Snakes and Stones

I don’t have tumbler, so I’d be looking at cabbing it.

In case you ever might want to sell these images some day, I wanted to pass something on. Probably in some message somewhere here or elsewhere in the forum I mentioned that I'm a former wildlife photographer "finder" who specialized in long photography contests especially with herps. At times, I became frustrated with the great pains the photographer would take to get a snake's tongue flicker just right, especially when I was the animal wrangler close to the danger zone of a large viper. I did become adept at various methods to elicit that tongue flicker even after the snake got all settled and seldom would do it. The message to impart is the photographer emphasized that a photo of a snake with the tongue in mid-flick was worth more money and attracted more attention from the viewer than otherwise. The ideal was when the flick was at that moment of maximum bend, either going up or going down. This was something I had never thought about, but later when reviewing thousands of our images to submit to the judges, I must admit that I too found such images more attractive than others. You may have already pondered this and made your decisions about the images you wish, but in case this is useful to you now you know.

I must admit it was pretty entertaining to hear all the expletives spewing when that snake seemed to sense how to flick perfectly out of synch to the photographer. I secretly enjoyed that part.

Photo #105


Carnelian Agate--mostly from Africa, a few interesting pieces from India. 

Some of the pieces shown have been vibed for months to carefully remove small imperfections.  

Photo #107



My gf calls this stone a 'slice of blueberry pie'.

Photo #109

Some river stones from my area-part of my first polish batch from the UV45.

Last Fall I was looking at a map of my area and I noticed that there was a former soapstone quarry which was now labeled as conservation land. 
A short trip to the site revealed a lightly used trail in the woods.
Nothing unusual about the trail...if you don't count the random tree with all the fake birds/bird houses...

The quarry itself was quite inhospitable (large pools of water with questionable depths).
A Barred owl persistently following me tree-to-tree ever watchful-added an eerie feeling of being in the woods. 
I did take some pictures of the owl, but, my camera has minimal zoom and the photos are not worth posting.

When I arrived it appeared that someone had the same idea ahead of me and had already dug a 3-4' hole in the ground into what appeared to be a 'discard pile' to the quarry.
I dug down another foot and found nothing.
Disappointed, but, not eager to leave empty-handed: I collected some shale.

Shale is a sedimentary rock. 
I can easily scratch it with my fingernail and break it into pieces with my fingers. 
Terrible tumbling material, but, I was so preoccupied with whether I could, I did not stop to think if I should...and tumble I did...polish I could not.
I do like to photo document the stones I tumble (good and bad)...so I tried to coordinate it into a photo with some different pieces...still ugly (two pieces at the top of the photo below)... 

Photo #111

Photo #112


Some shed stuck on this guys head...his body posture would indicate that removing it for the photo would not be a good idea.  

Sunset Blvd gif hmmm?  I know that movie is among the old black and white classics...I have no compulsion to watch them...

The only old shows I would watch/rewatch these days are the original Twilight Zones.