There is light...

I thought the Fireflies were done, until I walked out the other night at dusk to put the pony back in his pen for the night.

I thought I'd check out the meadow this time with a view to the northeast.

The old apple tree across the fence is in deep grass and brush. The photo is dark, but you can see that the Lightening Bugs were sure busy!

I then took the camera and faced it towards the evening sky. There was barely any light at all, but the neat thing about modern day cameras is that they pick up light better than the human eye.

The meadow's grass is pretty short here from grazing so I didn't see a lot of bugs lighting up. However the color of the clouds and the sky were beautiful.

I also could see the Big Dipper!

I set up for longer exposures hoping to get more Fireflies and more star movement all in one shot.

I used a 8 minute LiveComp exposure setting on the camera and hit the jackpot.

In the distance there was some lightening from a storm cell, I got the start of a star trail with the Big Dipper at the center, and the Fireflies showed up in great numbers. They also streaked across the sky in front of the camera.

Lucky me, I only got one airplane flying through the exposure.

I set up to do just one more exposure, but the Mosquitoes simply were not cooperative. I could have set the camera up and walked away for 10 minutes but I get nervous leaving the camera on a tripod when we have wildlife that move through the area.

Normally the bugs are not this bad. In fact, I think we are quite spoiled as we don't have lakes and ponds in our area, only rivers and streams. It does cut down on the bothersome skeeters.

Even sunrises are not so much fun right now. 

This was my Friday night attempt at a shots.

The crescent moon is on the left and my neighbor's yard light on their farm 1/2 mile away is on the right.
The fireflies are in the are down below. It was very warm and just after sunset. They were exceptionally active! I was quite surprised. The shot is taken over the mule pasture which is full of weeds and grass.

I turned north and spotted the Big Dipper just coming out in the dusk. It looks as though it is dumping right onto the spot where our house is!

As it got a bit darker, I decided to shoot a star trail over our house with the Big Dipper as the center.

Nah. I didn't quite get the Dipper in the middle and then I quit because no matter how many times I tried...airplanes had decided to use the north-south corridor in their flight pattern.

I tried several times only to continuously get airplane tracks.

One of the planes was rather low!

That is the bright white streak.

In my imagination ... later on. This could have been an alien ship trying to beam us up! Right?

Alas, it was just a small airplane flying low overhead. I imagine it was going to our tiny local airport which was having a pancake breakfast and fly in on Saturday morning.

I guess I'll keep trying.

Last night some storms came through to the south of us. I set up on the porch for a little bit to see if I could catch any lightening action.

Nope.

I did catch the night sky light up with lightening far off and some lightening bugs were busy in the yard.

It would have been cool to catch a lightening bolt.

I gave up and went in as the skeeters decided I was great food.

The night sky is a reminder
that even in the darkest
times.

There will always

be

light.

Night of the Fireflies...

I haven't been out to see the fireflies this year...well, that is until Saturday night. The skies have been smokey and the nights have been chilly. I decided to go ahead and look for them last night.

They were numerous!

View back towards the house...

This was just at 'Blue Hour' when Venus was visible in the sky. Our home is just to the right of the pines.

Fireflights/lightening bugs prefer the tall grasses and the woods. If you don't have an area that is unmowed, you won't see as many. I stood at the edge of our yard and took this shot of the meadow on the other side of the fence.

For anyone interested in how this was done. I used my Olympus E-M1 Mark iii which has a 'Starry Sky' Auto focus to help focus things in the dark. I used a setting called LiveComp. I set the LiveComp up to a 4 second exposure for 4 minutes. That means that each 4 seconds that passes by, the camera records any changes to the light and adds it essentially as a layer over the previous exposures for 4 minutes. ISO was set at 1600 and I had to modify the white balance.

I know that sounds like Greek to many folks, but there it is...

Setting it up and figuring out where to point it is the hard part sort of. 

I stopped while heading to the ridge:

The Driveway...

Tigen Road where I noted that the lightening bugs hung out along the long grass in the ditches.

At the mailbox...

And then I took a 'selfie'. The lights from the town 3 miles away was rather intense and gave the sky an odd color as the humidity, haze, and smokey sky increased the odd oranges. 

Could we please get some rain????

Sunday is Father's Day. So I leave these two photos of my father.

Young Dad:

I'm guessing this might be a clue as to why I love photography?

Dad in 2001 when we were in Hawai'i together.

Woke last night...

to the sound of thunder...
how far off,
I sat and wondered...
Started humming a song from
1962
Ain't it funny how the night moves... [Bob Seger]

I love the night sky too much to be afraid of darkness...

[Let me qualify that by saying that I live in a very rural area so any life I'd run into at night would be wildlife and not humans]

I couldn't sleep so I decided to take a walk across the ridge top and through the corn fields before the corn got too tall.

I brought a tripod and thought it would be fun to try some Milky Way shots. I am always experimenting and learning. I may even improve a little as I keep going!

Lightening Bugs and stars 

Walking on the road

Headed across the open fields

An attempt at a panorama shot that didn't quite work. Two shots.

I ended up a mile from home on a ridge and I wanted to try another shot where it was sort of a selfie shot with my head lamp shining into the Milky Way. 

The swirls in my light are moths

 that came to dance for me. 

I spent about two hours on the ridge walking and admiring the skies.

My night moves included watching a 'possum watch me. Deer eyes glowing in the woods and further off in the field. Unseen creatures moving about in the underbrush.
No coyote noises. 
No sounds of traffic.

I thought I'd try something different on my way home. My photos of fireflies were sort of bleh and dark so I thought I'd try some 'light' painting with my headlamp.

What felt so amazing is that I'm sure the fireflies danced just for me. I could have stayed all night.

Nothing is more amazing than a clear night sky full of stars and the Milky Way.

Night sky, stars, storms, and bugs

This was one of those amazing sunsets that just goes on and on and on.

There is something beautiful about just watching amazing colors to start or end a day.

I know I once said that I didn't use tons of extra planning and preparing for taking photos. I was an off the cuff type of person.

However, just lately with the partial lunar eclipse a bit ago and then with the upcoming June 10th partial solar eclipse, I started to do some serious homework!

One bit of that homework was to learn how to use the camera I have to the best of its abilities. I have a decent lens for night work and I figured out how to get the stars in focus with both 'Focus Assist' and the Starry Sky feature on my M5.

I intended to go out to the pasture to do some practicing and I if nothing else 'shoot' some lightening bugs.

The photos above are a bit dark [duh, it is night!], but if you click on them I think you can see them larger and with a bit more detail.

I realized there was a storm cell off to the east and the lightening bugs were everywhere. So I decided to try something a bit wild. 

My first try was a mistake. I must have bumped the camera or tripod while it was shooting its LiveComp.

I wanted to show the mistake. Did I touch the camera? I don't recall, but the effect was certainly dizzing!

 So I decided to 'do' it over and I hoped that the storm would still do its magic.

The first one is a 15 minute star trail. It's okay, but dang soo much is going on!

So I tried another and then just shut it down after about 7 or 8 minutes and I liked it much better. Odd how two shots of nearly the same area just minutes from each other are differently colored. I think there was more lightening going on with this second shot.

So what was the whole point? 

I guess practice.

So that was the practice part. Scouting and planning for trying to photograph the partial solar eclipse was the next step.

So I leave you with a pretty photo I shot of a Swallow Tail I tried to chase in my flowers. It looks like the verbena is a huge attractor!

Fireflies and Fun

If you live where the fireflies come out in the summer, you need to stay up late to enjoy the Dance of the Fireflies.

Fireflies are beetles that fly and they blink and glow to attract their mate? I guess. All I know is that I don't have the opportunity to share this special show often to guests. Timing is everything. Temperature, humidity, time of year, it all depends on those neat little beetles.

This year I was able to share with my Kenosha friends, the Dance of the Fireflies. The first night we had some amazing views. Fireflies, Lightening, and stars all in the same sky.

The shot is blown out from the lightening, but look above the bright spot. There are stars! In the black area, there are streaks of fireflies. I doubt I may ever see something like that again.

The storm circled around us and headed east. We oohhed and awwed at the sky show and alternately turned to the west to watch the fireflies glow and fly.

I woke up at 5am which is my normal wake up time. The day was going to be super hot but it was Amanda's birthday and she wanted to go for a ride.
I took them out and we went riding just after daybreak.

And we rode. I took video of our ride Daryl got some great shots, but mostly I concentrated on making sure my guests were properly mounted and were ready for the obstacles we encountered. That is my backside taking them down the camp road.

Photo by Daryl Clausen

I took them out the ridge first and then down into the 'rough' stuff. Mule slides, ditches, climbs, brush whacking, and branch dodging. I was afraid they wouldn't like it so we stopped to give the mules a breather and I asked.
"So...are you guys okay with this?"
"YES! Awesome!"
As we put the mules away afterward I offered them a second ride on Sunday morning.
Yes. Yes!
Most of the time when they visit, we try to go somewhere cool to do a sunrise photo shoot together.
It was set, we'd ride again on Father's Day.

The rest of Saturday was fun. The adults took naps and I went with the girls to visit the neighbors and see the baby goats.

The girls and I set up a bean bag game that also served as 'ladder ball' and another toss game to be played later.

The Gang wanted to go to the creek and so we went and spent a couple of hours in the creek bottom.

Big Dog and Little Dog played themselves out chasing each other. Scout played so hard. He is not a quitter. Charlie on the other hand would walk over to me and try to crawl into my lap for a rest.

We stacked rocks, and Daryl went off to explore and get some 'quiet' time. It was amazing how nice and cool the creek was. I don't think anyone wanted to leave and go back up the ridge road to the farm.

But chores had to be done and we were getting hungry also.

Everyone was sleepy after we finally had birthday ice cream cake. I was stuffed. But it was time to try out the games. The competition was fierce.

Photo of me in the blue by Daryl Clausen

Photo by Amanda Clausen

Then the Fireflies started to put on their show again. This time I walked up the driveway and looked east towards the meadow.

I was astounded and called out to my friends. They in turn were amazed also and Daryl went and woke his girls up so they could come and watch.

And we were again transfixed by the incredible show of what my friends' called Nature's Christmas lights.

We went to bed, as we wanted to ride out again in the morning before it got too hot.

Lessons from Charlie

Yesterday I took a break from the 'CareGiving' organizing and scheduling for both Rich and MIL. I took Charlie out so he could inspect the bulldozed ridge road. When we got to the creek, he calmly walked through the mud and silt picking up each leg higher than normal as he boldly inspected.

I really think he noted the difference in the bottom. He looked right, left, and slowly turned around and then spotted the trail going up the other side of the creek and took off trotting. He stopped and glanced back at me as if to say "Coming? Human-slave?" 

I was coming. 

However on our way through the mule pasture, I noted that the gate was not hot so I decided not to really explore any more but to go back and figure out why the fence was not working. I would have preferred to walk the whole trail all the way to the back fence, however the thought of loose equine turned me around.

I asked Charlie to come and he turned back and we headed towards home and the meadow.

[Note! Charlie is coming most of the time now when I call him, especially in the woods! He still likes to play catch me if you can in the yard sometimes.]

Often he stopped to listen to noises in the woods. I know he is close to the ground so he can't see over the brush and undergrowth. But he does listen and seem to think.
I heard a robin, a Titmouse, and in the distance I heard a wren scolding something while I stood and waited for him to check things out.

Charlie took a keen interest in the deer tracks on the ridge road. Probably looking for delicious deer poop. Not something I'm going to try any time soon.

In the meadow I had to set him down to fix the fence. First I had to introduce him to the mules who were all curious as to why I was in their pasture and why I had Charlie with me. I let the redheaded mules sniff Charlie in my arms. Seems that they don't perceive dogs that I am close to as threats.
They will chase down strange dogs and try to kill them. Charlie is so small, I think they don't believe he is worth chasing. They don't chase the cats that walk through their pastures either so I wonder if they think he is a cat?

With Charlie ignoring the mules and sitting between my legs, I found that the electric wire had gotten wrapped around barbed wire by some animal. Perhaps a raccoon had been chased through the fence. I've seen the girls do that before too. I fixed it and Charlie insisted on walking [with his cord attached to him of course] through the tall grass. I'm sure we looked rather funny.
Tiny dog, Human-slave, and 4 mules in single file walking through the meadow.

Did you know how interesting straw is? We have to stop, inspect it, and then chew on it. How about that bumble bee on the wild geraniums? Stop, inspect, watch, and then move on.
We eventually made it back to the house and Charlie flopped onto the rug I have on the porch. I brought him and I some cold water and we enjoyed the light breeze and the shade for a bit.

He was panting so I took him inside and let him rest. Rich was still napping. I had fence to rebuild and wasn't looking forward to using the post pounder but went back out and did it anyway.

.....

The lessons really came much later. After dark Charlie asked to go outside. I was in my PJ bottoms so I went out with him. He did his business quickly and then ran back to the piece of carpet on the porch and sat. I sat on the carpet too. He crawled into my lap and leaned against me.

His head kept darting back and forth. His ears would perk up when he heard the tree toads on the west side sing. Then his head would dart back to the east and suddenly he leaned harder and stomped his feet. I could see him trying to figure something out. Then it dawned on me.
Charlie was watching lightening bugs. He was listening to the toads and the June Bugs were buzzing in the Hickory tree nearby making the tree sound like it was electrified.

So I sat for a long time on the old chunk of carpet on the concrete with Charlie in my lap.
We listened to the toads.
We watched lightening bugs [he growled softly a few times...at them].
We listened to the June Bugs in the tree.

Fast isn't always the answer. Sometimes just sitting quietly and using your senses is the way to go.
Charlie is an expert at chillin' out.

It is a good lesson to learn.