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Verna’s Close-Up Photo Secrets

Cleveland Sage Flower Making a Close Up Photo

When the desert breezes briskly blow the flower you’re trying to photograph around, you simply get a grip on the flower stem out of the camera’s field of view and then take the image of the now stabilized flower.

We were both in the courtyard today taking photos of this and that, when Verna grabbed a flower stem on one of the Cleveland sage bushes, pointed her camera at it and managed the close-up photo she was looking to get. I just happened to be in a spot where I could capture the moment when she was shooting her close-up with my camera.

At the left is the image she got of the sage flower; on the right is my photo of her getting the shot. Click on either image to enlarge.

April 15, 2015 by Arizona Family Flowers Home & Garden Photography

Quail on the Courtyard Wall

Gambel’s Quail (male)

The local quail seem to make themselves at home on the courtyard wall which spans somewhere around 50 feet long as it curves around the front of the house. Bob took this shot of one of the males as it walked along the wall yesterday. Click on the image to enlarge.

Well, the quail will have another 300 feet of walls to commandeer: two more out front and two out behind the RV drive totaling around 350 feet altogether including the courtyard.

The new walls are in place already, but not painted and they won’t be until after the RV drive concrete gets poured possibly this week. However, we observe that the quail are already testing out their new “quailing walls.”

April 14, 2015 by Arizona Critters Home & Garden Photography

Jewel Thief

Jewel Thief

Verna keeps some interesting artifacts in the Rock and Cactus Garden west of the house. She has a variety of items including statuary, bric-a-brac, rock piles, native dead wood and a few marbles placed here and there. There has been a mystery as to why some of the marbles get displaced from their assigned spots.

Well, today, I got this telephoto shot of a little jewel thief in action. It is a white-tailed antelope ground squirrel that lifted one of the marbles out of a depression in a decorative rock where Verna placed it some time ago. Evidently, the little guy thinks it is something that might be cracked open to eat, or, it likes shiny stuff.

It is still a mystery, since we went out later and found the marble laying on the ground nearby to the original placement. Verna replaced the marble in the crevice in the rock. How long it will remain there is unknown. Click on the image to enlarge.

April 12, 2015 by Critters Home & Garden Photography Weirdness

Curve Billed Thrasher

Curve Billed Thrasher

I happened to be out behind the walls in the little wash to take some pictures of prickly pear flowers that are now opening. On my way back to the house, a curve billed thrasher perched on a mesquite stump a few yards away. Since I had the telephoto lens on the camera, I wasted no time and put the perched bird in the camera’s crosshairs.

The bird cooperated with me for about three camera shots before swooping away on its regular route around the back wash. We have a lot of these birds that hang around the area and two of them have a nest in the cholla in front of the house by the RV drive. We’re hoping to get some pix of the thrasher chicks after they hatch.

April 8, 2015 by Arizona Critters Home & Garden Photography

New Addition to the “Musical Mesquite”

Whimsical Boot Birdhouse

I found this cute little whimsical birdhouse shaped like an old western boot. It has some sort of electronic solar powered feature, but we didn’t know what that was until we peeked out the front door to see a little illuminated beacon shining on it. I guess that is so the birds can see at night in the birdhouse. Click on the image to enlarge.

April 7, 2015 by Arizona Home & Garden Photography

Flowers from the Outback

Not exactly Australia, but out back of our RV drive on the upper part of our lot. We have lots of cholla and a couple of hedgehog cacti up in the back that we could never see unless we hike up there. Today, I went up to look at the flowers that opened up there and to get pictures of them to enjoy from down below.

Hidden Hedgehog Flower Outback Cholla Flower

On the left is one of the light pink flowers blooming on a hard-to-get-to hedgehog cactus embedded between two palo verde trees and partially obscured by some other brush. At the right is one of many open flowers on the cholla cacti up there. Click on either image to view full-sized.

April 4, 2015 by Arizona Flowers Home & Garden Photography

Avalon 1998

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