a new camera, done with no real knowledge, just point and shoot. But after some pushing, especially from Mr. Burns, I enter the image in the Tulare County Fair.  

I am surprised twice: once when the Heron appeared, and again, when I win the red ribbon.

(When Mr. Burns saw the ribbon he beamed, and bragged about me to anyone who would listen on our walks together. Mr. Burns lead me on a discovery of an appreciation of how nature impinges on our lives here in Three Rivers. He is missed every day.)







A surprise captured
Reflection, an elegant
Morning at the pond.

Nature Impinges: Predator Preys ©2011



Noise outside the studio attracts my attention. I grab the camera. On the back hillside, behind the buildings, are seven deer grazing on the slips of new grasses. Males, just 1 year old, lock their new horns with spring fuzz on them. The two tussle back and forth, play and practice for the serious future when it is time to fight over the females. The three eat, and enjoy the sunny day.


Something is caught in my peripheral vision. A Great Blue Heron lands on the hillside, not ten yards from the deer. It is not concerned that I am below, clicking away with camera.

Heron is stalking across the hillside, away from the deer, moving in slow motion. Suddenly, it stops, head bent low, waiting. Pounce. Up, the head lifts. Dangling from the beak, a gopher. The Heron throws the critter up into the air and it falls into the open beak below. One swallow and it is gone.

The stalking begins again, this time the bird returns across the hill toward the deer, who by now settle at the edge of my property for what looks like a late afternoon nap. Five young deer, heads down, eyes closed, snuggle closely to one another. One female adult at the top of the crowd, head up, ears alert, but eyes closed. The male, a 4 pointer, on the ground, but eyes open, head up, alert, watching over his charges.

The Heron continues its slow motion stalk across the hill, and a sudden stop. The neck leans forward, so slowly it is hard to detect motion, and then, with lightening speed, lunges. Up comes the beak with a mouse hanging by the tale. The predator swings its prey into the air by the tale, opens the beak and he crunches down. Blood squirts out of the beak, spraying the feathers on its face and on the leg feathers below. The mouse disappears down his throat.
           
The bird walks above the herd of deer, lifts one of its legs in repose, closes its eyes, and naps. The male deer, now watches over not only his own charges, but the Great Blue Heron, too.






Predator Preys, blood
A sign of sacrifice
Satiated fluff




Nature Impinges: Egret Flying ©2011

We park the vehicle at the entrance to the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) at the end of Skyline Drive, Three Rivers. 8 year-old Drake, and 6 year-old Annie, run through the gate, taking only a minute to figure out the tricky latch system.

“Whoa,” says Mother. “If you find a gate closed, what are you supposed to do?”
“Close it,” says Annie.
“But Mama, you and Dad and Granny have to come through,” says Drake.
True. And we do.

We used to take the main trail, more like a road a jeep might use. The BLM folks maintain it and display signs that we are really walking through private property on our way to BLM land. This is an access road and we are warned to stay on it. But as you walk along you see side trails, made by cattle, then warn by dirt bicycles, deer, horses, other wild critters and hikers, with and without dogs. The main road takes 30 or more minutes to wind up and over, around and down, to the ponds. A metal plank, balanced between granite, secure enough for bikes, crosses the creek. Today, though, we discover a side trail, told to us by a friend, and within 10 minutes we are unloading fishing gear.

As a young woman I fished many a pier, pond, river, and the sea. But now, I prefer to watch the birds, people and fish, through my binoculars, and the catches are with the camera.

As we approach the ponds I teach the grand kids to walk silently up over the bank.  They are excited and find the discipline difficult. “Keep your eyes open and your ears alert. You never know what you will see and hear around these ponds.” They try.

Across the pond, perches a Great Egret a top an Oak on the cliff. As we move to the picnic table, the bird takes flight. We are too close for comfort.

I follow the white bird with my camera. Click, click and click again.

“Good,” my son says. “The competition is gone.” I laugh. Today an Egret, other days the Great Blue Heron is fishing along the edges of the pond. Sometimes the Black-belted Kingfisher squawks noisily at us. I imagine he is yelling, “What are you doing here? I’m not done eating yet?” Or the Green-backed Heron that is barely seen unless you know to look carefully in the backdrop of the dirt, algae, and rocks, a perfect blend at the edge of the pond. It stays longer than the other birds, a little braver because camouflage is safety, as long as we are on this side of the pond. He waits for fish or frog.

“Catch and release” is the standard my son teaches his children. “The fish will be here when we return kids,” he explains. I admit to feeling queasy. It must hurt to be hooked, then hung in the air while photos are being taken to prove prowess, then finally, a toss and you are surrounded by blessed water, reprieve. You are not lunch, this time. Unless Great Blue Heron captures you and with one gulp you are gone. My son and GBH, competitors: one for fun, the other for survival. Do the fish have consciousness? No way to know. Deep in my heart I feel they do. I say nothing. Just snap my pictures while I enjoy the beauty of old oaks, wildlife, the land and my family.

Azure deep sky
Treetops bereft of leaves
Wings a flurry