Little Bird with a yellow bill...

My dad, of all people, taught me the first part of that rhyme, and while neither appropriate or even relevant, I couldn't think of any other title...

One of the better zoos in the US is the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum. It doesn't even sound like a zoo from the title, but the reason it stands out over any of the others is that its an outdoor zoo where the all the animals are contained in "natural" environments. These are just enclosed areas of the actual landscape, so the animals appear like they are right next to you.

In addition they also have a resident family of Harris Hawks (I'll post some pictures later), that fly in and are fed twice a day, and a walk in greenhouse full of hummingbirds. You can walk right up to them and watch them feed and sit on eggs.

Pecking order

One of the more amazing things I have been blessed to see in my lifetime is a Sage Grouse Lek. If you don't know what this is you're missing out (well not really, but its still pretty amazing). Sage Grouse, while mating, preform elaborate courting displays for days in the spring time. During these competitive displays, they strut around in concentric circles puffing in and out a sack located on their chest. Apparently, there are very complicated rules/behaviors involved in all this (which I will not claim to be an expert in), so if you want to read more check out wikipedia.

Anyway, I had heard about these when I moved out to Idaho, and I wanted to see one. So I wrote an email to the local Fish and Game office and got a few reoccurring Lek locations. I drove out to one in Midvale at 5am, and waited for sunrise. At about 6:30, right when the sun started coming up, I started to hear clicking sounds, and looking out the window of my car, saw one of about 15 birds. I counted about 6 males and 9 females. All the males were strutting and puffing, and every once in a while sparring when their circles crossed. It was a awesome sight to see!

At home on the Farm

It is surprising to me every time I go home how many things there are to photograph. Literally I am surrounded by any medium I want; rusty equipment, old buildings, plants, and of course farm animals. But growing up, I just never seemed to notice any of this. I don't know how I missed out on all the photo opportunities I had!

Last time I was home, I took a ton of pictures around the farm, especially the cattle. I laid down in the field trying to capture the cattle in the background and some buttercups in the foreground, but the cows wouldn't hear of it. They walked right up to me and practically kissed my lens. Fortunately, this worked out in my favor and I captured some great pictures of the cows (with the flowers in the background).

Flower Power

Austin is probably one of the coolest cities in the US. Its a great place all around, because there are lots of things to see/do and because of the "Keep Austin Weird" mentality, its also one of the more unique places. So much art and culture comes out of this one city it's amazing. One of my favorite photographers, Trey Ratcliff, is also from and takes a ton of pictures of Austin. If you have never seen his work, check out his website Stuck in Customs. He does some pretty amazing HDR work.

Anyway... The picture below was taken at my buddy's sister's horse barn. There was a large runoff pond in the center of the horse paddocks between the stables. All the lilac was attracting a ton of bees and butterflies and it was easy to just walk up to any random flower and snap away as they feasted on all the nectar. I stopped this little guy in action landing on one of the flowers.

End of summer

As the days start getting shorter and the temperature starts getting alot colder I thought I would post a nice picture from summer last year (to help think warm thoughts). My family has been going to Rehoboth Beach in Delaware since as long as I can remember, but with moving out west, I haven't been able to go but once in the last four years. Last year was a great time with perfect weather (only rained one day), and the temperature never got above 90 degrees with almost no humidity (a rarity for an east coast August).

I went down to the beach in the morning and waited for the sunrise for about an hour, and as I was waiting this little bird kept running back and forth from the ocean feeding on the way. He seemed completely uninterested in me and just kept at his business, so I got to creep in nice and close and got a bunch of pictures of closeups.

Market crash

One of the best things about summer in Boise is the Saturday market. I don't get to go as much as I would like, but its great to go down there and see all the food and drink vendors (especially to sample the freebies they usually have laying around). Also seeing all the other photographers selling their photos really inspires you to try to get out there and take some pictures!

I try to walk around and get nice and close to every fruit and vegetable vendor I can find (they never seem to mind). Because of this, you can usually get some good lighting from the tents and the variety of fruit/vegetables you find rivals that of most grocery stores.