It has been a bit of a cool and dry summer all the way through the end of June. The rain and humidity however arrived just in time for the Independence day extended weekend. Days with temps over 80 and high humidity are the worst in my book. But that does not stop me from going out and enjoying whatever it is that Nature has on display any given day. The last day of June turned out to be a good day for butterflies and marsh flowers along the Dune Ridge trail in Beverly Shores.
These Great Spangled Fritillaries were all over the place. I don’t know if it is characteristic of the species, but I found that they were inclined to sit still for reasonable long periods which made it much easier to get some nice clear shots.
Orange is such a contrasty color against the background foliage. It is hard to miss all the Butterfly Weed and the accompanying butterflies.
I never knew that Poison Ivy produced berries. Although toxic it is really a very attractive plant in many ways. Poison Ivy thrived in disturbed habitats, so once you learn to recognize it you notice it all along many of the trails. A number of trails in the Indiana Dunes have really impressive patches packed solid with the stuff.
Although much of the area is lush with vegetation we have in fact been experiencing a drought, as evidenced by this distressed fern. Lots of times we focus on the “perfect” flowers and plants. However I think there is a special beauty in the “imperfect” aspects of nature, the damaged and decayed specimen is often the more interesting choice.
Few things are more fascinating than a single drop of water. The entire world around this leaf is encapsulated within this single tiny drop of water which was left over from the previous nights rain.
This photo is a nice illustration of how photography teaches you to see nature. When this leaf caught my eye all I noticed were the numerous little black spots of decay. The white spot in the middle just looked like more decay from a distance. It was not until after I had returned home and was reviewing my photos that I realized there was a tiny little creature on that leaf.
Another great example of how easy it is to miss things in the moment. When I took this photo of some Milkweed I had no idea that there was a fly approaching from the bottom left. Just pure luck that it was perfectly positioned in the focal plane of the camera when I took the pic, but I also had set a shutter speed fast enough to catch him as if he were stationary. If I were trying to get a picture of a fly in flight like this I could try a thousand times and never get anything even close to this.
Another example of the beauty of imperfection. I got plenty of images of these flowers where all the petals were perfectly arrayed in complete symmetry. Yet this one with it’s wrinkled petals was my favorite of the bunch.
When walking through a marsh it can be difficult to capture the vast diversity of plant life in a single image. Although many of the flowers are showing the effects of drought, the array of colors and line work in this image serves to capture the beauty and complexity of the marsh.
Deceptively simple in appearance, River Horsetail is one of my favorite subjects to try and capture in different ways.