La Chua Trail, Payne's Prairie

Hello again! It has been a very busy Fall here as a photographer. I did a photoshoot in North Carolina and Savannah Georgia. Recently my wife and I hiked 5 miles at La Chua Trail. This is in Gainesville, Florida in a beautiful park called Payne's Prairie. I strongly recommend this for any nature lover who is in north central Florida. Here are a couple of the photos I have processed, but still working on the rest.

                                                                

                                      

Here is my commercial website. I have gallaries with more than 600 photographs of wildlife, nature, and scenery in various categories. Please come and browse through the photos and I hope you enjoy them.

http://kenneth-albin.artistwebsites.com/

Not Enough Time!

Again, sorry for the months of not posting. I have been so busy with taking photographs and life in general I just haven't been able to keep up here. I went to the Everglades, the Keys, and all over Florida this winter taking photographs. Here is one a little closer to home that I took yesterday. Nothing exotic about the subject matter but I liked the interplay of light in the golden sand with rocks. The duck was very curious about the camera so I included him.

I took some really beautiful shots in the Everglades and Keys. Most of them are posted at my website Fine Art America.

Sneaking Up On Me!

Here is an alligator at the edge of a swamp close to my house. As I was photographing him the alligator was busy sizing me up for a meal. I hope he found a more suitable dinner after I left.

Where I Am Right Now In Life

Hi all! It's been awhile blogging because I have been so busy pursuing my photography, making videos, and caring for a sick cat. Let me catch you up on my life, if anyone out there is still even remotely interested.

Well, my former principal at Bartram High School, Brennan Asplen, has managed to scare the crap out of most of the faculty so they will not even talk with me. You see, he and school superintendent Joiner are afraid that I will tell some of the garbage that goes on behind the scenes in what passes for education in St. Johns county. Joiner and his minion Asplen decided that the best way to muzzle me is to cut off all communication between myself and my former coworkers. The funny thing is that I really couldn't care less what they are up to. I have too much of a full life here without picking through their dirty laundry. I guess that is how paranoid public officials act when they have a lot to hide. It is both humorous and tragic at the same time.

Our 13 1/2 year old cat Sebastian has been fighting a tremendous battle with calicivirus, a virus that attacks his gums and trachea. He developed pneumonia and spent time in a hospital in Jacksonville. He has just finished a 2 month course of antibiotics and has been going to our local vet daily for medication to help his nausea and lack of appetite. He is a tough little guy and is hanging in there.
Here is a recent photo of him.

I have been making new videos about our cat menagerie here. My favorite so far is a music video I made about Sam The Man. I think you will enjoy it!

I have also been taking lots of photographs in my second career as a wildlife/nature photographer. Here is one of a robber fly:

and here is one of a least tern:

My commercial website has these and a lot more photographs I have been taking this summer. It is Kenneth Albin Wildlife/Nature Photography. I have greeting cards, posters, and framed portraits of my best work there.

So that is pretty much what I have been accomplishing so far this season. I will try to update this blog more often but with so much going on it will probably be hit and miss. Take care and hope everyone is doing well.

Porpoise Point

The other day I hiked with all of my equipment to Porpoise Point to shoot the protected nesting grounds of the least tern, a bird I did not have in my portfolio. It was a real eye opening experience! These tiny birds had the attitude of hawks. They did not like me intruding into their territory so they made every effort to drive me off. This included divebombing me, trying to poop on me, and charging my tripod across the sand.

You have to admire the spunk of these little guys. It was a challenge to capture these fast fliers as they swooped down at me and ran across the sand.

My work is on my commercial website at Kenneth Albin Wildlife/Nature Photography. You can order framed prints, canvas, posters, and greeting cards of the beautiful Florida wildlife and nature scenes I have captured. There are more than 120 images to choose from and they are divided into galleries to make it easy to find a particular type of image. I am very happy to be able to share a little of native Florida with the world. Wildlife in Florida is wonderful and it is sad to see that it is vanishing with the oil spill and the encroachment of civilization.

Back to the Rookery!

The St. Augustine Alligator Farm bird rookery is not a typical zoo type of establishment. It is an open swamp where migrating wading birds raise their young. They build nests in trees over the alligators so they are protected from land predators. If you ever pass through St. Augustine, Florida I would highly recommend seeing this magical place.

The rookery is in full swing now. There are more than 150 nests with noisy baby birds. The predominant types of birds there are great egrets, wood storks, snowy egrets, and tricolor herons. There are also a small number of green herons and roseate spoonbills this year.

I have a large number of wildlife photos, including many rookery photos, on my commercial website, Kenneth Albin Wildlife/Nature Photography if you or someone you know would like one of my photographs to hang on your wall. They can supply the photographs as framed or unframed prints, on canvas, as posters, and on greeting cards.

Here is an interesting photograph I took several days ago at the rookery of a pair of tricolor heron chicks who seemed determined to outshout each other!

Sibling Affection

Great egret chicks in their nest.

The Cutest Tricolored Heron Chick!

I was lucky enough to capture this chick today at the St. Augustine Alligator Farm bird rookery while on a photo shoot.

Laughing Gull

I followed a little laughing seagull around at Guana State park in Ponte Vedra, Florida. This is a mini pictorial essay of him.

Here is the gull hunting for dinner around the lake shallows. It was low tide and there were schools of fish splashing everywhere.

He caught a fish and carried it to the edge of the water. Here he worked at turning the fish around so he could swallow it. I felt sorry for the poor little fish but I guess the gull needs to eat too.

After eating his dinner the gull became fascinated by my camera and tripod. He walked over to where I was and studied me and the camera. He was obviously a little puzzled by this strange guy who was taking photographs of him! A cute little guy, isn't he?

Do animals feel love?

Look at the photograph I took of a mated pair of great egrets and then you tell me if animals can express love. This and many other wildlife and nature photographs are for sale on my website Kenneth Albin Fine Art Photography. My photography there can be bought as framed prints, on canvas, as posters, and as greeting cards.

New Rookery Photographs

My commercial work, approximately 150 wildlife and nature photographs are for sale at Kenneth Albin Photography. The company does beautiful work transferring my art to canvas, greeting cards, and framed archival prints. If you are looking for wildlife or nature art to hang in your home or business please take a look at my site.

Here are some of last week's photos from the St. Augustine Alligator Farm bird rookery. Nesting is in full swing now!

Three great egret chicks.

The great egrets even talk while flying!

Closeup of a tricolor heron.

Great egret ballet.

St. Augustine Rookery Photo Shoot

I have a new commercial photography website. It is Ken Albin Fine Art Photography. The website company does excellent printing and framing work and I highly recommend them. If you are interested in a nature or wildlife photograph or canvas please check out my site. I currently have more than 140 photographs there. Many of them are placed into specific galleries to make it easier for you to find something specific you may be looking for. I hope you enjoy my efforts to show the beautiful scenery of Florida.

Last week I went to the St. Augustine Alligator Farm wild bird rookery to take some nesting photographs. It was a humbling experience shooting next to professionals from National Geographic and several other famous magazines. I certainly learned a lot being with them and had a great time with this opportunity to capture some images of these beautiful birds. The rookery is a swamp where herons, egrets, and storks come to raise their young. They have the natural protection of a group of alligators under the nests who keep ground predators away.

A great egret mom and her chick.

A roseate spoonbill in flight.

A wood stork. This is an endangered species.

Silver Springs - Last Photo Set

Here are the last of the better photos taken recently at Silver Springs, Florida. It was a very enjoyable outing though I am sad that the park was almost totally vacant. The economic collapse has really hit parks like this one hard and I only saw about 10 cars there. My fear is that places like this will fold up over the next year and we will lose some of the true nature gems in Florida.

My photography is available as framed,matted prints and greeting cards at
Fine Art America.


Yes, llamas have an attitude! You can see the smugness in the face of this guy.


This rhea certainly was not shy. She followed us around and was very curious about the camera.


Yes, I know they were just enjoying the morning sun but I can't help but think of this as a reptilian conga line!


Flocks of migrating white ibis were just starting to fly into the park.


Though it's not a nature photo I couldn't resist throwing in this shot taken from a glass bottomed boat. It is a set of underwater statues used in several of the old I Spy television episodes. They also wound up in a James Bond movie as well, serving double duty. They are fiberglass but the scene reminds me of those photos you see in National Geographic of sunken Greek statues.

Silver Springs #2

As promised, here are 4 more shots taken at Silver Springs, Florida. My nature photography is available at my website on Fine Art America as prints or greeting cards.

This set includes a cormorant, a goat with a smug attitude, a screech owl that was injured and could not be released back into the wild, and a giraffe. Hope you like them!

Silver Springs Trip #1

All of the photographs seen here can be purchased as greeting cards and prints at my website hosted by Fine Art America. Of course the art site photos are higher resolution. Please consider supporting a starving retired teacher by purchasing a nice nature photograph professionally matted and framed.

Well, I took a day trip to Silver Springs, Florida Friday. It's been ages since I've been there and I knew I could get some interesting photographs. In fact I have an embarrassment of riches in the number of nice captures so instead of choking the post with a large number of photos I will break them into several posts of 4 shots each.
Please bear with me as I share these over the next week and I hope you like them.
The first set is a flamingo, crocodile, barn owl, and yellow-bellied slider turtles.

Washington Oaks and Big Talbot Island Parks

I've been a busy photographer this week! First I went to Washington Oaks Park. Here are some shots from there. My photos can be purchased at http://fineartamerica.com/profiles/kenneth-albin.html


This motorized parachute was cruising above the beach.


The beach has a strange set of eroded coquina rocks there that make for a very artistic view of the ocean.


The algae covered rocks there were fascinating


and this little sandpiper was happily looking for morsels along the beach.

Next I went to Big Talbot Island and fed the mosquito population there. Wow, 95 degrees never felt so hot!


Here is a pretty little zebra longwing butterfly I found.


There is a funny story behind this ghost crab shot. I was trying to get down an embankment to the beach. The sand gave way under my feet and I slid on my tush the last 6 feet, winding up directly in front of this startled guy. I grabbed the camera and got a few good closeups of him before he recovered his senses enough to scurry away.


Speaking of crabs here is an Atlantic horseshoe crab I found at the edge of the water.


This poor osprey never did find a fish for lunch while I was there.


We will say goodbye to the beach there with this closeup of one of the dead oaks laying along the beach. There are hundreds of them there due to erosion, giving this section of beach its nickname "the Boneyard".

Till next time have a good week!

Another Nature Walk

Hi all! I've been going crazy the past week because my Nikon D5000 had a recall to fix a potential power problem so I have been without my baby! It's back now so I spent yesterday hiking 4 miles along a local nature trail. Here are three photos I took. As always, my photos are available as prints/greeting cards from my Fine Art America website.

This photo is of berries from the possum haw shrub, found near swamps. It adds a bit of color to the drab summer landscape.

and this one is another flying great egret. I never get tired of watching these beautiful creatures.

This last photo has a little story behind it. The poor male grackle spent 30 minutes fluffing his feathers out and loudly singing to a nearby female. She completely ignored his advances. Ah, the neverending story of love!