Wait, I want to be in the picture too.

You know how you'll come back from vacation and you'll have a few shots where some strange little kids jump into the background of the picture and make faces? Well, the same thing happens at Kenney Park along the Olentangy River, except that unwanted insects, rather than kids, are somehow getting into my photos.

On Sunday, I was really tired after working the day before, but my trigger finger was itching since I hadn't been back to the Olentangy River since Megan and I arrived back in Columbus. A few steps off the pavement and I saw the first lepidopteran of the day, an eastern tailed blue. This tiny butterfly was pretty ragged looking, and it was checking out pokeweed. I took several shots, but look what happened to sneak into one of them! Some type of flying green metallic thing. I'm not sure if this is a bee, wasp, or fly, but it is kinda neat. I don't think I could have captured a shot like this if I had tried 1000 times.



So, onto the next butterfly, this one also very ragged, a pearl crescent. This individual was getting nectar from a goldenrod plant. I put the camera on burst mode and ran off a bunch of shots. Sure enough, back at the house, another intruder had crept into the photo, this time a cabbage white butterfly. What is going on?



Apparently in this shot, the cabbage white had left, leaving just the spectacular pearl crescent.



After photographing the crescent, I strolled down to the river, and I noticed that my favorite rock from which to fish was occupied by two pancakes. Oh wait, those aren't pancakes, those are spiny softshelled turtles. The spiny softshell loves to bask on rocks and logs in the Olentangy, and even on its muddy banks. But they are really wary. You can't get within fifty feet without them sliding into the murky water. Luckily, today, I was watching for them, and sure enough, I was able to get a few nice shots by hiding behind a sizable cottonwood tree. As soon as I creeped down the bank to get a closer shot, these guys slid off into the river. Back at home, I checked out the photos, and this time, another flying insect had crashed my photo. Two American rubyspots appeared in the photo, one flying, and one basking on the rock.



I'm taking this as a sign that I most definitely need a camera with clear and precise viewfinder. That Canon Rebel XTI really sounds good right now. Ok, I guess that really does sound like a pretty bad excuse to get a new camera.

Tom