Photo
grrlscientist | September 26, 2008tags: Black Tern, Chlidonias niger surinamensis, birds, nature, Image of the Day
[Mystery bird] Black Tern, Chlidonias niger surinamensis, photographed at Smith Point Hawk Watch, Texas. [I will identify this bird for you tomorrow]
Image: Joseph Kennedy, 15 August 2008 [larger view].
Nikon D200, Kowa 883 telescope TSN-PZ camera eyepiece 1/250s f/8.0 at 1000.0mm iso400.
Rick Wright, Managing Director of WINGS Birding Tours Worldwide, writes:
After all of those big, mean-looking terns, it's nice to see one as sweet and gentle as this little bird. How do we know it's little? The pebbles and…
grrlscientist | September 25, 2008tags: Gull-billed Tern, Sterna nilotica, birds, nature, Image of the Day
[Mystery bird] Gull-billed Tern, Sterna nilotica, photographed flying over Bolivar Flats, Texas. [I will identify this bird for you tomorrow]
Image: Joseph Kennedy, 6 June 2008 [larger view].
Nikon D200, Kowa 883 telescope TSN-PZ camera eyepiece 1/2000s f/8.0 at 1000.0mm iso400.
Read a detailed analysis for identifying this species below the fold ...
Rick Wright, Managing Director of WINGS Birding Tours Worldwide, writes:
Compare this bird's shape and structure to the Sandwich Tern in a recent quiz. You'll notice…
grrlscientist | September 24, 2008tags: Sandwich Tern, Sterna sandvichensis, birds, nature, Image of the Day
[Mystery bird] Sandwich Tern, Sterna sandvichensis, photographed flying over Quintana and Bryan Beach, Texas. [I will identify this bird for you tomorrow]
Image: Joseph Kennedy, 26 August 2008 [larger view].
Nikon D200, Kowa 883 telescope TSN-PZ camera eyepiece 1/640s f/8.0 at 1000.0mm iso400.
Below the fold is a detailed analysis for how to identify this species ..
Rick Wright, Managing Director of WINGS Birding Tours Worldwide, writes:
Does anybody else remember The Book of Terns? My favorite was the sketch of…
grrlscientist | September 23, 2008tags: Royal Tern, Sterna maxima, birds, nature, Image of the Day
[Mystery bird] Royal Tern, Sterna maxima, photographed flying over Frenchtown Road, Bolivar Peninsula, Texas. [I will identify this bird for you tomorrow]
Image: Joseph Kennedy, 22 August 2008 [larger view].
Nikon D200, Kowa 883 telescope TSN-PZ camera eyepiece 1/2000s f/8.0 at 1000.0mm iso400.
Below the fold is a detailed analysis for how to ID this species ..
Rick Wright, Managing Director of WINGS Birding Tours Worldwide, writes:
The taxonomically savvy will have noticed that these quizzes are proceeding in roughly…
zooillogix | June 9, 2008Time once again for some of Igor Siwanowicz's spectacular insect photography. We've brought you his mantis photos in the past (#1 , #2, and #3) so we decided to switch it up and take a look at some of his moths. Unfortunately Igor doesn't tell us which species we are looking at, but maybe some of our entomologically inclined readers will chime in.
more below the fold
This last one might be a butterfly, but that's a killer proboscis...
stoat | May 23, 2008Last sunday was the Champs head (named after the pub where they meet rather than their status :-) and it was a lovely day and we got to borrow Christs first boat which was lovely too. We were sort of OK, rather rushed and splashy, not long enough (race results from http://www.championrowing.org.uk/; nothing to see, move along quietly...). You can play spot-the-me if you like.
Yesterday, though, back in the old K8 we had a gorgeous outing, down below 1:45 in sprints and down below 1:30 very briefly. Onwards to the bumps...
Pic is frmo Denis; click on it for the original or http://picasaweb.…
stoat | April 1, 2008I can report a definite downwards temperature trend: this year, Easter was much colder than last year. But thats because we went visiting in the Lakes. I heartily recommend having a relative living there; better still, live there yourself.
Here we see an igloo and inhabitant.
And the view from Knott on the Caldbeck fells, looking south. You can't see that it was also very cold and windy.
stoat | February 5, 2008Is a photo essay I bought years ago and rarely looked at. I was going to get rid of it, but then flicking through I came across this wonderful picture.
It looks like some bizarre sci-fi drawing, but is in fact a prototype nuclear-powered jet engine. Read more about it at nuclearfiles.org, which has the full set of piccies from the book, but I think I got the exposure better on mine.
stoat | January 10, 2008Don't you just hate bloggers who post a whole pile all at once? Sorry. Anyway, some scans from a film that sat in my F801s for ages.
Miranda and the Alien Spacecraft
The Fairy Dress
stoat | November 18, 2007To Belgium, for Wouters thesis; and congratulations to him. Pix are on Flickr once you get past the bonfires.
Now the new line from St Pancreas is in, it takes less than 2 hours to get there, and new posters are splashed all around, some of them quite good.
The one featuring Thatcher, Major and Blair is fun and preserves the proper stereotypes. Major looks like a tw*t; Blair is looking to Major for approval; and only Thatcher is actually going to do anything. Dunno who this is. Being Belgium, the posters are also in Dutch, but I couldn't read those ones and neither could you :-)
Looking at…
stoat | November 5, 2007And we're not much better. Some photographic souvenirs of a recent trip to Bruxelles.
From the cathedral of St Michael and St Gudula. A hard-to-believe statue. It looks less rude from other angles. This one shows *two* enormous organs.
Musee des beaux arts. The woman is holding a bar of glowing hot iron; hence the little tray of charcoal in the foreground. Notice the burning witch in the background. See also this charming mural from Bayeaux featuring some hand-chopping legend of which I know nothing.
Did you know that if you type "justice de otton" into google, at the moment my flickr page…
stoat | November 5, 2007
Remember remember the 5th of November! Gunpowder treason and plot. And so we gathered to burn the heap of junk at the bottom of the garden and set off some fireworks.
At least we did it on the fifth - far too many naughty people did it yesterday. Tut tut.
laelaps | November 5, 2007For all of you who enjoy the various photographs I post here every day, I've now opened a CafePress store featuring some prints, mugs, and calendars emblazoned with some of the best photographs I've taken in 2007. There are shots of various creatures, big and small, from the Bronx, Philadelphia, and National Zoos, although I hope to soon have a "Best of 2006" calendar with some earlier (but no less impressive) shots. If you'd like to take a look, click here.
laelaps | October 29, 2007
Female Snow Leopard twins born last year at the Bronx Zoo.
When I initially started posting pictures on my blog, I didn't know if anyone would have anything to say about my pictures. I frequent zoos, museums, and aquariums, usually shooting between 200 and 600 shots per trip, the handful of good shots making their way onto the internet. I've been certainly pleasantly surprised, therefore, to see all the positive remarks made about my pictures, especially since I don't really have any idea what I'm doing. Still, many of you have asked how I have been able to get the kind of shots I've…
stoat | October 22, 2007Sciblogs has channels (e.g env, which is where I live, except for posts like this, which go onto chatter) and they are looking for new pix to adorn the banners, which will rotate on a weekly basis. The instructions are: "It's not too hard: the image needs to be at least 465 pixels wide. Readers should send their photos to photos@scienceblogs.com. They should send only photos that they have the rights to (eg, photos they have taken themselves), and they should include a line of text to the effect that we have permission to use their photo on ScienceBlogs. They should also add how they'd like…