Horses

Posting the last handful of photos from my drive in dense fog on 5 Januaty 2019. My computer, which is driving me nuts, has worked long enough for me to upload these. The trees at the very edge of the roads were quite visible, but practically everything else disappeared in a dense fog that caught me by surprise on, 5 January 2019. I had hoped to finally drive east of the city on 4 January, after already waiting a couple of months to get out east and northeast. Then I saw in the weather forecast that it was going to be a very windy day on 4th January, so my plans changed. When I checked the forecast around midnight, we were supposedly going to have sun with some cloud on 5 January, clearing to a nice sunny afternoon. Yeah, right!! The thick fog had developed way before I left the eastern edge of the city and, though I was so tempted to turn around and head for home, I kept going, hoping that the fog would clear further east. Just the opposite! Most of the drive was in very poor visibility, barely able to see the road I was on and not seeing cars in the distance. Once my eyes looked further than the fences along the road edges, I could barely see anything at all, just dense fog. A far cry from an ideal day for looking for Snowy Owls! Everything was a pale grey or white and I would never have been able to see a distant owl and would barely be able to see an owl perched high up on a power pole. After roughly almost five hours of dangerous driving conditions and 235 km travelled, I just had to give up and head for home. I did manage to find a few odds and ends to photograph, but nothing too inspiring. Post-processing turned white photos into images that had some colour and detail - not at all how things looked in reality.

These are the only four photos that were worth saving from today's drive east of the city. I was beginning to wonder if I might end up going home with an empty memory card. I was totally out of luck with getting photos of the birds I had hoped to see close, but instead only saw from a great distance. For the last few years, I have longed to see and photograph a Short-eared Owl perched on a close fence post. It appears that "everyone" has been successful in doing this. This is my least favourite direction to drive out of the city. On the return drive, there are so many huge road signs and a few days ago, for the third time, I ended up taking a wrong turn and ended up heading way south of the city on the major highway, Deerfoot Trail. The afternoon sun is absolutely glaring and then, later afternoon, the light starts fading and I have to be really careful about getting back before it gets dark, thanks to lousy nght vision. I also don't like feeling I should go east again, just in the hope of seeing owls. There have only been a few people in the area when I have been out there. Quite a lot of my time was spent driving some of the back roads and I was happy to come across the horses and old barns/sheds in these four images. My photos were not as sharp as I would have liked, so I have added a touch of filter in post-processing to a couple of them. The weather was again absolutey gorgeous - what a wonderful contrast to last winter! Also very different from yesterday (Sunday, 27 January 2019), when we had very strong winds and blowing snow. A birding walk I had planned on going on yesterday morning suddenly lost its appeal, and, after my alarm clocks woke me up early, I decided I would climb back into bed instead.

These are the only four photos that were worth saving from today's drive east of the city. I was beginning to wonder if I might end up going home with an empty memory card. I was totally out of luck with getting photos of the birds I had hoped to see close, but instead only saw from a great distance. For the last few years, I have longed to see and photograph a Short-eared Owl perched on a close fence post. It appears that "everyone" has been successful in doing this. This is my least favourite direction to drive out of the city. On the return drive, there are so many huge road signs and a few days ago, for the third time, I ended up taking a wrong turn and ended up heading way south of the city on the major highway, Deerfoot Trail. The afternoon sun is absolutely glaring and then, later afternoon, the light starts fading and I have to be really careful about getting back before it gets dark, thanks to lousy nght vision. I also don't like feeling I should go east again, just in the hope of seeing owls. There have only been a few people in the area when I have been out there. Quite a lot of my time was spent driving some of the back roads and I was happy to come across the horses and old barns/sheds in these four images. My photos were not as sharp as I would have liked, so I have added a touch of filter in post-processing to a couple of them. The weather was again absolutey gorgeous - what a wonderful contrast to last winter! Also very different from yesterday (Sunday, 27 January 2019), when we had very strong winds and blowing snow. A birding walk I had planned on going on yesterday morning suddenly lost its appeal, and, after my alarm clocks woke me up early, I decided I would climb back into bed instead.

These are the only four photos that were worth saving from today's drive east of the city. I was beginning to wonder if I might end up going home with an empty memory card. I was totally out of luck with getting photos of the birds I had hoped to see close, but instead only saw from a great distance. For the last few years, I have longed to see and photograph a Short-eared Owl perched on a close fence post. It appears that "everyone" has been successful in doing this. This is my least favourite direction to drive out of the city. On the return drive, there are so many huge road signs and a few days ago, for the third time, I ended up taking a wrong turn and ended up heading way south of the city on the major highway, Deerfoot Trail. The afternoon sun is absolutely glaring and then, later afternoon, the light starts fading and I have to be really careful about getting back before it gets dark, thanks to lousy nght vision. I also don't like feeling I should go east again, just in the hope of seeing owls. There have only been a few people in the area when I have been out there. Quite a lot of my time was spent driving some of the back roads and I was happy to come across the horses and old barns/sheds in these four images. My photos were not as sharp as I would have liked, so I have added a touch of filter in post-processing to a couple of them. I would love to have been able to wander round these old sheds and photograph them from different angles. The weather was again absolutey gorgeous - what a wonderful contrast to last winter! Also very different from yesterday (Sunday, 27 January 2019), when we had very strong winds and blowing snow. A birding walk I had planned on going on yesterday morning suddenly lost its appeal, and, after my alarm clocks woke me up early, I decided I would climb back into bed instead.

Yesterday, 8 August 2019, was more of a barn day than a bird day. A while ago, another photographer had mentioned that a few barns in a certain area SE of Calgary had been removed and I was curious to see if I could tell which ones were missing. There is one huge barn in particular that I am always hoping still stands. I would love to be able to get photos from both sides of it, but it is way out in a farmer's field that is, of course, private property. Standing in the road, I can only get a distant shot and I had a problem with heat distortion yesterday. There is an old, round, wooden grain bin and a smaller barn just near the barn, too. I think the first time I ever saw the barn was on 21 January 2015, when I took my daughter out for the day. My intention yesterday had been to leave early in the morning, but it was already 10:45 am when I climbed into my car. Seeing the weather forecast for the next six days included rain on each day, I knew I just had to do this trip yesterday. Some of the roads I drove to get to my destination(s) were familiar, but others less so. There are two or three highway intersections that are confusing to me and I usually end up taking the wrong turn. For a change, I turned off the main highway going south before my usual turn, in order to shorten the distance. My first sighting was a distant Red-tailed Hawk perched on a wooden fence at a wetland that used to be a great spot, but now is totally dried up. After a quick stop at a tiny church that I always photograph when I am out that way, I continued east till I came to the three old Mossleigh grain elevators - one of the places I always get confused about which way to drive. Ideally, a dramatic sky would have been great, but I have taken better photos in the past. From Mossleigh, I did my usual exploring, finding that a lovely old, wooden house was still standing. I believe this was built from a kit years ago, and it remains in reasonably good condition. Eventually, I found the large barn that I wanted to see again. It took me a while to work out which road it was on (thought I knew!), but I found it after some driving back and forth. It was good to see the smaller barn, in less then good condition, nearby. The other two times that I have been standing in the road to take photos, a lady has come along the road from a nearby farm and very kindly told me to on in and take any photos I'd like. No-one around yesterday, so I stayed on the road,of course. At one point, I happened to glance up the road and saw what I thought was someone's dog on the crest of the road. When I zoomed in on my camera, I realized it was a coyote, who started walking towards me. Unfortunately, it turned off into the field and disappeared. When I was at this smaller barn, it amused me to see a magnificent Mule near the barn, plus a horse. The Mule looked huge and was a real poser, wanting to be in almost every shot I took. Such a gorgeous creature, that I don't remember seeing before. Once I had taken a few photos, I started on my homeward drive, not stopping anywhere as I could see that, if I hurried, I could get to the Saskatoon Farm in time to get a meal before the restaurant closed for the day. Yay, I just made it. Knowing that Frank Lake was only a short drive away, I couldn't resist driving back south to have a quick look. Found a couple of my friends there and spent some enjoyable time with them. Only took a few photos there, most to be deleted, before heading home. A fun day, though hot and hazy.

Well, I certainly didn't get very far with editing and posting photos taken on 25 August 2019, when a group of us took part in a bioblitz (mainly to see the amazing number of fungi!) of a wonderful old forest, in order to compare it to what was now growing in a large area that had been clearcut logged around three years ago. On 27 August, I finally made myself do a new drive that I hadn't had the courage to do before, going south of the city. The five photos posted tonight are from the drive on 27 August. After posting several fungi photos yesterday from the forest/clearcut outing, I decided that there are only so many fungi photos at a time that people will want to see here. The trip down south was not a huge drive and many of the roads were familiar ones. Just the last part was what made me afraid to try. I am so glad I did this, as I had longed to go to this particular Ranch for years. A couple of years ago, a friend and I drove south from the city to get to Kananaskis. Somehow, he missed a turn-off and we ended up going some distance south instead of west. I loved the scenery that we were driving through and I was determined that, one day, I would drive there myself. Done! The Ranch I wanted to see was the Bar U Ranch. I have seen so many photos online of the scattered sheds/barns and I was sure I would find plenty to photograph. "Bar U cattle literally fed the world. The ranch fed workers building the first transcontinental railway and waves of immigrants flooding to a new land. It fed Canada’s first Indian reservations, the first patrols of Northwest Mounted Police, our nation through the Great Depression and our soldiers through two World Wars. Bar U Percherons, “the work horses that powered North America,” built our cities and roads and pulled our trolleys and fire wagons, from New York City to Victoria, British Columbia. One of the first, most successful, most enduring large scale cattle ranching operations in Canada, the Bar U in its hay day ranged 30,000 head of cattle on 160,000 acres of grassland, and was world renowned for its stock of 1,000 purebred Percherons. Located deep in the southern Alberta foothills, on the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains, the Bar U, from 1882 to 1950, was a force to be reckoned with. While other large Alberta ranches succeeded for a time only to go out of business, especially after the killer winters of 1886 and 1906, the Mighty Bar U persevered to eventually become a kingpin in a business empire that included a variety of ranches and farming enterprises, as well as meat packing plants and flour mills." www.friendsofthebaru.com/bar_u_legacy.htm By the time three and a quarter hours had passed by at the Ranch, including sitting on a log around a camp fire, drinking hot coffee and chatting with a couple of ladies who were telling us about camp life in the old days, I felt it was time to start heading back home. I returned via the rough, gravel, very dusty backroad that I use when I drive to Kananaskis, hoping that I might just see something of interest, but out of luck. Thank goodness for Albums to keep photos together, and thank goodness Camera Roll is now finally back and working. Thank you, Flickr staff, for rebuilding this very useful tool for us.