Mike Walker Photography

I stayed at home today to watch the hummingbirds that were making steady appearances at my two feeders. The light was just right to show off this male Ruby-throated’s neck feathers which can appear bright orange to bright red depending on the angle of light.

While hanging around in the backyard (in the 100 degree heat), I discovered I don’t have to travel far from home to sight some of my usual photographic subjects of late….butterflies and dragonflies.

My yard was home to numerous Blue Dasher dragonflies, landing on plant stems, fence posts, flower pot hangers, anything that was sitting still.  My Black-eyed Susans were also attracting butterflies. I think the one below may be a Pearl Crescent but I’m not positive.

Usually, I’m the one seeking out the birds, butterflies, dragonflies, etc. at Huntley Meadows park.  Today, I was the subject of interest for this Red Admiral butterfly who spent some time checking out my 200-400mm f/4 lens, my tripod, my hat, me…

It was a good day for more close-up photographs of the smaller creatures in the park.  Below, I focused in on the eyes of this Blue Dasher dragonfly.

I spotted a Red Skimmer dragonfly nearby to photograph.  These seem to be less frequently seen but really stand out with their orange color.

I wasn’t the only one in the park keeping an eye out for dragonflies.  The Green Heron below was practically ‘bug-eyed’ on this one doing a fly over.

The tiny butterfly below, a Skipper I believe, was enjoying the plants of the wetlands and allowed me to get close enough for a nice portrait.

There were a lot of birds in the park, including Great Blue Heron, Great Egrets, Mallards, Canada Geese, Red-winged Blackbirds, Bluebirds and number of Goldfinch making a meal of the Cattails that have popped up recently.

I was invited by my sister’s family to take a ride up to northwestern Maryland to visit Herrington Manor and Swallow Falls state parks today. Herrington Manor is a nice park with a good size lake and cabins for rent.  There is wildlife there and we spotted several young deer and a number of turkeys with poults near the entrance to the park.  The park also has a field that is maintained with wildflowers that draw in numerous butterflies such as the tiger swallowtail below.

What Herrington Manor didn’t have was a lot of people. In fact, the park appeared nearly empty which was strange on such a good weather weekend.  This was not an issue at Swallow Falls, located just a couple of miles down the road. There were tons of people there, and many of them were taking a dip in the Youghiogheny river.  The park has four falls, including Muddy Creek Falls, the state of Maryland’s highest free falling waterfall at 53 feet (below).

With the number of people swimming, and diving off rocks near the other falls, it was not easy to photograph any of the falls without also capturing the army of folks enjoying the park. I concentrated on some smaller areas to capture the water flowing over the 300 million year old sandstone and shale rocks that make up the park.

The heat was turned on today here in northern Virginia.  The water level at Huntley Meadows park was very low forcing some Green-backed Herons, like the one above, to search for food in limited areas.  Luckily one of those areas was near the boardwalk allowing some close-up photography.

There were a number of Killdeer searching for food in the mud fields left by the receding water, getting their legs and beaks covered in the muck.  The one below shows the characteristic two black bands across a white chest and the red eye ring of an adult.

This time of year, dragonflies are seen by the hundreds. The varieties are fascinating and they trend to be easy to photograph up close at Huntley Meadows. I certainly enjoy photographing them….below are the Red Skimmer and Blue Dasher Dragonflies.

You will almost always find steam rising from the waters of Great Falls park in the early morning. The mornings around sunrise are a great time to visit the park since there are few other visitors and you feel like you have the whole park to yourself.

The early morning also allows the best water photography here, at least until the sun is overhead making the frothy water breaking over the rocks too hard to expose properly.

Even though there were few other human visitors, there were plenty of feathered visitors this morning including this Canada Goose below who was enjoying some feeding in the middle of the rushing water.

I visited Huntley Meadows today with my brother-in-law, Paul, and my nephew, Matt.  We had a good time getting some photographs of a variety of wildlife including these barn swallows. This group above was a chorus providing their rendition of World Cup vuvuzela. Butterflies, dragonflies, frogs and turtles were also in abundance.

The first creature we saw this morning was a…muskrat?….nutria?….I honestly can’t tell which it is but it didn’t mind us as it chomped on some floating plant stalks.

One of the amusing sights today was a group of Red-winged Blackbirds harassing a Great Blue Heron.  They did not like having this GBH in the area and conducted a steady dive-bombing effort.  Finally, one of the female Red-winged Blackbirds perched near the Great Blue Heron and they seemed to be sizing each other up.

My goal today was to photograph the new fawns which have been born over the last few weeks at Shenandoah National Park. However, I didn’t see any.  Instead I saw a few things that were unexpected, like the guy above strapped to a large fan, gliding over the park.  But most unexpected was my first ever sighting of a Bobcat in the wild. Did I get a photograph?…well, uh, no.  I managed to grab my camera, get the Bobcat in the viewfinder as it moved through the woods and press the shutter release only to discover that my camera was set to an aperture of f/22 and the exposure in the shade of the woods took 3 secs.  By the time the shutter had closed, the Bobcat was probably at home watching TV.  Rats…but it was still very cool to see one of these.

I spent a lot of time in the Big Meadows area looking for the fawns and ending up photographing other items of interest, butterflies, flowers and the grass above underneath a web covered in dew  drops.  Even though I didn’t find any fawns, there were plenty of deer in the meadow and plenty of people to spook them.