Bird of Paradise II (c) 2009 Patty Hankins
Here are some posts and articles that I enjoyed this week; I hope you enjoy them as well
National Park and National Wildlife Refuge Links
National Parks Traveler has Rebuilding After Sandy: How The National Park Service Is Putting The Pieces Back Together Again, Windows On Nature: The Ten Best National Park Webcam Sites In America and Death Valley National Park Earns International Dark Sky Park Recognition
Wildlife Links
National Parks Traveler has Python Challenge 2013 Results Offer Help For Florida Parks – And Bad News For Pythons and Yellowstone National Park ‘Crowdsources’ Visitor Photos To Help Study Wolf Disease, Dynamics
NBCNews has Famed giant Pacific leatherback turtle faces extinction in 20 years
Photography and Art Links
New York Times has Starry, Starry, Starry Night
Enlight Photo has The Trophy Shot – a nature and landscape photographers dilemma
DC Area Flower Safari
If you are in the DC area, I hope you will join me and other flower lovers at our DC Flower Safari Meetups. The next Meetup is scheduled for Sunday, March 17th at Longwood Gardens in Bethesda,MD. The Orchid Extravaganza at Longwood Gardens is always amazing. It’s one of my favorite times of the year to visit Longwood.
Info is at http://www.longwoodgardens.org/OrchidExtravaganza.html
Plan for this meetup is to meet at 6:30 AM at the Grosvenor Metro Station. Then we can carpool to Longwood. It takes just over 2 hours to get there. My suggestion would be that we plan on photographing in the Conservatory in the morning – then meet for lunch at 11:30 in the restaurant. After that – depending on what people what to do – either keep shooting – or head on back.
Garden admission is $18. You can purchase a ticket online at or you can get one when we get there. I doubt there will be problems getting tickets at the door on a Sunday morning for Orchid Extravaganza. But if you want to make sure you get one – go ahead and purchase a an entry ticket for 9 AM on March 17th.