Spring has Sprung

It's the first week of the month and that means that it's time for P.J.'s monthly photo blog, this time with the theme Spring has Sprung. With all of the hiking I've been doing recently, it wasn't much of a stretch to come up with 5 photos that fit the theme for this month, so here we go.

1. Ladybug on a leaf

Last year at this time, I was taking photos of insects left and right. Butterflies and ladybugs were the main subjects last year. This year, I've been concentrating on the reptilian end of the animal kingdom (more on that later), but that hasn't stopped me from occasionally sneaking a shot of some insect that I end up crossing paths with. Insects are out and about finding mates, laying eggs and generally doing those life things that perpetuate their species, so this is a general photo indicating that spring definitely has sprung. I really liked the contrast of this one with all of the green and that single splash of red color in the middle.

2. Making more sunflowers

This particular trail leads up to Johnson's Pasture from Pomelo Ave. in Claremont. It's kind of tricky to find the actual access to this particular trail on the low side because there's a lot of no trespassing signs all around, but if people pay close attention, they'll notice that the no trespassing signs pertain to the horse ranch to the west. Even so, the trail itself it still kind of hidden and you kind of have to have inside knowledge about it.

In reality, I don't mind since that usually means there's less people on this particular trail, thus more wildlife to see, etc. I've encountered all kinds of birds, snakes and insects up there and there's a nice "grove" of wild sunflowers up there lining the trail. I can usually guarantee there are several honeybees pollinating the flowers and can usually get one or two decent shots of them creating more sunflowers for next year. This year's crop are starting to die out, but as you can see by the blur in the background of this shot, there's plenty of them up there for all to enjoy as long as everyone who goes through there practices the "Leave no Trace" hiking philosophy. Leave only footprints, take only pictures. I think we really need to keep that in mind as the population of bees dwindles over time due to insecticides doing what they do best to insect populations. It's not just sunflowers that we'll need in the future, but a lot of other plants depend upon bees.

3. Geocaching

I know, I know. I write about geocaching a lot. But it's something I enjoy and when an old teaching friend of mine said he was having problems with a particular cache, I jumped at the opportunity to go out and cache with him. I'd already found this cache, but it's always fun seeing people's eyes light up when they find a really well hidden cache, as this one was.

He, as most people do when they see me nowadays, commented on the length of my hair. In the past, my hair would get slightly longer in the springtime and usually after school got out, I'd go and get my summer cut. It was not really much of a difference back then, but you can tell it's still spring because I haven't gotten my hair cut yet. The key word there is yet. It's really starting to drive me crazy, but there are still a couple of people who haven't seen it in person yet, so I'm holding off until I see them and then I'm getting it cut. I'm fully vaccinated now and it's really time for the locks to go. Then we will know that summer has sprung, but in the meantime, my hair is still shaggy.

4. The snake whisperer

But Paul, that isn't a snake. Yeah, I know, but I don't have any still photos of snakes this month, just several videos, but lizards and snakes are in the same family and with the warmer weather, they are starting to be out in abundance, which means we all have to be careful while hiking or geocaching.

I've posted so many videos of snakes on Instagram and Facebook this season that several people have even considered not following me anymore, while other people have started calling me the Snake Whisperer and still others have suggested that I'm becoming one with the snakes. I'm not sure about any of those, but I might grab the handle of snake or reptile whisperer for a couple of reasons.

Once after a hike, I walked into the parking lot and there was a large lizard, similar to this one, sunning itself on a rock. I ended up sitting down on the rock right next to it, no more than 5 feet away or so. It didn't even flinch, like it knew that I was not going to harm it and I only wanted to get a close up shot for posterity. So it posed for me and then just sat there after the photo shoot was done.

The second instance happened earlier this week when I was taking the last shot in this series. I happened to look down the trail and there was another hiker just standing in the trail with camera out and I could see down on the ground in front of her, a two foot snake, although I wasn't sure what kind it was because I was too far away. So I hurried up to where she was, but the snake had already slithered away into the bushes. The other hiker confirmed that it was a Western Diamondback rattlesnake, which I assumed it was as I walked toward it because it had its tail up and I could see the rattles.

Anyway, I peered into the bushes on the side of the trail just in case I might be able to get a glimpse of the snake, but I couldn't see anything, so I turned to walk down the trail and continue my hike. Only after I walked away from the snake, did it rattle its rattle at me, as if to say, "Here I am." So I walked back over to where I'd heard the sound and spotted the snake curled up in the grasses by the side of the trail. It never rattled its tail again at me, even though I was closer to it when I finally saw it, as opposed to when I was walking away. Apparently, it knew that I meant it no harm and only wanted to see it. So yeah, I guess I'm the snake whisperer.

5. California Gold

Even though our last governor declared our drought over, we really haven't been out of a drought in California in possibly 20 years. We'll get one or two good rainy years, but then the next six or seven years are below normal. This year is no exception to that with the snow pack in the Sierra Nevada at 25% of normal. That's not a good thing as it means a dry summer and fall and more wildfires throughout that same time period. We've already had a couple of local wildfires in Southern California already in the spring, usually a time of greenness, but this season, we're already into our California Gold season where the grasses start to die off and we get this beautiful contrast between the dark green of the oaks and the brown of the hillside. All this really means is that spring, even though it's sprung, is quite short this year and we're quickly approaching summer time.

And there you have it, my interpretation of the theme for this month, Spring has Sprung. Comments, as always are greatly appreciated. Please stop by P.J.'s page and see how others interpreted the same theme.

My World

I don't participate every month is P.J.'s Monthly photo blog, but this month's theme (Your World) made for a fairly easy set of photos. I know I really should attempt them every month, so I'll try to do better in the coming months. I've picked up my DSLR again since I've been in "shelter and place" and I have a lot of photos to choose from this month. I think I could probably come up with at least 10 different shots, just from my walks around the neighborhood over the past month, but here's my 5 that captures my world this month.

1. Weathervane

I'm a sucker for cool things like sundials and weathervanes. This particular weathervane is located on top of a house north of me, but in the same general neighborhood. Since I don't take the same route, I don't see this every day, but I noticed it early in the month and thought I really should take a photo of it, since it represents some interesting architecture, especially for Southern California. You don't see too many of these and I like that it gives off a New England kind of vibe. The only give away is the palm tree in the lower left hand corner of the shot. I could have edited that out, but that would have meant cropping some of the cupola out and I wanted that to be the main focus of the shot, and so the palm tree remains.

I remembered the next time I was out to take a photo of it, but the quality of the iPhone shot wasn't what I considered good enough, so I ended up throwing those shots away. I don't take the DSLR out every day, so the next time I walked around the neighborhood with the DSLR, I made sure to walk up that particular street. Because the weather had changed, we had some clouds in the sky which made for a more pleasing background to the shot.

2. Amusement Park

Twenty years ago, I was really into Roller Coaster Tycoon and particularly, Roller Coaster Tycoon 2 (RCT2). The game is one of many out on the market that allows you to play amusement park scenarios, while creating an amusement park, maintaining a budget, building roller coasters of various kinds and making sure your peeps are happy. The thing about Tycoon 2 that made it so good as you could also create buildings into your park and really make your park look like the real deal, with interesting architecture and themed areas.

There are other programs out on the market now, but there's also OpenRCT2 which emulates RCT2 perfectly as long as you have the original disks, however it also comes with enhancements that allow you to play in Sandbox mode. In other words, instead of playing scenarios, you can just create your own landscape and build your own park. Needless to say, I've been playing a lot of OpenRCT2 the last couple of months and this is a screen shot of a flying roller coaster (one where the peeps lay down and it makes it feel like they're flying) that I built in one of my sandbox mode games.

3. Family FaceTime

Our immediate family is spread out with some in the Bay Area of California and the rest of us down here in Southern California. Under normal circumstances, I probably would have visited my daughter when she had her birthday at the end of last month, but couldn't due to shelter in place, so we FaceTimed. That has grown into a weekly event so that everyone can touch bases with each other and enjoy each others' company. My daughter suggested that we have weekly themes. Last week, it was crazy hats, this week, it was Toga. It's amazing what a couple of actual olive branches from the tree in the back yard and a sheet will do to help you win the theme for the week. 

This image got posted on Facebook earlier this week and everyone has had a good laugh at my expense, but it was worth it. I got my wife to smile/laugh in the background of the photo as well, so it's all good.

4. Ornithology

I don't claim to be an expert on birds, but I do have an interest in them and with spring here, there are lots of birds out and about, probably more due to the lack of people out and about. If the theme for the month had been birds, I would have been able to have five different kinds of birds with ease. I have a book that was published by the National Geographic Society entitled Field Guide to the Birds of North America and it has been quite helpful in letting me identify most of the birds I've seen while out on walks around the neighborhood. This spring, I've seen California Towhees, Spotted Towhees, a Cooper's hawk, hummingbirds, scrub jays, two different kinds of sparrows, two different kinds of finches, and several Western Bluebirds, such as this one who posed ever so nicely on a branch in the park just north of my house. 

I'm pretty sure the Spotted Towhees and the Bluebirds are both nesting in some trees in the park. A friend of mine says that I've been lucky with the Spotted Towhees as they are usually heard and not seen, but I've been able to spot them on two different occasions. There are more than just a couple of bluebirds in the park. I've seen at least three different ones, which is why I'm fairly certain they're nesting somewhere in the park as well.

5. Earth Day

This year was the 50th anniversary of the first Earth Day. I was in 6th grade at the time, so yeah, I know I'm old. Once again, under ordinary circumstances, I probably would have celebrated in some other way than sheltering in place, but there's not much I could do at this particular time. And so I take photos.

Besides birds, the insects are also out in force, particularly, the ladybugs. Insects and creepy crawlies give me different sorts of challenges, as unlike birds, you can usually get quite close to insects. I've been using a variety of lenses to take photos of ladybugs, honeybees, bumblebees, butterflies and other assorted insects and arachnids. This particular shot I used my 250 zoom macro lens to get up close and personal with a couple of bugs doing what nature intended them to do. I'm very pleased with the focus on this particular shot.

And that, my friends, is my interpretation of the theme, "Your World" for P.J.'s Monthly Photo Blogging challenge. Please click on the link and see how other people interpreted the theme of their world. As always, please feel free to comment. I won't bite.

Flowers are easy

This is going to ramble a little bit becasuse I'm starting to get cabin fever, as I'm sure most people are who are taking "Shelter in Place" seriously. During the past couple of weeks, I haven't been able to do my normal routine as my favorite hiking trail has been closed down for the duration of this problem, so I've resorted to walking along the streets in my neighborhood. The last couple of days I started taking photos of flowers that I saw since Spring has definitely sprung in our neck of the woods. There's a lot of pollen in the air and I'm definitely congested due to seasonal allergies.

But I digress. Most of the shots I've been taking recently have been with my iPhone. It has a good lens, but it's not nearly as good as my Canon 80D lenses, so today, I dusted off the Canon and took it out on my afternoon walk. It's the first time I've really used the camera since my trip to Idaho last summer. First thing I had to do was charge up the camera's battery, as it was deader than a doornail.

Now, several years ago I got myself involved in a 365 project. Challenge yourself to go out every day and take at least one photo per day and publish it online so others can see it and possibly critique it. I ended up starting on January 1st of that year and for the next two years, I diligently went about documenting every day of the year by taking photos. Some days were better than others, but I felt that it made me a better photographer and the one thing I learned was that flowers are easy. In other words, it's hard to screw up a flower photo. In fact, during my 365 project, someone challenged me again to not take a single photo of flowers for the entire month of March. Do you know how hard that is? Sometimes, you don't have the energy to go out and take photos and it's easy just to step outside, especially in March and take a quick photo of a flower and call it good for the day.

I did end up completing that particular challenge, but it was difficult. With that in the back of my mind, I decided that today, I wanted to concentrate on things other than flowers. I'd actually noticed that Painted Lady butterflies were starting their migration north from Mexico and were starting to show up in the neighborhood, so that was a great subject. Last year, Southern California had a huge migration of Painted Ladies due to the unusually wet winter we'd had and they proceeded northward in droves. I'm not sure how large this year's will be but last year, it was estimated that over a billion butterflies of that species alone migrated northward. That's a buttload of butterflies.

Because it is Spring, there are a lot of insects besides butterflies out and about. It's like a bountiful smorgasbord out there for insects. Which flower do I want to pollenate today? Today on my walk, I saw bumblebees, butterflies, honeybees, dragonflies, and lizards.

Another reason for getting my Canon out, was I really wanted to explore things that were a little bit farther away from the path and it's hard to capture those things with an iPhone camera. So I concentrated less on flowers, but on other things, and so you get photos like a lone pine cone that's probably dropped all of its seeds but is still hanging on a branch surrounded by pine cone flowers awaiting pollination so they will eventually create new pine cones.

The lizard photo. I ended up stalking this little guy, probably no longer than 3 inches or so. I think he was actually kind of pissed, because I'd seen a painted lady flit by and land on the rock right were he was, then it darted off and I did see the lizard had lunged at the butterfly. So I guess this guy was pouting because he missed his mid afternoon snack. But it worked for me, because I got a nice portrait of a lizard.

Needless to say, I won't stop taking photos of flowers, but as I noted above, flowers are easy and if you concentrate only on the flowers, you're going to miss a lot of subtle beauty all around you. So I'm going to be walking around over the next couple of weeks, practicing my social distancing, but at the same time, exploring my world through my camera lens once again. I'm looking forward to it and I hope you will enjoy it with me. It's where I can wander at the moment.

June Bugs in July?

We've had lots of June bugs this summer for some reason.  It's probably because we had such a wet winter.  I actually saw a photo today, that said it was a good thing they only eat plants.

Every so often, I like to take photos of insects and creepy crawly things.  Most of the people on Facebook already know this.  I like spiders.  Insects, not so much, mainly because they're pests.  They fly in your face and annoy the heck out of you.  They suck your blood and spread disease. And so I like spiders and bats, because they eat lots of insects.

However, insects do provide many important things for us. They pollinate the flowers we love to smell and they pollinate the flowers of all of our food we eat. We need to be thinking very clearly about bees in the future.  Actually, we need to be acting on bee welfare right now.  We run out of bees, half of our population of people worldwide will probably disappear due to mass starvation.  That's a sobering thought.

And so I leave you with this June bug on some Hydrangea flowers. Yes, I know this post is in August, but I took the photo in late July.

Ice House Canyon

This past week, I went hiking with a friend up Ice House Canyon, which is a popular trailhead out of the Mt. Baldy area.  We were heading up to the Ice House Saddle, a portion of the trail that literally splits into five different trails at that point, leading to other peaks, or down into other valleys on the far side.

We got a fairly early start leaving my house around 8 in the morning and with a quick stop for a sandwich, we were at the trailhead and hiking by 8:30 in the morning.  One of the nice things about this hike is it's mostly in the shade and the temperatures are about 10 degrees cooler than what we'd experience down off the mountain, so we were hiking in the morning in about 50 degree weather.

At one point we ran into a spot where an entire boulder next to the trail was covered in ladybugs.  I've seen other areas further up and on the other side in the Lytle Creek area where I've seen the same kind of thing and it never ceases to amaze me.  Just thousands upon thousands of ladybugs.

The hike itself was very enjoyable, albeit steep.  2700 feet of elevation gain in about 3.6 miles.  I'd never hiked up to the saddle before, but I have been up on that trail several times, the last time was about a year and a half ago.

I knew my friend liked this particular hike and he kept commenting about different things on the trail to the point like he really knew all the twists and turns of the trail.  I asked him when he'd been on the trail last and his response made me laugh.  Yesterday.  Ok, that's why you're so familiar with it.

Getting up to the saddle took us a little over 2 hours and by that time, even though it was before 11 in the morning, it was time for our sandwiches.  So we found a log with the view posted here and enjoyed our lunch before we headed back down.

I will have to admit that the trail was about as slow going down too, mainly because the upper part of the trail was the only part that really resembled a simple dirt trail. Most of the trail was rocky, stair step type of trail where you have to go slowly so you don't lose your step or your balance.  It still was enjoyable, but we didn't make as good of time as would be expected since we were headed downhill.

I didn't find any geocaches along the hike, but that was not the purpose of the day.  We passed three on a side trail that I hadn't found and there were three more further up the trail from the saddle that I will have to wait for another day in which to find those.  I showed my friend one of the geocaches that I helped hide the last time I was up there.  In fact, that particular cache was named because of all the ladybugs that were in the area at that time.

I'm definitely going back, perhaps next week.  I hear some geocaches calling my name and there's also spots along the upper portion of the trail where new caches could be hidden.  I think the most surprising thing about the trail was the total lack of poison oak.  We didn't notice even one plant on our entire hike and we were in spots where you'd definitely expect to see it.  Curiouser and curiouser.