I wanted to title this post, “Oh (Shit!) For Two,” but I thought that putting the word shit in the title might cause my sage/goofball words to go unread. Instead, I decided to put the word shit in the first paragraph, two, er, three times— my bad.
No use talking about the first 2 miles of the hike, ’cause most of it was just me stumbling through the woods whilst the stars still shone.
Fast forward to mile 3.75. I was just past the campground and doing my normal scanning of the trees for birds of prey. I had just about given up when I heard the call of an Osprey nearby. I excitedly got my camera in hand, while continuing to scan the dead trees on the opposite side of the river. A split second later, I heard a noise, and the G.D.M.F.1 Osprey took off from a dead tree limb mere yards in front of me.
And YES, it took off from the same G.D.M.F.2 tree that a hawk was perched upon in early September!!!
That’s two days in a row of missing an Osprey shot. You can’t get this bad at wildlife photography overnight; you have to work at it.
File photo, ’cause it looks the same; void of bird.
I sighed, let out some expletives, and then moved on, hoping that the next few miles would give me something to add to my SD card.
Less than a half a mile later, I saw the G.D.M.F.3 Osprey again! This time, I saw it fly over the river and perch somewhere further down on my side of the river.
There was a slight bend in the river, so I gingerly walked down a steep, sandy riverbank about 50 yards up from the river.
Once my footing was secure, I started scanning the trees, hoping to find my Osprey. All of a sudden, out of the corner of my eye, I saw it diving toward the river, and without thinking, I just started spraying and praying.
This is G.D.M.F.B.S!!!
As you can see, I got a memory, but not a shot. G.D.M.F!!!!!!!!4
It was still too dark, so my shutter was too low, the ISO was too high, and I was still too far away (this is a very extreme crop). Some days/weeks, critter photography is just like that. *another heavy sigh*
On the bright side, it was freaking awesome to see the Osprey diving towards its prey, and hearing the big splash as it attempted, and seemingly failed, to steal a fish for breakfast. It’s probably been 45 years or more since I saw a bird do that, the last being while fishing with my Dad back when he had his yellow VW Super Beetle, so probably early 80s.
I love that while I might not always get a shot, my lumbers with my camera continue to offer me a look into nature that most folks never see. The photos will come, and I have some plans to do some photo creeping and stalking in the near future, free from my obligated “fitness” miles.
Anxious to get this month over with, and for Daylight Saving Time to kick in, so as to get more miles in my feetz whilst the sun shines, rather than my headlamp.
I need 5.75 miles to hit my goal for the week. I don’t want to jinx myself, but I’m pretty sure I got it.
Later.