Birddogman
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 p.258 #14 · Sony RX1, RX1R, RX1R II and RX1R III Image Thread | |
Haven’t posted here for a while. Here are a few recent RX1r II shots to make up for that failing.
You can still "hunt” in the off-season (sort of). Here's the Chaser “helping” me hunt for morels under the trees in a long abandoned apple orchard. When you can’t find them elsewhere, you can often find morels under old apples trees – don’t know why. Maybe I should teach the dogs to point them?
Joy pointed a VERY rare surviving spring rooster pheasant in this fence row next to the new corn field:
Chase at work in the dense late spring/early summer grasses and barley
President Abraham Lincoln’s great-great-grandfather, Mordecai Lincoln lived not far from where I live. His house, built in 1733, still exists. By the mid 1990’s, it was falling down in disrepair. A wealthy couple (from NYC, I think), bought the property and restored and modernized it (with electricity, central heat, indoor plumbing, etc) without destroying its early 18th century character – something that is very rare. I was really glad to see that done!
They lived there for a short while and (I guess) got tired of the compromises living in a small 18th century house requires, plus the isolation of the location and left. It hasn’t been occupied or maintained since. Sadly, it has been falling into disrepair again. It would not be too bad a job to bring it back again (as compared to starting such a modernization project from scratch). If I was single, I might well give it a shot - love those old houses.
Here’s how it looks today.
The other day, the dogs and I took a long run to the far end of my property – to an area where we don’t go very often. Here are Chase and Joy on the trail to that area – it’s getting to be full-on summer in the woods now - the trees almost fully leafed.
The dogs started casting around and acting oddly and I smelled death in the air. On looking around, I found a number of partly decomposed animal skulls, like this one (a fox or small ‘yote, maybe?) hung on strings from tree branches in a rough circle maybe 20 yards across surrounding an area of the forest floor that had been heavily trampled.
Creepy! I have no idea what this means or why anyone would do this, but I’m guessing it's nothing good. I’ve always felt 100% safe and comfortable in wilderness places (unlike on city streets, where I feel just the opposite) – but, to be honest, this gives me some pause. If people would do that to wild critters what would they do to dogs? I’m going to be keeping the dogs away from that remote area of my property for a while. I’m also going to try to keep a close eye on the area to see if I can find out who is doing this and why. It’s a long walk to get there and pretty much anyone can outrun the Old Man, but I can get there quickly on my four-wheeler and no one is going to outrun me when I’m on that mechanical horse.
On to more happy subjects... The dogs and I took a long, difficult run up a boulder and mountain laurel filled valley to try to find the headwaters of the Swatara Creek this past week for exercise and to scope out possible ruffed grouse hunting areas for next winter. Rather to my surprise, I heard the thunder of a large waterfall and we eventually found this one.
It’s about 20’ high and very pretty. Happily, I had some ND filters and my mini-pod with me, so we could do some photos with a slow shutter speed.
It is early summer now in the uplands and everything is very pretty with the wild flowers. Joy in a field of lupines and daisies
Joy point, Chase honor:
I decided to try to use the little RX1r II to try capture a flushing pheasant – something I can't normally do because I am gunning. As versatile as it is, this is something it is definitely NOT suited for with its fixed 35mm lens. A fast DSLR with at least a 200 or 300mm lens is what you want. Even though 42MP and a full-frame sensor will allow lots of cropping to get closer to the action, it’s not as good as a dedicated telephoto lens on a fast camera. I was pretty happy, however, with the little Sony’s focus speed on such super-fast subjects.
Flushing a Joy point:
Flushing a double-dawg point:
Unfortunately, this bird was badly hen-pecked, seemed ill and didn’t fly well, so the dogs managed to catch it – something that almost never happens. I do NOT want my pointing dogs to catch the birds or they may decide they don’t need me (the gunner) as part of their team! Chase brought it gently to hand as he is supposed to do. Other than being a bit slobbery, it was unharmed and I released the bird again when the dogs weren’t looking. Nonetheless, I doubt it lasted the day with all of the avian and ground predators – nature is cruel to the weak and sick.
It’s been nice and cool, if very rainy, this spring, but the past couple of days it’s been hot. Temps in the 90’s today. Ugh. The Chaser cooling off in a duck pond (this is a Fuji TX1 image):
Only 12 more weeks until Sept 1 rolls around and life can begin again. Countin’ the days….
Greg, Chase and Joy
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More pics in my "live" thread.
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