Trip to Smokey Mountains

Winter trip to Smokey Mountains. Myself, Jennifer (Pregnant), Izabelle, and Sam.

Sam is a Jedi

At some point in the past year or so, I picked up a couple light sabres and this is Sam. He has the sun tan on the feet typical of a Jedi who wears sandals all summer long.

He is on the dark side of the force, Izabelle is on the other side. Pajama light sabre fight on a Saturday morning.

Bushnell Trophy cam

Today, I purchased a Bushnell Trophy cam.
It is a model 8.0 IR Trophy cam XLT Bone Collector.

I set it up to catch the evening birds at the feeder. It was not a good direction as this is staring into the sunset. But the feeder is in a good location to view from the house, so I need to place the camera on a pole with the sun behind it.

These images are cropped very close show grain and had to be lightened. But I think with the proper camera  position, They should be less grainy and sharper and brighter.

Birding

Birding......

This is basically amateur study of birds. It involves the use of books, field guides, curiosity, and birds. I have always been somewhat of an optics person. So, binoculars, telescopes, and spotting scopes were already in my arsenal. What got me interested in birding.
That's ironic. It all started when some birds were pecking on my house. I had a several year battle with these birds, and was never successful at ridding my house of them. I mistakenly thought that they were woodpeckers. However, my investigation into the true identity of the birds lead me to truth that these were White breasted nuthatches. Not true woodpeckers.
Nuthatches and chickadees are known to excavate in a similar fashion to woodpeckers, but only in much softer wood, or in my case, in the cheap Masonite siding on the house. True woodpeckers, Picidae, have the ability to excavate into much harder live wood.

Back to the pecking on the house. Sick of patching holes and fixing trim, I hung some rubber snakes up. that has worked for a couple years, but the nuthatches are back. ??????????????

A juvenile Red Headed Woodpecker, melanerpes erythrocephalus, he still has some speckles on his back and his head is slightly brown.

7 Pointer Missed shot 11-9-2012

I spent a long weekend in early November hunting on a private tree farm in central GA. I am a licensed hunter in GA. On the first day, I missed a shot on this nice 7 pointer. He has 4 points on one side so he is legal in GA. I am an excellent marksman, but that doesn't make a good hunter. It was only after my shot that I realized how amped I was. My heart rate was well over 150, and I shot way low, I'd rather miss entirely than have a bad placement.

These images were captured on a game camera the following weeks after the hunt. The identity and location of the private farm will remain undisclosed. He is a good friend of mine, and this kind of stuff is a well kept secret.

Red Bellied WoodPecker

Melanerpes Carolinus,

The Red Bellied Woodpecker, I think this one is a male.
Olympus E-410 with Tamron 250mm manual film lens.
I only had seconds to run down and grab the camera to catch him having flit from my feeder tree to my neighbor's.

The photo is really grainy and not the best, but it serves to show the proof of evidence.

Kids Underwater

This is a Photo from the Last Day of Vacation.