March 29, 2021

Zooming – March 2021

March 29, 2021/ Gwen Morrison

The sunny March days have been so pleasant – great times to be outdoors and photographing what I see. I’ve been venturing out from home a bit more too – Brookside Gardens, Howard County Conservancy’s Mt Pleasant, and Centennial Park. There are still zoomed images taken through my office window (birds and the moon framed by tree branches); the sunrise and daffodils are from my house as well. Overall - this is just the beginning of the season for spring flowers. Can you find:

Skunk cabbage (Mt Pleasant)
Mourning Dove (my house)
Shelf fungus (2 of them - Mt Pleasant and my house)
Witch Hazel (Brookside)
Gingko tree trunk and branches (Centennial)
Blue jays (my house)
Dried hydrangea flowers (Brookside)

Enjoy the slideshow for March 2021!

Getting outdoors on these spring days is a mood boosting activity as well as good exercise. I’ve gotten comfortable enough wearing a mask that I just keep it on if I’ve in a place where I might encounter someone else on the trail. I enjoy it in the moment and then again when I view the images on my bigger screen monitor…and formulate the blog post. The activity is a bright core with tendrils of benefit that are longer lasting.

March 05, 2021

Mini Road Trip: Centennial Park

March 05, 2021/ Gwen Morrison

On a recent sunny afternoon – I headed out on a mini road trip to Centennial Park. Others had the same idea; the first parking lot I went to was full; there were plenty of spots at the second lot I checked. There were more people than I expected; most – but no all – were masked. This mini road trip was the trial of wearing a KF94 mask with a second mask on top for me; I’d put the masks on before I left the house. I walked across the street after my pace was halted by a young woman stopped in the middle of the sidewalk to coax her reluctant dog to walk; I took a picture looking up the trunk of a gingko tree; the long buds with a rounded tip look like they’ll have tiny green leaves emerging soon.

I went back to the sidewalk intending to take it to the main trail around the lake but that seemed like what everyone was doing and I was not keen to walk at the pace of the crowd to keep the distancing between groups. I was more interesting is finding at least one photographic opportunity which I saw almost immediately…under some pine trees near where I parked: pine cones in the grass and needles!

I found one that I photographed with my normal settings…then with special filters: art bold and water painting.

Before I turned back toward my car I took a picture of an empty picnic table. It was too cool for sitting around….people were out moving about and enjoying the sunshine.

It was too crowded for me to spend more time at the park. I accomplished my goal for the mini road trip: get used to the mask configuration and re-familiarize myself with driving my car! I’ll be doing more of these short outtings over the next 6 weeks or so as one step toward a new normal I’ll have post-vaccine.

December 30, 2018

Three Water Birds at Centennial Park

December 30, 2018/ Gwen Morrison

Last week my husband wanted to try out some new camera gear and decided to do it at Centennial Park. I tagged along to do some photography myself. The lake is settling into winter.

I saw three birds on the water.

Canada geese were the most numerous although still a smaller number than I often see. The water was high in the lake and the stone jetty near the boat launch (closed for the winter) was partially submerged. A goose stood on one – like a game of ‘king of the hill’ with the other geese.

There was a female bufflehead was periodically visible. Buffleheads are diving ducks that are very hard to photograph while they are feeding.

I managed to capture a sequence of the bird just after it surfaced…and then it dove again!

The third bird I saw on the water was a female common merganser. This bird was not feeding but quickly swam further away than I could follow with my zoomed lens.

That was it – less that a dozen Canada geese and then two lone ducks!

Walking back toward the car, I photographed some old birds nest fungus. There were still some ‘eggs’ in some of them…but probably thoroughly dried out by now.

There was also a very robust lichen on a dogwood tree. With all the extra rain we have recently the lichens and mosses are bigger and brighter than usual.

October 15, 2018

Spider Webs at Centennial Lake

October 15, 2018/ Gwen Morrison

Spider webs stand out when they have water droplets on the silk – either from dew or fog (or water sprayed by a photographer keen to photograph them). Last week at Centennial Park the water droplets were from fog. I was surprised at how many spider webs I saw along the path…. realizing that there are a lot more spiders around than we usually notice.

Some of the webs had probably caught something since they had gaping holes.

Others were more intact or maybe partially repaired.

As I was getting ready to leave the park I notice a large funnel web near the trunk of a pine. It too was more visible because of the fog. I didn’t see the spider, but it was probably there somewhere. I was so focused on the webs in the trees that I wasn’t looking for the funnels on the ground!

October 14, 2018

Mushrooms at Centennial Park

October 14, 2018/ Gwen Morrison

On the foggy morning I spent at Centennial Park last week, I found some tiny mushrooms in the raised bed across the pathway from the boat rentals. They were growing in the mulch and were ‘fruiting’ because of the very wet conditions we’ve had recently. Some were very hard to spot because their color’s were not that different form the mulch – and they were small. I stood far enough back so that I could use the zoom to photograph them without climbing into the mulch.

There were some birds nest fungi that were mostly empty nests although a few of the ‘eggs’ were still nearby.

My favorites were brightly colored like these very small red mushrooms (note there is a centipede just to the left of the mushrooms).

My favorites were some tiny orange mushrooms with yellow stalks and edges. They seemed to be glowing – standing out in their drab surroundings.

I walked over to some pine trees near the parking lot while I waited for my husband to finish his brisk walk around the lake. There were some larger mushrooms coming up through the pine needles.

October 11, 2018

Foggy Morning at Centennial Park

October 11, 2018/ Gwen Morrison

Earlier this week, I enjoyed doing some photography at Centennial Park on a foggy morning. The lake was a little high from the recent rains and the fog muted the colors of the trees (still mostly green).