Seashell Valentine
February 14, 2021 4 Comments
Warm wishes for a Happy Valentine’s Day from Florida!
Nature Photography by Pam & Richard
February 14, 2021 4 Comments
Warm wishes for a Happy Valentine’s Day from Florida!
February 13, 2021 9 Comments
For Christmas Richard got me a BLINK automatic outdoor security camera. Instead of using it for security, we use it to take wireless videos of the birds that visit our feeder. We also put one inside our purple martin nesting gourd. I extracted screenshots from the videos to post here. Love the variety and color of birds right outside our door here in Florida!
February 6, 2021 4 Comments
Malabar Scrub Sanctuary is a protected rare scrub habitat in Brevard County, Florida. It is part of the Space Coast’s Environmentally Endangered Lands program. Visitors come to see rare plants and animals in a beautiful setting. It’s a great place to hike!
January 31, 2021 Leave a comment
We like to grow BIG plants at our home here in Florida. Eight years ago this Pachypodium was only 6 inches tall when we planted it. Now it towers above me! Our agave recently shot up a HUGE flower spike that is over 16 feet tall! Bees love the flowers. Our rare orchid (Laelia moyobambae) has grown a flower spike for over 5 months now, which has peaked at 6 feet tall! It is tied to a frame for stability and raised a bit off the ground for root aeration. The flower head at the top has individual flowers a pretty bronze and purple color. Not much is known about this variety of orchid other than it comes from Peru (http://tropicalplantbook.com/garden_plants/orchids/Laelia/laelia_moyobambae.htm). WOW – we love plants!
January 17, 2021 7 Comments
We especially enjoyed the LEGO art on display at McKee Gardens over the holidays. It was great to see such creative sculptures by talented artist Sean Kenney in “Nature Connects: Art with LEGO Bricks”.
Click on any of the pictures to enlarge and see details about how many LEGO bricks are in the sculpture and how many hours it took to create it. For example, the Polar Bear with Cubs sculpture is the most complex – it is composed of 133,263 LEGO bricks and took 1,048.5 hours to build.
See Sean Kenney’s tour schedule by Imagine Exhibitions at: https://www.seankenney.com/portfolio/nature_connects/ See more of his work at: https://www.seankenney.com/exhibits/
January 12, 2021 5 Comments
Bok’s December Entrance with Holiday Flowers (red impatiens and poinsettias, and white Snow Flake Bush (Euphorbia leucocephala)
Flowers in Bloom Display (Make of it the most beautiful spot on earth where the bird and human can rest and find themselves)
We visited Bok Tower Gardens in Lake Wales, Florida, in December 2020. Lucky for us it is only a day trip from home and it was easy to walk around in isolation. It felt oh-so-good to visit such a beautiful place during the Christmas holidays. https://boktowergardens.org/
November 29, 2020 3 Comments
Entrance Door. The Star of Bethleham window is oriented so the sun streams into the sanctuary during the summer solstice.
Mission Carmel is one of our favorite California missions! Father Junipero Serra founded Mission San Carlos Borromeo de Carmelo in 1770 in Monterey. It was moved to a better location in nearby Carmel on August 24, 1771. The church was dedicated on Christmas Day, 1797.
It is a National Historic Landmark, the second of 21 California missions, and is still an active Catholic parish. It is one of only three missions made of stone (the others are San Juan Capistrano and Santa Barbara).
The mission’s buildings deteriorated over time and were also damaged by earthquakes. It has undergone extensive renovation and restoration. The Carmel Mission has been visited by people from around the world and is a jewel on the central California coast. Planning is now underway for the 250th anniversary celebration in Fall 2021! Read more at: https://missiontour.org/wp/carmel/mission-carmel-basilica.html
If you visit the Carmel Mission, pair it with a stunning coastal walk at Point Lobos State Natural Reserve – only a short distance away: https://www.pointlobos.org/
November 15, 2020 5 Comments
A full SpaceX crew launched tonight at 7:27 pm EDT here in Florida. Four astronauts are on their way to the International Space Station! WOW – what a spectacular view and achievement!!! Such a beautiful warm evening – the rocket lit up the whole sky. This was the view from our backyard pond in Palm Bay, Florida. Watch full coverage of the Crew-1 mission on NASA TV at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=21X5lGlDOfg&feature=emb_logo OR on SpaceX at https://www.spacex.com/
November 14, 2020 Leave a comment
Gorgeous Atlas rocket launch by United Launch Alliance at dusk last night! The last rays of sunset lit up the rocket’s exhaust trail in the sky. The satellite was delivered safely into orbit. Next up is the SpaceX full crew flight to the International Space Station!
November 1, 2020 4 Comments
Rain showers made our yard lush and green and the flowers happy. Here is a little tour of what we see every day.
August 15, 2020 2 Comments
We visited the Monterey Bay Aquarium at the end of February. It is always a delight – one of the best aquariums we’ve ever seen! It is extra special because of its beautiful location on the central California coast. Although temporarily closed now because of the pandemic, you can visit virtually through these live cams: https://www.montereybayaquarium.org/animals/live-cams.
Some of the birds at the aquarium are quite old (https://www.montereybayaquarium.org/stories/the-aviarys-amazing-senior-citizens). Each one was found injured and unable to be released back into the wild. They have been happily living their lives in the aviary ever since. I read that birdwatching and nature is good for the soul and health – agreed! https://www.healthfitnessrevolution.com/top-10-health-benefits-of-bird-watching/
July 1, 2020 4 Comments
It seems like ages ago, but in February we enjoyed a trip to Filoli Gardens in Woodside, California (south of San Francisco). It is one of the most beautiful gardens in the United States! It is well worth a visit. More info is at: https://filoli.org/
June 14, 2020 18 Comments
On Saturday morning in the predawn hour of 5:21 am SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station here on Florida’s east coast. The sight was spectacular – WOW!!! The rocket trail was illuminated by sunlight from below the horizon. The glow in the bottom picture is from the booster return landing on the drone ship “Of Course I Still Love You” offshore, which at that point was 350 miles away! Fifty-eight Starlink satellites and 3 Planet SkySats were sent into orbit. Read about it at: https://www.space.com/spacex-starlink-8-planet-satellite-launch-rocket-landing-success.html and https://www.space.com/spacex-starlink-8-launch-amazing-twitter-photos.html
June 6, 2020 4 Comments
It’s that time of year here in Florida – our Queen-of-the-Night cactus is blooming every evening! This unassuming snake vine cactus (Selenicereus pteranthus), which is unremarkable for most of the year, steals the show in early summer. It is easily propagated because there are rootlets all along the plant. Each bloom opens and lasts only one night. The flowers are the size of dinner plates – wow!
May 30, 2020 7 Comments
Pfeiffer Beach is a real gem tucked away at the end of Sycamore Canyon Road at Big Sur, California (south of Monterey). This spectacular beach is famous for its pink sand, formed by manganese garnet crystals that have washed down from the cliffs above. Look for ever-changing patterns of increasing pink sand as you walk north along the beach. A bonus to your walk is the rocky sea arch offshore – watch for the waves to come roaring through its keyhole arch. Don’t miss this hidden secret! Learn more at: https://www.hikespeak.com/trails/pfeiffer-beach-big-sur/
A previous post about Pfeiffer Beach is at: https://naturetime.wordpress.com/2012/08/17/big-sur-stunning-pink-sand-beach/
May 25, 2020 Leave a comment
We are so excited to have a pair of great crested flycatchers nesting in our yard! For identification, look for the bird’s pretty lemon-yellow belly. The picture inside the nest box was taken with our tiny Insta360 ONE camera. We could see 3 babies in the nest at the bottom (middle). Surrounding the babies are the flycatcher’s unique nesting materials – lots of feathers and even a bit of black and white fur (upper right). Flycatchers are well known for weaving snakeskins into their nest, and this one has one too – how exciting! The nest also has two round white empty mud dauber pots (top). I wish we had gotten a picture of the eggs – they are creamy brown with purple squiggles on them. Maybe next year! A previous post about flycatchers is at: https://naturetime.wordpress.com/2017/06/17/great-crested-flycatchers-are-nesting/
May 11, 2020 16 Comments
Paired with my other post about Florida’s egrets and other white birds in spring, this post is about herons and dark feathered birds during nesting season. These colorful birds and their babies make me smile!
May 2, 2020 21 Comments
We love our Florida birds, especially in spring. This post shows egrets and other white birds during nesting season, when feathers are plumed and colors are bright. If you are lucky, you will see great egrets, snowy egrets, and cattle egrets together in one big breeding colony – it is quite a sight! Sometimes wood storks and white ibis nest there too!
April 28, 2020 8 Comments
We have so many purple martin babies! Did a backyard count here in Florida and the grand total for our nesting colony is 201 purple martins (107 babies, 22 eggs, and 72 adults). Ages range from eggs to newborn pinkies to older babies with pinfeathers. Love this time of year! Learn more from the Purple Martin Conservation Association at: https://www.purplemartin.org/
UPDATE May 16, 2020: Lots of babies fledging this week! Constant activity at the nesting gourds – great time of year!
April 10, 2020 Leave a comment
Golden Gate Bridge and Surfer as seen from Fort Point National Historic Site (also location of famous scene in Alfred Hitchcock’s Movie Vertigo)
In February this year we made a return visit to San Francisco, California. We left just before the Pandemic and lockdown occurred. We look forward to the day when life returns to normal. Meanwhile we’ll enjoy thinking about the good times we had and more to come (note all pictures can be clicked to enlarge).
The iconic Golden Gate Bridge first opened on May 27, 1937. This suspension bridge is an engineering marvel that is 1.7 miles long and contains 80,000 miles of steel wire – enough to circle the Earth three times! Painting the bridge is a never-ending job. Read a fascinating story about it at: https://www.citylab.com/life/2015/04/the-fascinating-neverending-job-of-painting-the-golden-gate-bridge/390453/
The U.S. Navy originally wanted to paint the bridge black with yellow stripes. Others wanted to paint it aluminum grey to evoke the beauty of a dirigible airship. Architect Irving Morrow decided to keep the bridge the same color (International Orange) as the original red primer on the steel. He thought it blended well with the nearby hills, ocean, and sky throughout the seasons.
San Francisco is famous for its fog. It forms most often in summer when warm air flows over the cool Pacific Ocean. Some visitors never see the bridge because of the dense fog! Poets have described the fog as “moving art”. Our time-lapse video of fog streaming past the Golden Gate Bridge can be viewed at: https://naturetime.wordpress.com/2012/05/27/our-best-video-of-the-golden-gate-bridge-and-fog-time-lapse-10x-speed/
San Francisco is consistently voted one of the top ten cities in the world by travelers. The “City by the Bay” has inspired the following quotes:
Billy Graham: “The Bay Area is so beautiful that I hesitate to preach about Heaven while I am here.”
Walter Cronkite: “Leaving San Francisco is like saying goodbye to an old sweetheart. You want to linger as long as possible.”
Julia Child: “It is simply a very romantic place…you couldn’t be anywhere else.”
Larry King: “The ultimate for me would be one perfect day in San Francisco. There’s no city like it anywhere.”
Rudyard Kipling: “San Francisco has only one drawback…it is hard to leave.”
Frank Sinatra: “I left my heart in San Francisco.”
And on a funny note, a famous quote attributed to Mark Twain is: “The coldest winter I ever spent was summer in San Francisco.”
You can read about the history and features of the Golden Gate Bridge at: https://www.goldengate.org/bridge/history-research/
Huell Howser of California’s Gold has a must-see video about the Golden Gate Bridge and the men who work there – an absolute classic and one of my favorites: https://blogs.chapman.edu/huell-howser-archives/1993/12/10/golden-gate-bridge-californias-gold-407/
April 6, 2020 18 Comments
We love the variety of wildlife in our backyard here in Florida. So much fun!
February 18, 2020 5 Comments
Orchids have been around since the age of the dinosaurs. Many people do not realize that some orchids have fragrance. The scent is used to attract pollinators, such as bees or moths, and varies by when those insects are most active. One of my favorites is the chocolate orchid – mmmm! Other fragrances in our orchid collection include lemon, cinnamon, spicy, fruity, and delicate floral tones.
February 16, 2020 7 Comments
Did you know that vanilla flavor comes from an orchid? Each bean pod of Vanilla planifolia contains thousands of tiny black seeds – these are the black specs in vanilla bean ice cream! Pure vanilla extract in your spice cabinet comes from vanilla beans mixed with water and alcohol. In nature, Vanilla planifolia flowers can only be pollinated by hummingbirds and special bees. For commercial production, the orchids must be pollinated by hand. Orchids get more interesting all the time! Now who is hungry? Read more at: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/vanilla-comes-from_n_5021060
February 7, 2020 10 Comments
Blue Iceberg at Fjallsarlon Ice Lagoon
The glaciers and ice on the south coast of Iceland are stunning! Some of the icebergs are an incredible blue. This area is one of our absolute favorites of anywhere we have ever been! When we flew home, we got super lucky and had a spectacular view of Greenland on the return flight. Gorgeous! We will definitely return – nature photography is the best in Iceland! Our updated Iceland slideshow / travel guide full of pictures, tips, and a custom google map is located at this link (click once, and then click again; wait a minute for it to load and open): ICELANDIC SLIDESHOW 2020
February 2, 2020 2 Comments
When we visit Iceland, we always spend a few days visiting the Reykjavik area before heading out to the countryside. We always see something new! This time downtown we enjoyed a spectacular view from the top of Hallgrimskirkja Church Tower and then went on a walking tour of Harpa Concert Hall. Near Keflavik International Airport we highly recommend seeing the Icelandic Museum of Rock and Roll (Rokksafn) – the wall of guitars includes those by John Lennon and Wolfman Jack. Viking World nearby features the full size Viking ship Islendingur – an exact 9th century replica that was sailed from Iceland to New York City in the year 2000 to celebrate Leif Erikson’s journey to North America 1,000 years earlier. An unexpected delight was to see the unique people-shaped street lamps in the same area.
December 24, 2019 14 Comments
Warm wishes from the beach here in Florida for a wonderful holiday and happy new year!
November 29, 2019 Leave a comment
Mount Stapafell (Home of Elves). Rocky Point on Top is called Fellskross – a Viking Sign of Holy Powers
Iceland’s Snaefellsnes Peninsula is an enchanting place. We find more places to go every time we visit. The birds – the sky – the coast – and the ever-present Snaefellsjokull volcano make for a magical place.
In the Sjominjasafn Maritime Museum we saw a display with a beautiful quote by Halldor Laxness, World Light:
“Where the glacier meets the sky, the land ceases to be earthly, and the earth becomes one with the heavens; no sorrows live there anymore, and therefore joy is not necessary; beauty alone reigns there, beyond all demands”.
November 10, 2019 13 Comments
The churches in Iceland are incredibly scenic and beautiful. They often sit on a hill overlooking the ocean. You can feel the history of the place as you stand in some of these remote locations. “Kirkja” means church in Icelandic. An excellent article about Icelandic churches is at: https://guidetoiceland.is/best-of-iceland/churches-in-iceland Previous blog posts about Icelandic churches are at: https://naturetime.wordpress.com/?s=iceland+church
November 2, 2019 Leave a comment
In June we visited Iceland again (our third trip) – the photography opportunities are that good! The weather was great, and the sights were amazing! Some of our favorite photos are included with this post (click to enlarge).
August 9, 2019 16 Comments
We watched a stunning rocket launch yesterday at dawn here on the Space Coast of Florida! An Atlas V rocket blasted off at 6:13 am and successfully placed a communications satellite into orbit. Sunlight from below the horizon lit up the rocket’s exhaust plume and ice particles formed from it at high altitudes. The resulting effect was spectacular space art in the sky – WOW!