Essays
Moseying: Exploring the Natural World
Join the Sibley Nature Center Nature Photo Club this Saturday
July 22, 2009
On July 25th, at 10 a.m. the Sibley Nature Center Nature Photo club will have its organizational meeting, at the Sibley Nature Center, 1307 E. Wadley. At the meeting, the new club will decide on a schedule of meetings and field trips, prospective classes and instructors. Membership is $25, with full membership in the Sibley Nature Center and the Permian Basin Outing Club (that takes monthly camping trips.) Members will also be able to go on one-day field trips (to private ranches) organized by the Llano Estacado chapter of the Texas Master Naturalists. In the future, classes in digital photography and digital photoeditting will be offered to members. The photography club will have its own blog, as well as contribute photographs to the Sibley Nature Center website (with over 2500 distinct IP addresses visiting the site each week) and the center’s El Despoblado newsletter (read monthly by over 1200 people across the state of Texas and beyond.)
There is always something new to see and photograph when a person goes out of doors. On the Sibley Nature Center website’s homepage there is a link to the Virtual Trails. Staff and volunteers take hikes down the trail all during the year and photograph what they see. Twenty-six photoessays (with over 1200 photos) have been produced over the past three and a half years. Every photographer finds something new and different along the trail. Two photographers have even documented animal behavior previously unrecorded in scientific literature on the Sibley Nature Center’s trail system! Also on the website are over 130 photoessays with over 3500 photos have been created by Sibley staff and volunteers that celebrate the amazing diversity of our home.
We hope that the new Nature Photo club will broaden the scope of our investigation of our bioregional landscape. Within 150 miles of Midland, the landscape can be divided into eight major habitats. Each of these habitats has many microhabitats (up to at least twenty-three as in the case of the breaks and canyons habitat). A photographer can focus on one habitat and record all that can be found during many successive trips. In recent years volunteer photographers associated with the Sibley Nature Center have discovered and documented the previously unrecorded presence of many species of plants and animals in many of the habitats. Even when the Sibley staff can not identify the species of some of the new discoveries, our network of correspondents will soon provide us with the correct identification and additional information about the organism’s life cycle.
Many of our most common animals and birds do not have photographic records of their behaviors. The much-maligned great-tailed grackle has dozens of fascinating and quirky behaviors, for example. On the Sibley website are photographs of gular panting, nestling fecal matter disposal, and soon will have photos of grackles and western kingbirds squabbling, and fledgling begging, but we have no photos of courtship posturing or nest-robbing, as well as many other behaviors. Nor do we have many photos of the recently imported fox squirrels that have taken over the town. Members of the new Nature Photo Club will have ample material to investigate in their backyard!
Outdoor nature photography is readily accessible for many people. Adequate cameras can be purchased for under $300. Many computers are purchased with a photo-editing program already installed, and many cameras when purchased often include additional photo-editing software. Photos are easily shared or stored with the $20 jumpdrives available at every computer store. Many jumpdrives can hold multiple gigabytes of images.
When photographs are taken with high resolution, incredible “macro” photos can be created. Most digital cameras have wide angle to telephoto capability. Using the widest angle setting a flower, insect, or reptile can be approached within inches, retaining an adequate depth of field. The amazing intricacy of the structures of plants and animals are revealed in stunning detail.
Nature photography is an excellent way to enjoy getting out-of-doors. It is also an excellent family activity. Some of the Virtual Trail photographs of the Sibley website have been taken by children as young as seven years old! It is also a great way for high school and Midland College students to fulfill Legacy volunteer hours. We hope you come to Sibley on Saturday at ten and get to know the organizers of the club and join in the fun!