Gleanings of the Week Ending April 22, 2017

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Beautiful Easter Eggs Hand-painted with Colorful Folk Art Illustrations – Yes – it’s past Easter…but I was a little late seeing this post. Art on an egg shape!

Top 25 Wild Bird Photographs of the Week #83 and Top 25 Wild Bird Photographs of the Week #84 – So many gorgeous bird pictures! My favorite in the first section is the male Ruddy Duck; the blue bill is always a surprise! My favorite in the second set is the female Great Horned Owl…sun through the wing and tail feathers.

Maps Show a Dramatic Rise in Health Insurance Coverage Under ACA – I was interested in seeing the trend…and wondered if the decline in uninsured people will correlate to better health outcomes.

Many US Freshwater Lakes could surpass ‘safe’ chloride levels within 50 years – Not good. Road salt is evidently a significant contributor.

Is the world running out of fresh water? – The world’s major aquifers are being drained. Mexico City – built on ancient lake beds, is now sinking in some areas at a rate of 9 inches per year! Global water demand is projected to increase by 55% between 2000 and 2050. So the answer to the question is ‘yes’ --- unless we change the way we currently use water.

Vitamin B diminishes effects of air pollution induced cardio-vascular disease – Interesting study…not actionable yet…but I hope they continue the research.

A Vegan Protein Sources Chart – A good comparison of different kinds of vegetable proteins.

Maryland Food System Map: Version 2.0 has arrived – Read about how the map has been improved…then take a look at the interactive map here. I wondered if other states were doing similar type maps.

Tunable electric eyeglasses bend to the will of the wearer – I hope this technology matures into something looks better. I would much prefer these to the types of static glasses available today.

7 cool facts about Water Striders – I frequently see water striders when I’m hiking with elementary students on field trips. This article has some great pictures…and more that I had known about them previously.

National Aviary – Pittsburgh

We got to the National Aviary in Pittsburgh just after it opened at 10 AM....early enough to find parking very easily in the aviary’s parking lot. It was a good outing on a cold day just as the Phipps Conservatory had been the day before. A few of the exhibits are birds in large cages or enclosures but most the birds are in open areas and sometimes they will walk right up to where you are standing on the walk. It makes taking pictures a lot easier.  I developed a strategy for causing my camera to autofocus on the bird rather than the wire mesh or smudged glass (pick birds further from the wire mesh, point the camera at something else that was about the distance to the bird…then go back to the bird). The snowy owl in the slide show below was photographed using that technique. All the birds were inside except for the snowy owl, bald eagle, and Andean Condor (near the end of the slide show).

Something l learned that surprised me was about penguin’s beaks. They get furrows in them starting at the part closest to the head and extending further toward the tip as they older. This is an old penguin!

Centennial Park – January 2017

Late last week there was a sunny day…and I accompanied my husband to Centennial Park. He walked all the way around…I was busy taking pictures! The first subject was a red tailed hawk high in a tulip poplar tree. The angle wasn’t great – but the reddish tail feathers were a little visible in one of the pictures and the fluffing of the breast feathers was a good clue to how cold the day was.

There were Canadian Geese of course. They are always at Centennial. I experimented with different angles…reflections, near silhouettes, the awkwardness of the bird on land.

There were two types of diving ducks. Both are winter birds in Maryland. They are a challenge to photograph because the go completely under the water then pop back to the top for few seconds. The Buffleheads were on the other side of the lake from where I was…but the white on their heads make them easy to identify even in a blurred picture. The one on the left is a male; the right is a female….not enough of a side view to tell the one in the middle.

The other diving ducks on the lake were female ruddy ducks. Their tails are a stiff fan. I didn’t see any flipped upward but these ducks were actively feeding…only staying on top of the water for short periods of time.

I decided it was a little chilly to stay out longer so headed back to the car. Along the way, I tried a ‘looking up’ shot of small cones. I like the sharpness of the lines within the cones – light and shadow.

There is always something to photograph at Centennial Park!