
Gwendolyn is into Voodoo Ranger Catnip.
All of the blood moon photos were shot between 4:30 am and 5:04 am. I changed my exposure allowing the non-eclipsed portion of the moon to washout. When there is no cloud cover it easier to keep the non-eclipsed portions of the moon from washing out. The bright parts of the moon cast a glow off of the thin cloud cover that turned into heavier clouds as the moon sank toward the horizon. After the moon slipped behind the tree I walked up the road to where I could barely see the white sliver of the moon through the haze. After that it disappeared. The full eclipse was at 5:18 am, but it had slipped behind the clouds and out of sight.
More flowers and roses for the Super Flower Blood Moon.

All three owlets have flown into the bosque. They are near the Tangle Heart Tree. Can you find them in the above photo? I’m not sure you can see Mona Lisa from the photo. I believe she is blocked by a branch. This is a higher resolution image than I normally upload, so you can click on it to see the full image and enlarge the image to help find the owlets.

A super-wide view of the area the owlets are in with the Tangle Heart Tree on the right.

Contrails when I got home.

Wild sky of the Sandias and Rio Grande.
More wild skies. The last shot was sunset tonight.
The Flowers: Mutant Peace, Peonies and Rio Samba.

The western clouds were beautiful, but not promising for a clear sky in the wee hours of the morning when the Super Flower Moon gets bloody. I’ll get up a 3:00am and check the sky.
The Super Flower Moon Rise.

Super Flower Moon

Super-wide-angle view of the Super Flower Moon rising over the Sandias and Rio Grande.

Super Flower Moon in the clouds.

Can you find Venus?

You should be able to see Venus in the above photo.

There was nice color in the west, but I missed most of it photographing the moon.

At 5:18 am Wednesday morning, I should be able to see and photograph the Super Flower Blood Moon, which will be a full lunar eclipse. We have had two days and one night of crystal clear skies. The forecast is for clear skies tomorrow, but clouds on Wednesday. The big question is will the sky be clear between 2:47 am when the eclipse begins, and 6:02 am when the moon sets on Wednesday morning? We’ll see. In the meantime, I present you with our first fully bloomed Peony and the moon at 97.7% full.

I was going to buy a ultra-wide-angle lens for my Fuji XE-1 that I used to use as a carry camera. But the 10-24mm zoom lens is quite large, which makes it not as desirable to carry when I’m also carrying the Bazooka on a 7D Mark II body, and the 70-200mm zoom lens a 5Ds body. I have been using my iPhone XE for all street photography and wide-angle photos, stitching together panoramas for ultra-wide-angle shots. I finally decided that since an iPhone 12 Mini was the same price as a Fuji 10-24mm lens, I might as well upgrade my iPhone to the iPhone 12 Mini. The 12 Mini is the same form factor as the old iPhone 5, which is my favorite style of iPhone case, and the camera has wide-angle and super-wide-angle. The iPhone 12 Pro has telephoto, also, but I have the Bazooka and the iPhone 12 is bigger than I like.
What’s really nice with the iPhone 12 Mini is the “Portrait” setting works for any abject or critter as you can see in the photos of the kitties and the America Rose above. The “Portrait” setting on my iPhone SE only worked on human faces. When I tried using it on the cats, or anything else, it said “No faces recognized” and would not take a photo. I’m really happy with the camera on the iPhone 12 Mini.
All photos below were shot with the Bazooka 400mm lens on a Canon 7D Mark II body.
Swallows from below and above.
Rose in the late afternoon light.
Bird on a line, owlets in the cottonwood. Sleepy is wide awake.
Moon through clouds.
They sky was crazy tonight. It had me running from one end of the property to the other the get all the angles.
Intermission: I walked up to the fence along the north side of the property to do another panoramic photo, and got a horse kiss.
The end of the crazy skies.
Can you find the Owlets in this photo? The above photo is a full-sized so when you click on it, you should be a able to see a little better.

Hint: Major Tom Peepers was in a pretty distinctive spot in the tree tonight.

I wonder which Owlet is Sleepy? This photo might give you a clue about where Sleepy and Mona Lisa were.
Western Tanager? Blue Grosbeak and Mystery yellow-bellied bird across the river at Beaver Point.

More Iris blooming.

Down by the river

How many faces can you find?

Lots of clouds. Lots of brush strokes. Not as much reds and oranges as I was hoping for.

No sunset, no moon, I couldn’t check on the owls. Rain, much needed rain, kept me inside to post photos of roses. The first Dr. Huey in the above photo. Julie’s giant Dr. Huey is only thinking about blooming. After it blooms we will have our 7th annual Dr. Huey tour.


Fourth of July with a Grasshopperlette.



I posted this one last week when it only had 5 roses in bloom.




Bazzoka’s first beavers. It was dark so they are not super clear. the one on the right looks like a bear.

Bazooka’s first swallow. Swallow are faster and more erratic flyers than bats.