Bee mine

Bumble bees. They aren’t honey bees. Bumblebees have a much more fraught social life. (Everyone but this year’s queens die off before winter.) They aren’t meat bees aka yellow jackets; yellow jackets are aggressive little minions of the devil with mostly hairless, yellow and black bodies. Bumblebees are hairy all over. Carpenter bees have hairy thoraxes (upper bodies) and smooth bottoms. Bumblebees are rumored to be poorly designed for flight. But they are definitely flying around our garden this year. Here’s a few images of these bulbous pollinators. If you want to learn more, you can visit the Bumble Bee Watch website. We know, right? Who knew there was an organization dedicated to just bumble bees.

And just for comparison, here’s a member of the Devil’s supporting cast, direct from Hades, the all-around nemesis of woods people, the Yellow Jacket.

Boyd TurnerSeptember 29, 2025Comment

Time for a refresh

Sometimes the ol’ place just needs a little work. The Image Galleries of our site had not been re-worked in a while. So we pruned the galleries down to six: Animals, Cities, Clouds, Mountains, Plants without green, Streams. We replaced almost all the images in the galleries with images you probably haven’t seen. A few of our absolute favorites remain.

We hope to add new galleries more frequently. Maybe more like projects that are too big for a story here in the Journal. And we are thinking about adding occasional limited time galleries. In short, The Images section of this site is getting some extra love.

We hope you enjoy the refresh. You can let us know by sending us a comment.

Boyd TurnerSeptember 4, 2025Comment

A Glittering

We don’t know who created the various words for groups of animals. Some group names are just generic: a herd of deer, a flock of geese. But some are quite appropriate. Maybe none more so than a glittering of hummingbirds.

Here’s a selection from our files that proves a group of these tiny birds are truly a glittering.

Rufous hummingbird and showy milkweed. Oregon

Purple-throated mountain-gem (male). Costa Rica

Purple-throated mountain-gem (female). Costa Rica

We hope you enjoyed this small bouquet (also a word for a group of hummers.) If you wish to see any of these images larger, you can click on the image for a larger pop-up version.

A technical note: You will notice many of these images are from Costa Rica. The cloud forest there has a variety of birds that are spectacular. These Costa Rica images were captured in 2012. Since then processing techniques have improved dramatically allowing more of the full potential of the digital image to come through. This allows us to present images we thought were disappointing, in a manner more true to the light in which we originally saw them.

This freshly polished group of hummers, from Costa Rica, as well as the western US, are, we think, a truly glittering group.

Boyd TurnerAugust 3, 2025Comment

An Evening to Remember

Sometimes you just have to stick it out. Maybe the game goes down to a 3-2 count with 2 outs, no runners on in the bottom of the 9th and the home team rallies to pull off the win and advance to the championship. Maybe the bird won’t move from behind the stick and then suddenly flies to a new perch next to your head. Sometimes a photographer just has to be patient. And then sometimes there is an embarrassment of riches. Maybe the evening starts with shadow rays and golden reflections.

And being a sunset you know it is going to change quickly. But you don’t anticipate it would go blue and red.

And then the light begins to fade but the last bit of light and color doesn’t seem to want to let the evening go.

And then the storm rolls in.

All the images in this entry were captured over the course of 39 minutes on July 3, 2025.

It was an evening to remember.

Boyd TurnerJuly 4, 2025Comment

Spring Saunter in Keukenhof - Part 2

Details. If you have read a few (or many) of our stories here on our Journal you will probably notice we love to photograph details and textures. With 7 million planted bulbs at Keukenhof garden in Holland, there are lots of opportunities for beautiful details. The late April flowers are incredible. Making interesting images wasn’t the hard part. Winnowing down the choices to a manageable number was. Here are some of our favorite, more detailed images. Like a broader scene? Then don’t miss Part 1. Didn’t view Part 1? Have a thing for looking at things in the “proper” order? Just scroll down to Part 1. Or you can look at Part 2 first. Dip your toe in for a feel of either one, just be sure to make it all the way through. We hope you enjoy a tiptoe through the tulips of Keukenhof.

Boyd TurnerJune 2, 2025Comment

Spring Saunter in Keukenhof

Holland, 7 million bulbs, and a spring day. Must be Keukenhof. Their brochure says they are “the most beautiful spring garden in the world.” That’s a pretty high bar. But it is a spectacular place. In the first of two stories, join us as we saunter, maybe even tiptoe, through the tulips.

Thanks for taking a stroll through the garden of Keukenhof with us. If the pictures don’t fit your device try clicking on them and they will open in individual “lightbox” versions where you can see the whole image at once (even on a phone, although bigger screens ARE better.) Check back soon for part two of a Spring Saunter in Keukenhof.

Boyd TurnerJune 1, 2025Comment

Back in Death Valley

People go to Death Valley for a variety of reasons.

Unsurprisingly, we find the landscape spectacular.

But one of the things we are always fascinated with here are the textures.

And the colors of the rock, well, forgive us, but, we are rocked by the colors.

And of course there is the night sky… Add a warm invigorating breeze and wonderful company, and the valley should be re-named Life Valley.

Boyd TurnerApril 12, 2025Comment

California Dreamin'

Snow is in the forecast, the sky is gray, it’s still a winter’s day in Central Oregon. But a few hundred miles to our south, spring has arrived. So we went for a walk, on such a winter’s day, in a place where the grass is green, the leaves are starting to appear, the birds are singing and the flowers appear. We hope, your heart soars as the dream of the California spring in the oak savannah on Mount Diablo comes to our cameras and to you. Let’s take a walk on such a spring day.

Hope you enjoyed the stroll. Time for a glass of Yorba Wines’ Tempranillo. Remember clicking on our images in the journal will open the image in its own window.

Boyd TurnerMarch 11, 2025Comment

A Bandon'd Evening

Winter on the Oregon Coast can be gray and wet. It may be windy and powerful. Or it can be a time of calm and serenity. A time, perhaps, to abandon ones thoughts of the rest of the world. And if you find yourself at a famous central Oregon coast beach, it may be a Bandon evening.

Boyd TurnerFebruary 3, 2025Comment

Power of the Pacific

The power of the Pacific Ocean is often on display along the Oregon coast. Mariners used to refer to these latitudes as the ‘Roaring Forties.’ High winds create large swells. Most of the time the Oregon coast is swaddled in fog too. But occasionally the sun comes out, the wind blows, the swell rises, the full moon pulls the ocean a little higher and photographers rejoice. We recently found reason to rejoice in the power of the Pacific. We hope you will find enjoyment in these images too.

Boyd TurnerJanuary 25, 2025Comment