the solitaire
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It's quite amazing. This thread has been around for 20% of the time I have been roaming this planet. I turned 40 2 days ago, and to celebrate I got a surprise visit from a friend who made the effort to drive 150 miles to shake my hand....
.....and invite me to go on a photo trip at 4 in the morning the day after my birthday.
Of course I agreed. Even without a camera. He was so kind to lend me a D500 and with that knowledge I brought two lenses to round out a small DX package.
We went to a nature reserve to see if we could snap some wild horses.
Starting early, and having the luck to get some morning fog, we got a spectacular show as soon as the sun started rising. Unfortunately no horses in sight, so I used the opportunity to aim the D500 at some other subjects
 NG2_0646_PS by b j, on Flickr
Taken with the D500 and 300mm f2,8 ED-IF Ai-S
Right in the middle of the nature reserve is an excavation company. At first, that seems a bit strange, but later that morning we met one of the people working on restoring this habitat to a self sustaining biotope, and received a very detailed explanation.
Before this area was turned into a nature reserve, it was agricultural land. The fertilized loam based soil is far too rich for the native vegetation. The excavation company excavates this rich loam based soil, and uses the by product of their operation to terraform the surface of the reserve into an area that can evenly distribute precipitation the year over, as well as maintain moisture in pockets of the land during dry periods.
In the next two years, this company will completely retreat their operation and machinery from the reserve, and the next stage in the creation of the biotope will begin. The attempt to find a balance between flora and fauna, between predators, prey, hosts and parasitesthat will, in the end, cause the biotope to be fully independent of human intervention.
 NG2_0670_stitch_PS by b j, on Flickr
4 shot pano with the D500 and 300mm f2,8 ED-IF Ai-S at f8
Below if a photograph of my favorite tree in the entire reserve. It stands rather solitary, normally at the edge of a small lake. Due to the dryness there is no trace whatsoever of the lake that normally resides there. The tree offers shade, and when the lake is back, the wild horses living there prefer this spot as a retreat.
 NG2_0673_PS by b j, on Flickr
Taken with the D500 and 35 f2 Nikkor-O @ f5,6
 NG2_0679 by b j, on Flickr
With 300mm f2,8 wide open
The Galloway cows found their way to the shore of the Waal. A river that is used as a natural barrier on one end of the nature reserve
 NG2_0698 by b j, on Flickr
And so did some of the Konik horses
 NG2_0707 by b j, on Flickr
On the shadow side of one of the trees, I found a colony of these comedians
 NG2_0700 by b j, on Flickr
 NG2_0730 by b j, on Flickr
 NG2_0731 by b j, on Flickr
Of course it isn't all about the wild horses and cows, or magnificent trees. In the end, a biotope like this thrives by the existence of a rich variation of flora and fauna, with many dependencies between species of both categories. One of the most obvious examples shown below
 NG2_0709_PS by b j, on Flickr
Again, 300mm f2,8, wide open. This lens on a DX camera actually really makes a nice lens for close up work
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tongue and cheek... I actually like focus peaking. 
