Butterfly Festival

I finally took the time to properly photograph the butterflies at the Powell Gardens Butterfly Festival this year. While I do not have a digital SLR yet, I have learned that using the iPhone 6 with my headphones as a remote shutter, and being patient and getting the phone within a couple of inches, as well as snapping dozens of photos of each subject, will yield at least one or two good photos.

Blue Morpho

I love the Butterfly Festival at Powell Gardens, and my favorite is the Blue Morpho. I remember the first time I saw them in the Jungle outside of Panama City, in the old Canal Zone. The Panamanians had slash & burned the rest of their jungle, so places in the U.S. controlled area were the last vestige of old growth jungle. When this butterfly is in flight, it alternates from it's dull brown underside to its bright blue topside, so you see the iridescent blue in wingstroke flashes. It's hypnotic.

Fear My Antennae!

This moth reminds me of that woman in The Hunger Games from the Capitol with the crazy hair

From the Underside

I love these huge veiny leaves.

Fly-by Goslings

Zach & I were at the Lakeside Pergola at Powell Gardens. While a large group of nuns in old-fashioned habits were standing in the shade behind us, Zach was fascinated by the "Water Spiders". I didn't know what he was talking about until I noticed there were what we called "Water Skeeters" and what Wikipedia calls Water Striders. They were the smallest ones I had ever seen. We had to get down on our stomachs and get our faces right down by the water to see them. So we were laying there, with Zach poking his fingers in the water, and the people behind us were acting funny, talking about something. I looked around and a pair of geese with 5 goslings were swimming right toward us. I warned Zach to be still and they came right by us, about 5 feet away. They went by and then started eating in a bed of moss about 10 feet away. It took about 10 minutes before they got sick of it and moved on, and by then, Zach was tired of sitting still. He was picking at the moss and dipping his fingers in the water, ignoring the geese. One of the adults made this little gobbling nose and wagged his head, which was obviously the signal to move out. The nuns had already moved on. I was surprised they didn't stay. Aren't they supposed to be more patient than that.

8/5/15

This guy was on the trunk of a car at the Frito Plant in Topeka.


Kind of like a fish out of water.  I know how he feels.

Turkey Convention

We used to always have 6 turkeys, a consistent little flock. Now we have 9, so I was trying to figure out which positions each played on the turkey baseball team. They all seem to be in left field to me.