Category: Art

Storks and Spoons

Roseate Spoonbills (Platalea ajaja) and Wood Storks (Mycteria americana) share the limited water in the marsh during this dry period before the monsoon season. They both feed in the shallow marshes but do not compete for the same prey. The Spoon Bills are bottom filter feeders while the Storks pick up insects and small fish. The Spoon Bills spend much more time preening than the Wood Storks. I find this particular group appealing because of the stark difference in the feather colors and behaviors of the two species. The spoonbills are so much more flamboyant than the severe storks. Both are iconic birds of SW FL. The feature image is an overview of the flock of birds including the spoonbills, wood storks as well as snowy egret and maybe a blue heron.

“I hope you don’t mind me drying my plumage here.” I emphasized the visual line of interest here.
“There! Now I’m all clean and dry. Arn’t I beautiful?” I really like the reflections in the water in this image.
“Eeeks! Goodness Chickie! Can’t you do that somewhere else? I just got done doing my feathers!”
At last some peace and quiet in this stand of isolated mangroves that has water at this period of high tide.

With diminished water and a protracted drought, water dependent birds are crouded together. These conditions make photography interesting. The birds may be more remote and thereby technically more difficult to photograph. The more compact group with more variety improves opportunities to observe bird behavior. The best approach I had for the group image was still at a distance of 150 meters. The image was just at the limit of the hand held 300mm lens that I had in my bag. I casually followed one bird through the afternoon and in the late in the day it sought an isolated area away from the flock. The fill-in-flash picked up the brilliant colors.

Make a comment: Which bird images do you prefer, roseate spoonbills or flamingos?

#roseate spoonbill #wood stork #snowy egret #group behavior #marsh

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Microscopy, A New Tool in Our Armament

In the blog about Photomicrography you could easily see the detail of the butterfly wing scales. This valuable insight is not only beautifully patterned and dramatically colorful it also shows the remarkable complexity of the wing. This was done with a very low cost microscope and a cell phone. We also spoke earlier about the simple Gear used in this voyage of discovery. To expand the range of observations and bring more sense into the discussions I acquired a more sophisticated microscope.

New microscope

The addition to the observation gear is an Olympus BH 2 BHS trinocular microscope with five Splan objective lenses including oil immersion, light source adaptable to ultra blue illumination, photo extension with NKF 2.5X L microscope eye piece, and a Olympus OM to Canon EOS 5D mark II camera adaptor. The system was created by referencing the Alan Wood web site.1

Freely available microscope description downloaded from internet.1

New microscopic methods

The new scope has bright field, dark field, polarized light, color filtered light and flash direct lighting. These provide the opportunity to make observations of samples that may be unstained, vital and devital stained and fluorescent illumination.

Computer Assisted Photomicrography

In 2021 Canon made available a free downloadable software interphase to couple the camera to the Apple macOS Monterey on the Mac Pro computer. This allows a seamless control of the attached camera and a recording of still and video microscopic observations. Using this software, the camera can be remotely controlled without shutter or mirror camera vibration. The resulting photo micrographs can be loaded directly to the local hard drive or to the cloud with this arrangement.

Fully operational observation system assembling the microscope, digital camera and MacPro computer at the work station. The image on the monitor is the first light, live view of a cross-section of mammalian bone using polarized light.

Accessories

There are also a number of accessories including hand microtome, ring light flash light and full slide mounting, staining accessories and supplies for mounting and cleaning.

Sharing the Opportunities

Additionally, I donated my American Optical trinocular bright field microscope to the Wonder Garden of Bonita Springs FL to assist in observation of micro anatomy and pathology of their animals and plants and for live demonstration for their education programs. This was done in the spirit of exploration and expansion of horizons for others. We are all together on this discovery voyage of the Everglades Ark.

For further discussion for the amateur microscopist check out the website Microscope Clarity.2 Included in that site are discussions, recommendations for gear and supplies and experiments for novice microscopists.

References:

  1. Alan Wood Olympus microscopes
  2. Microscope Clarity

If you are a microscopist or are interested in the subject please make your comments in the space below!

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#microscope #polarized light #ultra blue light #bright field #dark field #oil immersion #slides

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