Earth Explorations

NY Times caption :  A steady stream of mountain climbers lined up to stand at the summit of Mount Everest, on Wednesday. (5/22/2019) Edited to add: Photo Credit Nirmal Pirja of Project Possible. This photo has been heavily shared in traditional and social media  with most of the articles discussing the impacts-including higher death toll-from the increased popularity of and access to climbing Everest. I'm not here to add to that particular discussion but with a blog title like Earth Explorations I feel like I would be remiss if I failed to address this picture. In the About section of this blog, I make the following statement: Being an explorer is mostly about having an approach to life that is based on curiosity about the unknown. That's the core requirement. The other things like travel to exotic places are nice but not necessary. And it's really not necessary to climb a mountain or traverse a polar region. That's being an adventurer which is different than b...

Central South Dakota is a hotbed of bird migration and May is peak season. My bird photography skills (which I practiced all winter) are still meh. It's hard for me to get good photos of birds flittering about which means all the pictures of warblers look like this one. See the tail feathers off to the center right of the photo? Maddening. I have been able to capture a few photos of birds that are ground foragers. They tend to be a little easier to photograph because they are on the ground (no craning my neck) and they also take longer pauses between flits or hops looking for insects. I'm very pleased with this photo. Thank you, White Crowned Sparrow. Your black and white crown feathers are so fetching.