Today I went on a trip to the Raakmoor nature reserve with my loved one. This was urgently needed because the last few days have been very frustrating here on our doorstep. For some reason the magpie offspring left the nest quite early. They hopped through the day here, well guarded by their parents. We helped with water, apples and worms, which was gratefully accepted.
The little ones couldn't fly yet, and the older ones chased away any danger with loud chittering and flapping wings. The neighbor's cat knows a thing or two about it and often fled frantically. However, the little ones had no chance against the cars speeding down our narrow street on the right. One after another, they ended up under the wheels. The last, and actually the biggest, happened yesterday, right in front of the "Caution: Children" sign pointing to the elementary school at the end of the street. It was an extremely frustrating experience for me. The drivers didn't even flinch.
It is a complete mystery to me how one can drive so carelessly through a street where a child can jump out from between the cars at any time - but a bird is clearly visible sitting on the cobblestones. It was even worse for my wife, who was standing on the balcony watching the hustle and bustle outside when a car turned the corner with great momentum...
On the way in the Raakmoor nature reserve
That's why we both urgently needed to get out today and experience nature up close. Photography is not my specialty at all, but very much that of my loved ones. So I let them decide where to go. She decided on Raakmoor because she hadn't been there yet. It was a great choice: easy to reach on foot from the Langenhorn Nord stop, very natural, varied, with lots of water and there is a great ice cream shop on the way back. Of course I have no idea what I photographed - I had to google it at home. Something with ducks, banded demoiselles and other dragonflies, a frog, a butterfly and a little nature. Not my thing at all, but beautiful.
I had this in my camera bag 12-24mm f/4*, I bought my brand new one from a local dealer on Friday for the unbelievable price of €440 35/1.4 by Samyang* and the one used here almost as a macro 100-400mm f / 4.5-5.6*. The camera was the one A7RIII*. And if I can give you a tip for this megapixel colossus: JPGs on a slow card in compartment 1 and a fast SD card for the RAWs in compartment 2. When importing the RAWs, I wasn't even halfway through importing all the JPGs of the day looked through it and marked it for later editing. This really saves a lot of time.
Either way: nature can be really fun. And hunting animals without hurting them is even more important. In any case, I had a lot of fun being out and about in the Raakmoor nature reserve. Maybe you too when looking at my pictures...
A great report about a great piece of Hamburg. Even as a child, I went to the frozen “lake” in winter and played hockey. And on the way was the football field...
Thank you Stefan for this childhood memory!
Why unusual, since you also do portraits? But tell me, how did you get the dragonfly to squint? The frog does it somehow automatically… 😉
Nice insight into nature, I'm always fascinated by the allotment garden alone, what it stands and crawls and flies and sings. And broken things are part of nature, the way of things, only sometimes with a large anthropogenic footprint.
Everything is correct, except that the footprint thing is too simple for me. I've been to Buddhist countries too often for that 🙂
Stefan Groenveld as a biologist, I agree with you, the entire biosystem is far too complex for humans to understand and regulate “for the best”. In other communities people are more humble and try to accept this complexity. This is often VERY difficult for us here.