Joan has been very successful in growing peppers this summer. We have dozens, maybe hundreds, of them on our kitchen counter at the moment.
Joan is, as I write, cutting them up and putting them in the freezer. I gave a few of them a very temporary reprieve from the knife so that I could make some photographs.
Yesterday afternoon, I took a walk on the Harris Center Brimstone Corner Road property just down the road from our house. My goal was to see what odes were still out and about. I was expecting to find autumn meadowhawks and some darners.
As I expected the most common dragonfly I observed was the autumn meadowhawk. I saw more than a dozen; mostly in the old log yard. However, there were also a few, including a mating pair, by the outlet of the beaver pond. Here, I also observed a single variable dancer; the only damselfly I saw yesterday.
There were a few large darners flying out over the water of the beaver pond. However, the most common dragonfly here was the slaty skimmer. There were at least a dozen, mostly males, patrolling the edge of the pond defending territories.
In addition to the odes, my eye was attracted to all of the late season flowers.
Give me a good heavy load and a clear stretch of road
And just watch this old Bulldog run
—– Bill Staines (Wild, Wild, Heart)
Early this afternoon, I spent about ninety minutes wandering the Granite State Old Truck Meet/Show. (It was held at the airport in Deering this year) .
Of course there were a multitude of trucks on display… many different types and brands.
However, it was the Bulldog that kept catching my eye.
Someone has been having fun balancing stones down by the lake,
I had fun photographing the rock piles!
I wonder how long these sculptures will last.
Those who know me know that I don’t (usually) make photos on assignment. However, when my wife suggests that she needs a photo of a windmill wind turbine for the upcoming Limrik*… well you know!
I spent part of this afternoon driving the roads of Antrim looking for places to photograph the new windmills wind turbines** along the Tuttle Mountain ridge. I knew that I would not find good views if I was too close since the area is heavily wooded. Thus, I took my long lenses (300 and 600 mm) and searched for spots with an unobstructed, if somewhat distant view. I had some success.
I gave Joan fourteen photos to choose from; five of which are shown here. Hopefully one will be satisfactory!
* The Antrim Limrick is our quarterly community journal. Joan is the editor. Consequently, I am the staff photographer!
** A nine windmill turbine, 28.8 MW “wind farm” on a local mountain ridge is scheduled to begin producing power shortly.
Yesterday, I made the two hour (one way) drive to Portsmouth, NH over on the seacoast. I had arranged to pick up an old Epson printer that I am going to convert to use only black inks. (details below, after the photos).
After getting the printer safely ensconced in my truck, I took a walk, camera in hand, around downtown Portsmouth, a bit of New Hampshire that I am not familiar with.
Despite the hordes of tourists, I spend an enjoyable couple of hours. I visited a special NH Art Association exhibit at the Sheafe Warehouse in Prescott Park and a photography exhibit in their permanent gallery on State Street. The sights and sounds of the city were interesting, but I was glad to head back to the peace and quiet of our neck of the woods before too long.
Warning… photographer talk ahead!!!
I already have one converted printer with a set of Piezography “warm neutral” inks installed; it makes wonderful prints on all sorts of matte papers.
I am trying to decide on which ink set to use in the “new” printer. I’m torn between a set which resembles selenium toned gelatin silver prints or the “special edition” set which emulates the tones of platinum/palladium prints.
Decisions… decisions!
Yesterday morning, I took my camera with me on my morning walk up the un-maintained section of Brimstone Corner Road and down Boutman Rd to its low spot.
Late yesterday afternoon I had a bit of free time before I was due at the Grange’s Summah Suppah so I headed out to make a few photographs.
Most of my recent non-wildlife photography has been done using the camera obscura. This day, I resolved to leave the camera obscura in the truck and to see what photographs I could make with the regular camera.
I ended up with two series of photographs,
Machines…
“Numbers”…
On Monday afternoon (from about 2 – 4) I took a walk up Hattie Brown Road to see what was up “ode-wise”. The temperature was in the high 70s F, the skies were mostly clear and there was a bit of breeze intermittently.
The walk along most of the road is heavily shaded and I did not expect to see many/any odes until I approached the beaver swamp. My expectations were met and I saw my first ode, a bright red male meadowhawk, just as I got to the swamp.
The swamp itself is amazingly dry, even for this time of year. The outlet stream is still flowing, but much of the swamp proper consists of large dry or drying patches separating discontinuous patches of surface water. (I imagine that there is still significant subsurface water.)
Usually, there would be good numbers of darners cruising out over the swamp, but not this trip. There were a few (two?) male meadowhawks along the road and a single female damselfly (most probably a variable dancer).
I continued along the road past the swamp and was rewarded with more numerous insects in the clearing just where the road turns up the hill.
Present in this clearing were small numbers (less than six) of both male and female common white-tails. The most common ode present were female spangled skimmers, roughly a dozen; I saw no males.
Individuals of both of these species seemed to be attacking me as they flew directly at my head numerous times, often close enough that I could hear there wings beating. A male common white-tail even briefly perched on the front of my thigh. Of course, what these insects were really doing was picking off prey from the cloud of small flying insects that I had attracted!
I also observed a single male twelve-spotted skimmer who was a very obliging model. During the course of the ten or fifteen minutes I watched him, he made repeated hunting forays and always returned to the same perch. In contrast to the other species, he ignored me and the cloud I attracted, as he flew off in seeming random directions each time.
One the way back to the truck, I passed a single meadowhawk along the road by the swamp and a single spreadwing along the road almost at its junction with Craig Road. I watched the spreadwing for a few minutes always staying low to the ground and in the shade. Just as I despaired of making its photo, it flew to a chest-high perch in a patch of sun. Even the background (the dark shaded woods at some distance away) was perfect. I made two exposures before it flew away!
Yesterday afternoon I headed to town to drop off some photos for an upcoming exhibition at the library. As I headed back to the truck, I noticed the nice light. There were dark gray clouds (and presumably rain) just to the south. We were clearly on the edge of this weather system.
I was inspired to get out my camera and to poke around the old Goodell Company mills across the street from the library. It sprinkled very lightly and for only a few minutes while I explored.
Most of my non-wildlife work these days is in black and white. However one of the first things that struck my eye yesterday was the wonderful combination of weathered blue paint and rusty hinges on a mill building door. Thus the resulting photo and the next one I made (of a nearby window) are rarities in my oeuvre.
After I finished poking around “downtown”, I decided to head to the Antrim Center and Meetinghouse Hill (the original “downtown”). It is about three miles from the library to the top of the hill.
I may have a need for a photo of a stone wall for the next issue of the Limrik and there are plenty of stone walls on Meetinghouse Hill. Of course, the same can be said about the rest of Antrim… or New Hampshire… or New England! However, I am particularly fond to those on Meetinghouse Hill.
On the way by, I stopped and made a couple of photographs of the Stone Church, where Joan and I were married some thirty nine plus years ago. For some reason, I have not made many photographs of this building.
This afternoon (about three) I took a walk up the unmaintained portion of Brimstone Corner Road. I wanted to see what was up with the logging operation that has been going on for the last several weeks. The good news is it looks like the loggers are essentially finished. Therefore, shortly, serenity will again reign in the neighborhood.
It was a perfect mid-summer day. It was sunny and the temperature was right around 80 degrees F.
Most of the road is well shaded but I did find some dragonflies in the sunny patches and in clearings near the road.. I did not see any damselflies.
The most common ode were male calico pennants; I saw three individuals, all immature males) in one clearing. In addition, I saw single specimens of the following species: a female meadowhawk (exact species not know), a female Halloween pennant, a female blue dasher, a male common whitetail and a male spangled skimmer. I was unable to make photos of the last two of these.
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