266 / conversations

Fun to find these kind of shots. I like to imagine

the conversations some plants might have

with their neighbours ~ 

the palm fronds above are laughing, no?

242 / & by computer

Some of the photo alterations worked much

better once I got a computer

(Cape Cod)

& /or I needed to make them a bit more 

'professional'

(Mexico)

you may have seen them in some books I illustrated

(north of San Francisco)

these days I don't get prints so often, 

though I like making photo books,

& its great to see photos on a big screen

had never seen an iced tree before that winter

in Colorado

rocks near my friends house in New Mexico

Darjeeling chickens

a tree fern at Springbrook, in Queensland,

a remarkably wet year

228 / coucal

Think this is the mother Coucal - she's just caught a baby 

water dragon, for her endlessly hungry chick, already nearly as big,

while the mother is looking quite ragged & thin.

They're quite heavy birds, & not such good flyers.

get lost for hours, here

211 / & trees

Huge old Plane trees are often leaning

near Istanbul's wonderful stone walls

penned by the same hand, so to speak

& looked after in a similar way, over many years

Then the inscriptions: so elegant, with the feel of

sunlight on water.

206 / wildlife 2

a water dragon.

Sad to say another surfer has been killed by a shark

at a beach about 20 minutes drive from Byron Bay.

carpet snake 

it was at least 5 metres long

forest person 

have been watching a vine make him

since its been raining again - beyond my back fence.

( I didn't alter the photo )

205 / wildlife

Theres a kind of cuckoo, a Coucal,

 that live around here, 

it was panicked by a neighbours dog, today

too fast for me

they are quite large & usually unafraid,

especially when hiding in a tree 

here's an echidna, haven't seen it for many months,

perhaps because of a dry spell after last winter

& the Terns are seasonal

- or here in Byron only some of the year.

198 / wet

Christmas & New Year was mostly wet

& humid

hot, even though it doesn't look it, somehow

the peacock was in a larger Pandanus

or strutting around a park, north of Byron Bay.

178 / traveller's palm

took some photos with my iPad of travellers palms

there's a bunch growing a few streets from me

they have fan shaped leaves at the top, 

the older ones turn brown & fall

They have a distinctive flat growing habit

An old painting of mine:

 'a Traveller's Palm gives me itchy feet'

177 / Spring art

Looks like tree art, changing each day

really Spring only lasts a couple of weeks, here

the light is different, theres been enough rain to wash the dust off

the cycad & palms are in Mullumbimby, a small town 

close to Byron Bay (where I live)

it's a good reason to walk into town:

see what they've produced overnight.

176 / trees

Once the weather warms, the eucalypts begin to lose

their winter bark: the spots are hollows, like small

doors to their summer white

nearby are some paperbarks, maybe visitors 

start peeling them

I'd like to leave a message, but I'd have to

peel back a layer too

the start of the bark opening, wonder if

it makes a sound?

a parenthetical grass tree

168 / garden

So there's not much to post about..

this is not the fast lane, despite how speedily 

the days go by (I like the blur, here)

& I like to look for new compositions in the palms

in fact most every thing looks new each day, don't you agree?

167 / spring

There is a brief Spring, here in Byron Bay

sometimes I'm away for 2 weeks, & miss it

the Petrea vine blooms a few times a year

& creatures that have been away, now recharge.