Fish and Flamingos

Since yesterday’s walk was in the dark I have had to dig into more of the pictures from my trip to the Assiniboine Park Zoo earlier in the month for today.  I have some of the fish from the Discovery Centre and some Flamingos from Toucan Ridge.

It is looking like it should be an ok evening for all the little ghosts and goblins tonight.  The temperature is going up to 10C by afternoon and will be dropping by then, but it is not supposed to rain or snow today.

Flamingo Oct 10 Toucan Ridge

Flamingos Oct 10 Toucan Ridge

Clown Fish Oct 10 Discovery Centre

Yellow Tang Oct 10 Discovery Centre

Many years ago I tried keeping a marine aquarium, but failed miserably at it.  I love the Clown Fish and would have been happy with a tank full of them.  Of course, they don’t get along with other Clown Fish, so I only had 2. There are so many different kinds but they are all beautiful.  The only critter that thrived in my aquarium was the anemones which the Clown Fish like to hang around with.   You can see parts of the anemones in both pictures.  The store took the anemones back when I realized that a salt water aquarium was too much for me to handle.

On Africam so far today we have seen Cape Buffalo, Zebra, Elephant, a mystery critter, Saddle-billed Stork, Egyptian Goose, Black-headed Heron, Brown-hooded Kingfisher, Impala, Vervet Monkey, and Giraffe.  Click here to see today’s pictures.

Chickadees and Chester

Yesterday Chester and I found nothing along the riverbank when we walked so we came back to the yard to take pictures of some little Chickadees that were very high in the trees.  Of course in my own back yard I have to take pictures of Chester too. 

Since the Chickadees were so high up, these pictures are heavily cropped and I had no idea when I was snapping them if I even had the bird in my viewfinder or not.  It turns out they were all in the picture, but most of the time had their heads down – so they’re not great pictures.

Chickadee Oct 29

Chickadee Oct 29

Chickadee Oct 29

Chickadee Oct 29

Chickadee Oct 29

Even though these are not GREAT pictures, they aren’t bad considering the distance they were from me.  This is a big Oak Tree they were in.

Chester Oct 29

Chester Oct 29

So far on Africam today, we have seen Elephant, Zebra, Baboon, Common Duiker, Wood Sandpiper and the adorable Spotted Eagle Owl chicks.  There is still lots of time for more sightings.  Click here to see today’s pictures.

Deer (happy and healthy deer)

Yesterday, I went a few miles outside of the city to pick something up and was thrilled to see 2 very happy and healthy deer.  Even more exciting was the fact that they did not run away when I stopped my car to take pictures.  As a matter of fact, one of them even walked closer to me.

They both looked right at me and continued feeding, just stopping every once in awhile to check to make sure I was still there.  Combining these beautiful creatures with the beaver sighting earlier in the morning made my day and pretty much made up for the heartbreaking deer sighting of the day before.

The sun was shining and it was warm enough to keep my car window down and watch them for awhile as I snapped a few pictures.

White-tail Deer Oct 28

White-tail Deer Oct 28

White-tail Deer Oct 28

White-tail Deer Oct 28

White-tail Deer Oct 28

White-tail Deer Oct 28

I have driven this road many time before and never been lucky enough to see deer there and today, I decided to bring my camera with me and they were waiting near the side of the road for me.  This pictures are cropped slightly and re-sized, and were taken with the Sony NEX-5N.

I think I’m all set to take hundreds (or maybe thousands) of pictures in Africa next year.

A Beaver for Sarah

I’ve mentioned Sarah before.   I worked with her at the Y, but now she has gone from being my physical fitness guru to my financial guru.  Anyway, she is still obsessed with beavers.  I got my best pictures ever of the elusive beaver on the Red River yesterday.

I got pictures of him coming and going.

Beaver October 28

Beaver October 28

Beaver October 28

Beaver October 28

Beaver October 28

Beaver October 28

Beaver October 28

Beaver October 28

And away he goes again.  First time I’ve seen one get out of the water where I could see him well enough to take pics.

I got much better pictures from the Sony than I would have from the Olympus.  They both zoom about the same amount, but these are clearer than they would have been with the Olympus.

I took both cameras to the Sony Store today to ask about the zoom.  Finally I got someone who knows about cameras and zoom lenses.  He knew right away that the Olympus should zoom as much or a little bit more than the Sony.  The 75mm on the lens was not referring to the zoom – it was the 15x that was the zoom and the mm was more of the distance from the camera to the object.

I’m disappointed that I can not get more zoom from the Sony, but because of the size of the pictures, I have lots of room to crop.  heavily cropped pictures will not make good prints, but they work well online.  The pictures of the beaver are heavily cropped.  When he was out of the water, he was approximately 150 feet away from me.  I’m just guessing at the distance, but figuring that the tree in my yard was about 50 feet and he was at least 3 times that distance away.  When he is swimming, he is obviously further away again.

I got a couple of pretty decent gull pictures too. 

Ring-bill Gull October 28

Ring-bill Gull Oct 28

Its kind of neat that the path where Chester and I walk is above the river so I am above or even with many of the birds that fly by. 

I got real lucky and got some more great pictures yesterday afternoon.  I will post those later today or tomorrow.

So far today on Africam we have seen Waterbuck, Egyptian Goose, Zebra, Hadeda Ibis, Blacksmith Lapwing, Terrapin, and Cape Buffalo.  Click here to see today’s pictures.

Gulls in the Fog

As I mentioned in the last post, I was taking pictures of Gulls in the fog yesterday.   It appears as if the gulls were all grounded by the fog – very few flew and only for a short distance while I was watching.  The fog was really thick and I also took a picture of the other side of the Red River – the only thing is that you can’t see the other side. 

I also ran each of the pictures through Paint Shop Pro’s One Step Photo Fix and there is really quite a difference in these pictures.  The photo fix got rid of much of the fog, similar to the way it gets rid of smudges on glass when I take pictures through glass (Chester’s nose prints on my window or hand prints on viewing area of critters at the zoo).

Today is supposed to be mainly sunny with a high of 7C but is currently -3C.

I was sorry to see that the deer was still on the riverbank when I walked today.  I don’t know if he called someone else to pick it up or if they leave it there for the scavengers.

Chester and I have already taken our walk and have today’s pictures for tomorrow’s blog.  I have some good ones to show, but back to the foggy gulls for now.

Foggy Picture of the other side of the Red River

You can see the rocks along this side of the bank and what looks like it should be the reflection of the trees from the other side of the bank in the middle of the picture.  The far bank is not that close and should be around the top of the picture.  I told you it was a thick fog. 

Gulls Oct 27

Now – the same picture after One Step Photo Fix.

Gulls Oct 27

Gulls Oct 27

And the same picture after the fix.

Gulls Oct 27

Gulls Oct 27

and after photo fix.

Gulls Oct 27

I think they are all Ring-billed Gulls.

So far on Africam today we have seen African  Fish Eagle, Impalas, Gecko, Blacksmith Lapwing, Hamerkop, Hadeda Ibis, Egyptian Geese, Warthog, Elephant, Spotted Eagle Owl, Saddle-billed Stork, Common Duiker, Grey Heron and lots of frogs.  Click here to see today’s pictures.

The Deer

Yesterday morning I was on my usual walk with Chester along the Red River and taking pictures of seagulls in the thick fog.  There was some rustling in the tall weeds not far from us and I looked down to see a deer lying down.  Excited, I pointed my camera at her, but just as I snapped, I saw that she could not get up and was then thrashing.  Chester went bonkers wanting to go after her, which made it worse.  No one was around with a phone, so I headed back home to call someone.

I looked up “wildlife in Winnipeg” online and got a Department of  DNR phone #.  I called them and she said they couldn’t do anything and gave me another number to call.  I called them, but they didn’t open for another hour, so I called DNR back.  She again said they couldn’t do anything and gave me another number.  I got an answer at that phone number, but she said they couldn’t do anything about deer and said DNR had to handle it.  She gave me another number that would go straight to a conservation officer there.

I phoned that number and finally got someone who would come out, but he was about 45 minutes away.  I  agreed to meet him there because would have trouble finding her in the tall grass and there was no way he could see down there from the road.  So, I headed back there to keep people and dogs away.

By the time I got there, I think she was gone already though – no movement and I wasn’t about to do anything to check just in case she was just resting.  When the officer got there about 1/2 an hour later, he thought she was gone too.  At that point I said I had seen enough and was leaving.  As I walked away I heard 2 shots.

Just before leaving for work I downloaded the pics and I was so sorry I had snapped the one of her.  I wasn’t close enough to have seen her face well at the time but the picture told the story and she was obviously in a tremendous amount of pain.

I’ll put the seagull pictures in another post.

Cloudy Day

Yesterday was pretty dark and cloudy most of the day.  In the early evening the rain suddenly poured down.  A few minutes later there was hail mixed in with the rain, followed by sleet and then snow (I didn’t want to get started with that 4 letter word yet this year).  The snow part didn’t last long and although the ground was white when it ended, it was pretty much gone by night time.  This morning it is freezing fog to greet us when we walk with a temperature of -3C, but it is supposed to drop to -5C soon.

You will notice that yesterday’s pictures below here are pretty dark, which makes focusing difficult so I don’t have much to offer, but I will offer them anyway.  They may be better than what I can get today.

I keep forgetting for some reason that there are different types of Sea Gulls.  Barry from Africam reminded me yesterday that one of the gulls I had was a Ring-Billed Gull, which are common here – but there are other gulls that are also found here.

As you can see, he has a ring around his bill.

Ring-billed Gull Oct 26

Mallards Oct 26

Gull Oct 26

Gull Oct 26

Cloudy Day Oct 26 - the sun is trying to come out though

On Africam today we have seen Hamerkop, Egyptian Goose, Baboon, Impala, Common Duiker, frogs and a spider.  It has been storming, so the critters don’t come out of the bush as much.  It could turn out to be a great afternoon or evening for viewing though.  Click here to see the pictures taken so far.

Geese and Gulls

I had to change the subject line a bit from yesterday, but we’ve got more of the same critters today from yesterday’s walk.   Well maybe not the exact same critters – but the same species anyway.  The gulls are giving me practice taking pictures of flying critters too, but I’m getting some headless ones sometimes.

On Friday I’m going to take the lens back to Sony and see what they have to say about the zoom on it.  I am hoping there is something wrong with this one and I really should be getting more zoom out of it, but no one seems to know the difference between the x factor in zoom and the mm factor in zoom for cameras or if the mm factor in the Olympus is just more than the mm factor in the Sony NEX.

If you haven’t been following my tale, the Olympus camera has a zoom of 15x and also says on the lens 75mm.  The Sony NEX zoom lens is 210mm, but they both zoom the same – pictures taken at full zoom look identical, except that the Sony pictures are sharper.  The only reason I got a new camera was to get more zoom, but I really like the sharper, clearer pictures.

Here are today’s pictures from yesterday’s walk.

Headless Gull Oct 25

Canada Goose Oct 25

Gull Oct 25

Canada Geese Oct 25

Gull Oct 25

Canada Geese Oct 25

As always, walking along the Red River with Chester sometimes makes me miss a great photo since he simply isn’t interested in  taking pictures.  There is always something more exciting up ahead and we should not be stopping.  If I wasn’t walking him though, I probably wouldn’t be walking, although I think I’ve convinced myself that I will walk on my own when I no longer have a dog.  Its easy to say that now and I plan on having Chester for some time yet anyway, so I will continue to miss some shots when he decides its time to go and yanks my hand away from the shutter.

On Africam today, we have seen Lion, Bushbuck, Waterbuck, Elephant, Woolly-Necked Stork, Egyptian Geese, Baboon, Nyala, Hadeda Ibis, Saddle-Billed Stork, Common Duiker, Crested Guinea Fowl, and Impala.  The day isn’t over yet, so there can be more sightings.  Click here to see today’s pictures so far.

Gulls and Geese

On yesterday’s walk, as you can tell by the subject line, we saw lots of Sea Gulls and Canada Geese – so that is what I have pictures of today.

The days are pretty nice according to the time of year we are at with daytime temperatures around 8-10C and night time temperature dropping to a little under 0C.  Hopefully it will stay nice until after Halloween so all the little ghosts and goblins have a comfortable night outside.

Chester is actually taking time off his bunny hunt to watch the gulls and geese these days.  Until now he’s been too busy looking away from the river, but hasn’t seen many of his long eared friends lately.

Gull Oct 24

Canada Geese Oct 24

Gull Oct 24

Canada Geese Oct 24

Gull Oct 24

Canada Geese Oct 24

Gulls Oct 24

On Africam today we have seen Elephant, Spotted Eagle Owl chicks, Tree Squirrel, Impala, Helmeted Guinea Fowl, Egyptian Goose, Saddle-billed  Stork, Baboon, Kudu, Giraffe, Common Duiker, Vervet Monkey, Zebra, Giant Eagle Owl, and Black-backed Jackal.  Click here to see today’s pictures.

After I posted yesterday’s blog, we saw (well I only saw after looking at the pictures) a young lion, a herd of Cape Buffalo and a Serval as well as other critters.

Flowers and Flights

It is hard to believe that October has only one more week and it will be history for this year very soon.  I hadn’t stopped to look at my poor neglected flower bed in front of the house for ages and was surprised to see a yellow pansy brightly blooming yesterday afternoon.  My chrysanthemum has been blooming for some time now also – so I got a couple of pictures of those flowers to show you.

We did not see any critters on our walk along the Red River after work though.  By afternoon it seems they have all moved on to another location, but it was much too dark before work to even consider taking pictures yesterday.  Today I’m back to the usual weekday shift and we’ll see what is waiting out there for us a little later.

Chester is looking out the window and getting exciting and so I assume there is a bunny out there now.  Its too dark for me to see, but he seems to be able to pick them out.

One of the problems with a camera that has interchangeable lenses is the fact that you should change lenses for different picture opportunities.  My plan is to use the zoom lens 55-210mm almost exclusively instead of doing a lot of changing back & forth (which increases the chance of me breaking either one).  Flowers are best taken using the macro or at the very least not zooming, but the minimum of 55mm is zoomed with this lens.  So, I stood back to take these pictures.  The pansy looks ok, but the mum is taller, so I should have stood back more – LOL

I am not wearing glasses when I take my pictures and its not until I get them uploaded onto the computer that I get a good look at them.  I chose the wrong flower to focus on as well with the mum.

Chrysanthemum Oct23

Pansy Oct23

On Africam today we have seen Giraffe, Kudu, Impala, Zebra, Slender Mongoose, Baboon, Blacksmith Lapwing, Vervet Monkey, Warthog, Black Backed Jackal, Hippo, and of course the Spotted Eagle Owl babies.  Click here to see today’s pictures.

There were a lot of sightings yesterday that had not been noted in my blog, since I posted long before the day was over, but if you take another look at yesterday’s pictures, you will find the Wild Dogs visited Elephant Plains and another leopard visited Nkorho – plus more (of course).

I haven’t booked my flight to Africa yet, but I have received the flight itinerary.  I have 4 planes going and 4 planes returning.  Going there doesn’t look too bad, since I have an overnight stay in New York City after 2 pretty short flights – Winnipeg to Minneapolis and Minneapolis to New York.  The next day is New York to Johannesburg and Johannesburg to Nelspruit.  There is about 2 1/2 – 3 hours between arrival and departure each time I change planes.  The return trip is the reverse, except that I will be leaving from Hoedspruit and it will be 2 days of flights without an overnight stay in a bed.  On these flights there is more like 5-6 hours between flights to hang around the airports, except for the last transfer where there is only 1 hour – so that one will be a rush to make.

The flights scare me much more than the idea of driving around alone in Africa on the wrong side of the road – not the flights themselves, but the airports and changing planes.