Creatures of Habit

I’m a creature of habit. Mostly good, sometimes obsessive, always predictable. This is especially true concerning my photography. When at home, my attention is on bird photography. This is due to the wide variety of species that live in or pass through the area. That variety gives me a large number of subjects to focus on, no pun intended. When traveling, my attention turns to other wildlife not native to Iowa and landscapes that are not comprised of corn fields.

The local birds that I photograph are creatures of habit too. Those habits vary by season but usually are very predictable. They are usually determined by sunrise, sunset, weather, and the location of available food sources. Figure out the combination of those and you can pretty accurately predict where you will find a specific species of bird. I wasn’t able to figure out that combination this week, largely due to multiple heavy rain storms that cycled through the state.

I wasn’t able to locate the Great Blue Herons that I intended to photograph today but did catch a glimpse of them flying overhead as I walked back to my truck. That said, I did find a number of different dragonflies this morning. If you think that birds in flight are difficult to shoot, take a try at photographing a dragonfly in flight. It ranks right up with trying to photograph barn swallows in flight. A good picture may be as much a result of luck as skill to accomplish that. Today I was neither lucky or skillful enough and ended up with the picture of this dragonfly that was perched on a twig.

Hopefully the water levels will recede this week and put the wildlife back into the more predicable habits I’ve grown accustomed too. If not, I’ll find another new subject.

Thanks for visiting, hope you enjoyed. – John