Just let there be a forest and there is sure to be a forest spirit
(Russian proverb)
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“If trees could scream, would we be so cavalier about cutting them down? We might, if they screamed all the time, for no good reason.”
– Jack HandeyA shot from the back yard today. Our property is surrounded in essentially untended trees. Ive been trying to tend to them. In order to open up the light in the yard, particularly to some of my fruit trees, a few others had to be given the ultimate sacrifice. I dont particularly like cutting down trees, so the few that have begun being felled have done so after some solid thinking.
Shot on the Sony Nex 5N with 16-50mm pancake.
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When I think about the dinosaurs (not that I do that very often) and our current day animals, the giraffe is like the modern day brontosaurus to me. Long necked greens eater, evolved to reach the high trees. Funny looking, but gorgeous creatures that for some reason always look well presented.Today’s shot is my last for now from the Sydney Zoo series I have dropped in this last week. On a related note, one of our local giraffe from Auckland Zoo, Nakuru, has just completed her journey across the ditch to Melbourne Zoo to find a new mate…proving that even giraffes get seasick along the way!
One or two interesting facts – they can close their nostrils, useful to block out ants or in sandstorms.A giraffe only walks or galops and can sustain about 50kph (30mph) for several km. Lifespan is up to around 25 years. Greeks and Romans theorised the giraffe was a hybrid of a camel and leopard – called a camelopardalis!
That will do for giraffe facts for today…
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Pelecanus conspicillatus, the Australian pelican. Shot at the Sydney zoo a few years back on my old Sony A230 DSLR. With a wingspan of ~2.5m, these guys are fairly large birds. Interestingly, you can tell if they are a part of a breeding couple or not by the colour of their bill and circles around eyes. Protected in Australia, they are lucky enough not to be on the endangered list, although some of their native waterland’s have been taken over by our recreational sports.
As above, shot on the Sony Alpha A230 and resized/converted to black & white in Gimp.
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