Aloha all. I have been a little scarce around these parts lately. On reason is that my underwater camera housing has been in the shop so I haven't been getting any new shots for a few weeks. There are other reasons I won't go into here. It is pouring rain here on Oahu today so I thought I'd post one of these photo diary things. If you are not familiar with these I simply post them as diversions from stresses of the day, and as a reminder that we share this planet with a wide range of amazing creatures.
Today I am going to just post a mix of photos, mostly from the archives. There is no theme other than the fact that many of these creatures are in danger of disappering from the wild.
Red-Tailed Tropicbird
Hawaiian Monk Seal, critically endangered species. Only 1,000 left with populations continuing to collapse. Strangely their numbers are actually increasing in the populated main islands but falling drastically in the isolated northwest islands.
Snowy Egret, Bolsa Chica CA
Water
Brown Bear Female, Katmai National Preserve
Billions of dollars worth of gold and copper threaten the environment of the Katmai Penninsula and Bristol Bay if the Pebble Mine is constructed.
A sunset
Red Fox Katmai National Park, Alaska
Lion Pride, Botswana. Lions populations in Africa are collapsing from well over 400,000 in the 1950's to possibly as few as 16,500 now.
Harlequin Shrimp
Bigfin Squid
Bottlenose Dolphins
Hyena Cub
Waimea ShorebreakAs the climate changes the ocean is getting more energetic, producing larger wave events.
Leopard, Botswana
The leopard is the great generalist among the big cats, able to survive in all kinds of environments from semi-arid to rain forest. While many subspecies and populations are threatened, the species as a whole is doing realatively well. Emphasis on relatively.
Land's End, Cabo San Lucas, Mexico
Moose Love
Great White Shark, Guadalupe Island, Mexico
Nene or Hawaiian Goose
The state bird. DNA studies show this bird is exactly what it looks like, a Canada Goose that decided to just stay in Hawaii and become squat and plump. It's feet have also adapted to walking on rough lava rock. They are endangered and are only doing relatively well on Kauai due to the lack of invasive mongooses present on the other main islands.
Commerson's Frogfish (juvenile)
African Wild Dog
There are possibly as few as 3,000 of these amazing hunters left in the wild. More information here.
Spinner Dolphin
Composite photo of one jump.
African Elephant, Botswana
The big matriarch makes a false charge.
Hawaiian Red Lionfish
Another Hawaiian Sunset
Rusti the Orangutan, Honolulu Zoo
The Sumartran species is critically endangered, the Bornean species is endangered.
Bowser the Yellowmargin Moray
I shot this last year. I first met this moray seventeen years ago when I first moved to Hawaii. It lives on a wreck/articial reef known as the Mahi on the Waianae Coast. It has lived a long time with this mangled jaw.
Snow Goddess Nudibranchs
Of course diaries always are better with bOObies!!! wOOt!
Red Footed Booby
Feel free to treat this as a community photo diary and please be good humans. If you have any problems with this diary I refer you to the Complaint Department:
One note about the Princess because I know she has many fans here. She is a very old little house cat. I adopted her about fifteen years ago and she was already a full grown, mature cat at that time. This year she has started to really slow down significantly, she no longer goes up and down the stairs and she doesn't move around much. While there is nothing really wrong with her I don't think she has a whole lot longer to go. I say this only to prepare you, her fans, as well as myself. Of course I could be wrong.