Figure 1 shows an African redhead agamas (Agama agama) that I photographed at the Viscaya in Miami, Florida. Also called the “rainbow lizard,” it is another beautiful but invasive species in Southern Florida. Originally from subsaharan Africa, it is spreading like wildfire in Florida’s hospitable environment,
Canon T2i with EF 100-400 mm F/4.5-5.6 L IS USM lens at 275 mm, ISO 800 Aperture Priority AE mode 1/200th sec at f/7.1 with no exposure compensation.
I thought that I would take a break today from photographs from my Florida trip and post the image of Figure 1, which I took on one of the Skygems Observatories robotic or remote telescopes. This was taken on a twenty inch telescope in Namibia. It is 31.1 million light years away and has a a diameter of approximately 49,000 light-years.
M104 resembles a Mexican sombrero and for that reason as well as its head on orientation is truly one of the most dramatic and appealing of the Messier objects! In the 1990s, a research group led by John Kormendy demonstrated that the Sombrero Galaxy contains a supermassive black hole, with a mass of ~ a billion times that of the sun.
Unfortunately and for many reasons, it seems that there are uneasy times. Maybe it is always that way. Dicken’s told us that:
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.”
Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities
Always is and always will be!
With Figure 1 today I want to return to those beautiful tropical gardens in Southern Florida. This one was taken in Key Biscayne itself, another “artificial” display. Real rainforests can be more troublesome. There are snakes, jaguars, maybe even tigers. And, of course, lots of bugs! But there is something off-putting here. There is the matter of the cement wall in the background and the garden hose, lower left. Still to the extent that this is a living “painting” of what the gardener wanted there to be, we can still delight in the beauty and the desire for the primordial.
I know that for those of us in northern climes complaining about the heat at this time of year, when we are dead sick of winter, seems excessive. Nevertheless I discovered in Florida that mornings and evenings are the best times to be active and outdoors. Noon until about five in the afternoon is a good time for a siesta. So…
As we were looking birds at the Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden and it was nearing noon, TC and I came upon this pair of very sleepy white ibises (Eudocimus albus) sitting in a tree. They could barely keep their eyes open to watch me warily. I was reminded immediately of John Tenniel’s “The Dodo” from Lewis Carol’s Alice in Wonderland. Perhaps it is that they seemed to have smiles on there faces. In fact, like Alice I felt just a bit bratty in the heat. I wondered what would happen if I started, like Alice, talking to these birds. “The best way to explain it is to do it.”
For me this pair is truly memorable of my trip. And if you look closely you will notice what I noticed only after I “worked up” the photographs. Ibises have beautiful blue eyes. How delightful.
Canon T2i with 100-440 f/4.5-5.6 L IS USM Lens at 300 mm, ISO 400, Aperture Priority AE Mode, 1/400th sec at f?7.1 with no exposure compensation.
The name Egyptian goose (Alopochen aegyptiaca) clearly invokes images of The Nile, perhaps neatly fitted into a poem about crocodiles. As Figure 1 indicates they are striking in appearance. This image was taken at the Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden, and clearly is another of the invasive species that I encountered in Coral Gables, FL. We came across it on the lawn by a pond along with its mate and a very impressive brood of goslings. My traveling companion (TC) captured an impressive encounter with a snapping turtle. The turtle was lumbering down the hill towards the water, and this goose started squawking. I was impressed by just how fast the snapper could move. Said goose finished the not so friendly meeting with a poke and bite behind the snapper’s neck as it finally made it to the water.
For my photograph, I decided that the best was this close-up of his head and distinctive plumage.
Canon T2i with 100-400 mm f/4.5-5.6 L IS USN lens at 275 mm, Aperture Priority AE mode, 1/4000th sec at F/6.3 with no exposure compensation.
Figure 1 is an image that I took at the Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden in Coral Gables, FL of a green iguana (Iguana iguana). It is a very Jurassic Park kind of image. The green iguana is one of three iguana species in southern Florida, the other two being the black spiny-tailed iguana and the Mexican spiny-tailed iguana, All three are invasive species, yet perfectly well adapted to the environment.
We were waiting for an Uber and watched in dismay as one iggy kept trying to cross the road, but each time was thwarted by a car. Finally my traveling companion got up and stopped traffic so that Mr. Iggs could make its way across. That’s the kind person that she is. We need to live in harmony with nature and the natural world.
Great fun every spring is chasing the warblers, who are very adept at hiding from me and hiding in the bushes from photographs. During my trip to Key Biscayne I was lucky enough to catch the Northern Parula (Setophaga americana) (I think) in a seagrape tree (Coccoloba uvifera) .
I was very pleased with the overall greenish tint to this photograph and, of course the bokeh in the background. For the New Englander Florida is a paradise of new plant and bird species. You do have to be careful about venturing too close to the water’s edge!
As we walked into the woods at the Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden, we heard a commotion. It was an early spring territorial battle between a pair of red-bellied woodpeckers (Picus ventre rubro) and a pair of northern cardinals (Cardinalis cardinalis). Figure 1 shows the female, holding her ground in a warm morning light. In my experience red-bellies are skitterish. They never stay long and, if what you want is a photograph without a feeder, “a natural photograph,” hard to capture. I was delighted by the delicate dried fiddle head ferns on the tree limb to the right.
Canon T2i with EF 100-400, F/4.5-5.6 L IS USM lens at 220 mm, ISO 400, Aperture Priority AE Mode 1/100th sec at f/6.3 with no exposure compensation.
Real or contrived it is time to enter the rainforest.
“Things will come out right now.
We can make it so.
Someone is on your side,
No one is alone.”
Eric Sondheim “Into the Woods”
So I will begin today with another photograph take at the Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden in Coral Gables, Florida. I am pretty sure that it is Medinilla Magnifica. At least that is what the AI program Plant Net tells me. If I am wrong please let me know. This was so perfectly laid out that I couldn’t resist it. The flower looks to me like like a miniature fruit cup.