Live Oak Allee, Brookgreen Gardens
Cathy, mom, and I went to Brookgreen Gardens today, driving the 75 minutes from Ocean Isle Beach and getting there at about 10:00. I’ve got three past posts with pictures from Brookgreen on the blog, two in 2013 and one in 2012 (Brookgreen Gardens, Thursday, August 02, 2012, Brookgreen Gardens, Thursday, August 01, 2013, and Brookgreen Critters, Thursday, August 01, 2013). Between the gardens, a lunch in the restaurant, and a visit to the small zoo, we spent about five hours there. Not long enough to see everything but it was a great visit. It was hot and very humid but not as swelteringly hot as it’s been some years. I took nearly 400 photographs today and I’ve got three to show you. This year I decided not to include any of the wonderful art work, there are simply too many nice sculptures from which to choose.
Carolina Anole (Anolis carolinensis)
The first picture is of the Live Oak Allee, which forms the center of the garden leading up to the former location of the house. These trees are said to be over 300 years old and I have no reason to doubt that, as they are quite large. The branches are covered with resurrection ferns and there is the ubiquitous Spanish moss all over. Under them are beds filled with Caladiums. This image is an HDR image made from three different exposures and I liked the muted colors in this nearly monochrome image. I have mixed feelings about HDR images but I have to admit, they produce some extraordinary results. My camera has an autobracketing feature that lets me take three images in quick succession with three different exposures (and I can control the amount of difference between them). Sometimes I would prefer five images, but maybe that wouldn’t really help much. I usually take them without the benefit of a tripod and I’m sure they would turn out better if I didn’t have to hand hold them.
Wet Wings
The second image is a Carolina anole (Anolis carolinensis) posing on bright red Coleus leaves. I found the contrast between the green of the lizard and the red of the leaves to be wonderful. We saw quite a few of these little lizards as well as huge eastern lubber grasshoppers (Romalea microptera). In the zoo we saw black-crowned night herons (Nycticorax nycticorax, including one which caught an anole), white ibis (Eudocimus albus), American alligators (Alligator mississippiensis), bald eagles (Haliaeetus leucocephalus), and in both areas, lots of dragonflies. That brings us to the final picture, a dragonfly with water droplets on its wings. I think the tiny droplets have a jewel-like quality, although this isn’t one of the jewelwings (genus Calopteryx).
