Jordan Lake

Category

By sky halo

halo Haw river meadow IMG_8388

I sent this photo to WRAL and Mike Moss of the weather bureau was kind enough to reply with the following explanation of what I photographed at 8:06 AM this morning at the Jordan Lake dam using my iPhone 5S. The photo is not edited in any way.

“Hi Ellen, You captured a nice example of the 22-degree halo, formed by light passing through a layer of millions of tiny hexagonal ice crystals that happen to be both well-formed and more or less randomly oriented. That happens on occasion with sheets of high cirrus clouds like those passing over the area this morning.”
[the small green dot at the top of the halo is from my iPhone]

By where begins

IMG_1296 flora fauna med 2014

Let me ask you this: where begins the flora and ends the fauna or is it begins the fauna and ends the flora?

By spoilers

spoiler on display

As I understand it, it was 1948 before man began to use air spoilers on airplane wings. The great egret and all flighted birds, make good use of spoilers as they land.  It is not often I get to so easily see the spoilers on the back edges of the wings deployed and the lift spilled so the bird can safely land.

By shines

_RK_9606 egret flight med2014

I marvel when the sun becomes my spotlight and the great egret shines in the dawn.

By tag and bounce

_RK_1266 Cadet and vulture 2014

Cadet, who is the immature osprey on the upper right, has taken to harassing the immature turkey vultures, the bird on the lower left. Both these birds were fledged this year and their flying skills are still sloppy. But that didn’t stop Cadet from diving down on the vulture who had to twist awkwardly to get away.
I caught the moment as Cadet bounced off of the vulture.