Wild Kingdom

This post is all about animals doing their normal daily activities. My camera captures them in their natural habitat,... perhaps they're searching for food, or perhaps just whiling away the afternoon.

This painted turtle is soaking up the sun resting on a log. Must be time for afternoon sunbathing.

Show Off

The turtle is looking directly at me where I stand on the shore. Still, it seems largely unconcerned about my presence. I'm about 20 feet away and there's water between us. Smart turtle.

The Look

All turtles come aboard! This appears to be the log to sunbathe on. It would seem that turtles are social animals. Maybe some of them are siblings?

Party Time

I was amused by the stance of this robin. Sort of looks like she's looking around something to see what new danger lurks.

Robin on Patrol

Does this duck have any idea what beautiful golden water he's gliding through?

Water Glide

Baltimore Orioles are not commonly seen in our yard, so I was delighted to see this one gracing our hawthorn tree, even for a quick visit.

Oriole Peek

Red-winged blackbirds love to stand on tall skinny objects like these cattails on Farm Pond.

Balancing Act

This one found a different perch to survey the situation on the pond.

Deciding the Next Move

All photos © 2019, all rights reserved.  Contact philslens@gmail.com for licensing or to order prints.

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Audubon Residents

The Broadmoor Wildlife Sanctuary in Natick, MA is a MA Audubon Society location with many pleasant nature trails and local wildlife. I recently visited this excellent site with my camera and even my tripod(!) I almost never photograph with a tripod; virtually all pictures on this blog are handheld; the OM-D E-M5 MkII's built-in 5-stop equivalent image stabilization works spectacularly well. However, there's no question that using a long lens - all the shots below are with my 75-300mm lens - can often lead to better results with a tripod.  At 600mm equivalent focal length, camera shake is a fact of life. Many photographers wouldn't consider shooting at 600mm without a tripod.




This was one of my first views of this fine swan family.  For those with a thirst for knowledge, according to the site Animal Babies baby swans are called cygnets or flappers.

Family Outing

You will notice there is a lot of algae.   So much, in fact, that in some of the photos the water surface itself is barely visible.  It appears that adult swans, and young swans, love to eat this stuff.  You can see it on their beaks in virtually every photo.

Up Close and Personal

This heavily cropped ISO 1600 photo of a handsome turtle was taken from about 30 feet away.  I love how his (or her) eyes have the same yellow striped coloring as his/her entire head.  And the claws/feet have red, not yellow stripes.

Never Goes To the Nail Salon

Getting Warmth from One Another on Their Water Bed 

Giving Me the Eye

Giving Me Some Neck and Eye

Not all the water was filled with algae.

Water Painting

Young Swan 1

Young Swan 2

Caring Mom and Her Side-by-side Swan Children

All photos © 2015, all rights reserved.  Contact me for licensing or to order prints.

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Seven Different Animals

Noah's Ark this is not, but over time I do manage to take pictures of various animals. Amusingly, I'd picked this set of animal photos to share in this post, and only after making the selection did I realize that these happen to be seven different animals. Only one of them is a bird. I don't think you'll have any problem picking out which animal is a bird.

The first two photos were taken with my Panasonic ZS40 travel zoom.  Both of these were taken with a 35mm equivalent focal length of 720mm.  That's a lot of zoom!

Notice the Striped Colors All the Way Along This Snake's Skin

Turtles Always Seem to Be Basking in the Sun

The rest of these were taken with my Olympus gear.

Believe it or not, I took this picture through a glass window at a not-so-great angle.  I admit I removed a few glass reflections after the fact.  This critter was looking in on us at a local tech college where I was taking, of all things, a photography class.  The instructor took some shots of this visitor as well.

Checking Out the Classroom Offerings

Vertical Climbing Oficianado

The picture of this little fellow was taken from 45 feet away with my 60mm lens, and heavily cropped.

Crossing Front Paws

Can you count the well-camouflaged children in this photo?  Taken at 1/60 sec. at ISO 1600, also with my 60mm lens; about 50 ft. away:

Gobblers During a Family Stroll

Shirley Temple Hair?

All photos © 2015, all rights reserved.  Contact me for licensing or to order prints.

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