Pictures for Pam, Day 61: Strawberry Tree Berries

(+3 insets!)

I'm back to posting pictures from my trip down to San Anselmo, and today I ran into a problem. Let me explain…

On our first day at Brian and Nathalie's house, I looked out the kitchen window and could hardly believe what I saw! A six-point Mule deer buck was calmly nibbling the grass on their hillside, a mere thirty feet away! Naturally I didn't have my camera with me, and by the time I got back with it, he'd wandered away. Shucks.

Fast forward a couple of hours. I'm wandering around their patio taking pictures and I look up…there at the same spot was a younger buck with four points! AHHHHHH!!!! I went over to the path up the hillside and slowly moved closer. The deer here are extremely used to people so I wasn't surprised when I was able to get much closer. He stared at me as I creeped towards him and only turned to walk off when I was about ten feet away.

I'd been focusing on him so intently that I didn't realize he wasn't alone. I noticed movement and was surprised to find yet another four-point buck AND the six-point beauty from earlier! All three of them were eyeing me but weren't especially afraid. I stood and took pictures as they moved around the grassy knoll, watching for any aggression on their part. All of us were calm and quiet so they ate grass and food from the trees and I got lots of pictures. Finally they walked away and I returned to the house, overjoyed at the encounter I had.

I ended up getting lots and lots of useable pictures but none of them were very spectacular. Also, they were close enough to trees and bushes so it was going to be some work to get reasonable separation in post-production. I really wanted to use a picture of the six-point buck but the only one that would work was going to be a tough image to fix up. I spent a long time working on the photo but my first attempt was just bad. I ended up working on a picture of one of the four-point bucks and it came out ok but he's walking up the hill and I don't know…it's just nothing special in my opinion.

Today I decided to give the six-point buck picture another try. The result was much better but I finally had to admit that it's just "OK". Not a picture I really want to feature as my Picture of the Day.

Ugh. So now what? I considered trying another deer picture but abandoned the idea because all of the images were either too similar to what I had or just not interesting enough. MEH!! I gave up on my deer idea. However, I am posting both pictures as insets so you can see! The six-point is a knock-out! But meh on the post-production.

I took a look at the pictures I've processed and decided on my Strawberry Tree Berries! These trees are popularly grown in urban areas and feature countless colorful berries that are prickly in appearance. The berries require a whole year to mature and finally ripen in about November in most places. The berries are edible and used in jam and liquor, though rarely eaten off the tree because of their fairly granular texture. The tree on Nathalie's hillside was positively bursting with berries in all colors from yellow to bright red. Such awesome photo subjects. I have included one more as an inset for you to see, and it has pretty white blossoms that are in bokeh.

Pam, I hope that you are doing well today after all the excitement of yesterday's scheduled appointment. Crossing my fingers for you…I hope that there will be some treatment which will resolve your issues! Worried but optimistic too…and wishing I could give you a hug!

Explored on 1/8/19, highest placement, #2.