boolie

My Kicks

We had a sunny day on Friday so while I was taking pictures on the way home from work, I took a quick picture of my favorite pair of shoes, orange New Balance trail runners that are coming out of winter hibernation and returning to the regular rotation. I picked them up a couple of years ago after I returned to commuting by train and wanted to be more visible as I walk to and from the station or around town. The sun was low in the sky when I took the picture, and I in shade, but you can get a glimpse of how visible they are in low contrast light that causes human vision to stumble. I love everything about the shoes and should have bought a handful when I realized how much I liked them so I could store them in the closet and have a supply for years to come.

I was walking Ellie a couple of weeks ago on one of her long morning weekend walks when I felt the sole break in my other favorite pair of shoes, a black pair of New Balance trail runners from four years ago (a different style), finally succumbing after years of steady use. I stepped carefully for the rest of the walk and thankfully they held together enough that I didn’t have to cut her walk short. I sadly placed them in the trashcan when we got home, thankful for the years of use, they started out as shoes for summer hiking but I loved them so much they became one of my main shoes until they started to show signs of wear and were relegated to dog walking the past year or so.

Through These Flooded Fields

The water levels at Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge are managed to mimic the seasonal flooding from the Columbia River in the days before the dams. But this flooded field comes courtesy of an unusually wet winter, even for the Pacific Northwest. The fawn is a Columbian whitetail, born to one of the does that was transplanted in the third wave of relocations.

Made for Trixie

When we first got this cat tree, I thought the cats would only use the middle platform as a place to jump to the top, as it isn’t very tall. But it turns out to be perfectly Trixie sized, so she often hangs out here to watch the birds and squirrels in the backyard.

Two Bees or Not Two Bees?

Clearly there are two bees. I’m glad we’ve been able to answer this age-old question, let’s move on.

Sam in the Sunlight

My faithful companion in the evening light.

Winter Destinations

I wanted a quick test of my new Sony Zeiss 55mm f1.8 lens so I visited a popular winter destination in our area, the wooden heater vent in our living room. Boo was enjoying warm air blowing on his belly but when he got up to greet me he was immediately replaced by its most frequent guest, Trixie, who is usually sleeping here when I come home from work.

I am, I am, I am Superman

Easter Eggs

Boo and Sam get into the holiday spirit even in their sleeping positions.

Earrings

The green tags in this rain-soaked doe’s ears suggest she was part of the third wave of Columbian white-tailed deer that were captured at Julia Butler Hansen National Wildlife Refuge and brought to Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge. She was hanging out with a group of other does from that transfer, and more importantly, their fawns, part of the reason their status has improved from endangered to threatened.

Hunter in Green

When I visited Ridgefield a week ago I decided to only shoot with the new Sony camera and the adapter that lets me attach my Canon telephotos. I was expecting to have to rely on manual focus but the autofocus did work sometimes, although not consistently enough for this to be a combination I’ll use often for photos. For these shots I used manual focus, although I was still learning how to do it. I’d normally like a little more depth of field in a shot like this, especially to keep more of the pouring rain in focus, but by shooting wide open I was able to take more of an abstract and turn the grass that surrounded the hunting heron into a sea of green.

With the heron standing tall, you get more of a sense of the large meadow it was hunting in. I had no idea herons hunted in meadows until I moved to the Northwest, but all the voles that live here are well aware.

I didn’t have time to take any 4K videos of this heron, it struck into the ground and walked off when it came up empty, but I did take a few videos of some animals sitting in the pouring rain, including a bald eagle, a white-tailed deer, and some snipe. I’ve never edited video but I’ll see if I can learn enough to put a few clips up in the next month or so.

📷: Sony A6500 | Canon 500mm | Canon 1.4X
🗓️: March 26, 2017