Out Of Bounds - one of my favourite photo manipulations to play with in PhotoShop … it can be a lot of fun and turn an average pic into something quite special. You see this technique a lot in product marketing, sometimes you just don’t recognize it. I like to use it on calendars and greeting cards, and sometimes it makes a neat portrait.

These budgies were fun. The original photo was taken at a local pet store.

A junky old truck turned into a piece of art …

This is the first OOB I made …

Fun stuff, eh???

Hope you enjoy them!

Got me a new printer yesterday … and it is not doing a very good job of printing my photos.

This is a test to see if it will print this image (our test image) from the web …

I went to the Black Mountain Rodeo on the June 14th weekend and what a blast! Can’t remember when I enjoyed a rodeo more (the burgers were wonderful, too!). Managed to snap off 942 pics - yikes! - most of them keepers, too! It was a super day of shooting - but man oh man, did I come home caked in dirt!

The Opening Ceremonies were really great! The Cariboo Cowgirls, a women’s mounted drill team from Williams Lake, BC, were the entertainment and were every bit as good and as entertaining as the RCMP Musical Ride. Kudos to these ladies who travel miles just to get to their twice-weekly practice sessions, then spend the rodeo season traveling and entertaining. And entertain they do! They are a real crowd-pleaser for sure.

They have much more ambition than I’ll ever have! I can’t even ride a horse …

Hope you enjoy these girls and their “dancing” horses - at full gallop!

Yeehaw!!!! Rodeo is coming back to Black Mountain!! Man, I do love my rodeo!

I can only go Saturday to take pics, so am hoping I can find a schedule somewhere.

In the meantime, I have been shooting weeds and wild flowers along my route to work and back ( I go different routes coming and going) and I am still blinding the birds at my feeders with my flash.

June is wildflower month and there’s been so much rain lately that there are lots and lots of weeds blooming.

Here’s some of them …

Wild Asparagus - when it gets to this stage, you know you’ve missed the edible shoots (damn)

Common Bugloss

Common Bugloss - up close

Hoary Alyssum

Western Goat’s Beard

One of my iris bloomed today …

And this is one of the Clematis plants I bought yesterday - it was already blooming at the store …

Hope they add some happiness to your day.

Too cool, eh??? Not the clearest of shots - but I was shooting through my windshield AGAIN. As soon as I moved to get past that he flew away - and didn’t come back again last night. I waited about an hour for him, then finally gave up and came inside where it was warm

Hope you enjoy him - thanks for looking!

Busy night at my hummer feeder tonight … I think this one is a female Rufous … the white tips on her tail say it is female - their size is so tiny, but they are real scrappers at the feeders!

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Oh, how thrilling this was!!! I was sitting at my kitchen table watching my feeders this morning and I saw a streak of blue. Jumped up for the camera (wrong lens) and dashed back but it had disappeared. I spent most of the day waiting for it to come back. From the fast glimpse I had gotten of it, I figured it was a Western Bluebird.

At suppertime tonight it came back and I managed to grab 3 quick shots before it took off. They are not wonderful and badly out of focus, but I realized this was not a Western Bluebird because of the black and white on its wings. So off to Peterson’s Western Birds Book I went - its a Lazuli Bunting - related to the finches. I had never heard of one before so this was soooo cool!!!

Here’s my very poor shots … Hope you think he’s as pretty as I do.

This spring, I bought a new pole to hang my bird feeders from - it has multiple options for hanging things. I had originally planned to hang a couple of flowering baskets with hummer-attracting flowers, but the weather was still too nippy for them, so hung my seed feeders instead. I have become very popular in my neighbourhood.

All the little birds feed at the feeders, but some of them are rather messy and chuck the food out onto the deck. I have not minded, because now I have the larger birds coming as well, who pick at the tossed seed. The other day I was sitting here at the puter (I can see the feeders from here) and there was a flurry of big wings and large tails right outside the window so I jumped up and grabbed the camera.

Here’s who came calling ….

These are Mourning Doves. They have a very distinctive call and I hear them quite often in the orchard. You can hear their song here: http://www.naturesongs.com/falcstri.html#modo

Hope you enjoy this - thanks for looking!

Here’s another couple - taken at the Chichester Wetlands last Saturday. These ones clearly show the yellow rump

I spent a glorious few hours yesterday down at the Chichester Wetlands. The wetlands snake around several housing subdivisions with two access points. I started at the first one closest to my home, filled the first 1 gig card, went and got lunch from Dairy Queen, then took it back to the second access point, ate my lunch listening to all the birds singing, then filled a second 1 gig card.

It was fabulous! Very few people around, too.

The Red-winged Blackbirds were out in full force - lots and lots of them!!!

Here’s some of the best:

More birds at my feeder - this is a new one this year. I had seen them around town, but not at my feeders up here on the hill, so was really pleased to have attracted them.

These little birds were skipping around in a tree next to where I park at work. Had no idea what they were but I took pictures anyway.

Looking in my Petersen’s Western Birds book, it appears they may be the Western form of the Yellow-Rumped Warbler. If you think they might be something else, please let me know.

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Pretty things, aren’t they?

Thanks for looking

… and I have the day off work, too! The sun is shining and it looks like it is going to be a gorgeous day.

There’s a photo competition I want to shoot for, but my idea is a tad bizarre so it will take a bit of setting up. The deadline is tomorrow so I’ll need to get my act together if I am going to do it today. I am such a great procrastinator!

Stay posted - I may just get this done

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Several hours later … I got sidetracked … still no entry for the competition BUT …

The birds were singing out there in the sunshine …

and then my camera saw this cool image …

I’m still planning to shoot for the Comp

I’ve been hearing this critter rat-tat-tatting for several days now but couldn’t see where he was. Today I was outside without my camera and I could hear him “knocking” quite close to where I was, so I went into stealth mode and found him. Dashed back inside for the camera (luckily the 70-300mm was on it already) and hoped he would still be there when I got back out again.

I crept around the side of the building and he was still at it, so managed to fire off four shots before he realized “candid camera” was stalking him. He didn’t stick around. Three of my shots were complete duds, but this one was sorta salvageable.

He’s a Northern Flicker - part of the woodpecker family.

Am not too sure if this flower is supposed to look like this or if it has some development “issues” but I thought it was kinda cool and different.

Getting in tight with a happy flower.

Daffodils remind me of my Dad (I called him “Pa”). He was a career Air Force guy and we were posted to France for 4 years when I was 8 years old. On our holidays and weekends we would load up the travel trailer and go somewhere. My favourite place to go was to Holland.

One time when we were there it was daffodil time and there was a roadside stand selling thick, long, heavy “ropes” of braided daffodils. They were about 5-6 feet long and about 8-10 inches thick and weighed a TON! My dad arranged with the seller to take a picture of these ropes and draped one over us three kids like a giant yellow boa. That pic is long gone - lost in a fire (as were all my childhood pics), but the memory remains as strong as if it was yesterday.