Nature Up Close: Another Hike With My Macro Lens
I love walking the woodlands of Northeastern Pennsylvania. The beauty of nature appears in so many forms. A beautiful waterfall. A view from a mountaintop. A bald eagle in flight. Mountain laurel in bloom. A deer, bear, or fox. I can go on and on. Another aspect of nature, often overlooked, is looking at its beauty and complexity up close. 
On Sunday I again walked with my camera and macro lens. Once again I was searching for wild edible mushrooms, and once again I wasn’t successful. Not wanting to reveal my mushroom woods I took photographs of nature we sometime miss, such as this image of the common, but intricate, chicory flower
The late summer flowers, including the goldenrod, considered a weed by many, attracted many bees and wasps.
There were numerous grasshoppers jumping from along the trail as I walked, some landing on a leaf or twig long enough for me to get a photograph. 
Beetles could also be seen on the flowers,
some still doing what beetles do to continue the next generation. 
I found a few areas of milkweed again and was pleased to again find quite a few monarch butterfly caterpillars. 
It is good to still see them in our area, How long will they continue to be seen here is uncertain. Large areas of their winter habitat in Mexico are being destroyed. 
My search of mushrooms took me to a mining reclamation area and I found some flowers I had never seen before including the delicate flower of the bush clover. There were many large shrubs covered with this tiny flowers.
Wild basil could also be found growing along the trails. 
Queen Anne’s lace flowers are found everywhere in the woodlands of our area this time of year. 
As is ground clover and it pretty pink flowers. 
The beautiful blue flowers of the cow or blue vetch could also be seen. 
There were some puddles and wetlands in the mine reclamation area and here I saw many frogs jumping into the safety of the waters. I was able to capture a photograph of a few before they hopped away. 
Growing in the puddles and ponds was another plant I had never noticed before , American water plantain. 
As I walked back to my car, without having found any edible mushrooms I saw this buck watching me walk by. 
I did finally find a few mushrooms, none edible, including the pigskin puff-ball, This mushroom is poisonous and actually not a true puff-ball, My dad called them “shoe polish” since they would cut them in half and “shine” their shoes with the soft inside of the mushroom when it was young. As it ages it does become a puff-ball. 
We through many of them at each other as children laughing as the mushroom exploded sending a cloud of brown powder into the air. Good memories they are. Here is a link to some more photographs from my hike. Macro Lens Hike September 1 2019. 
“If your pictures aren’t good enough, you’re not close enough.”
– Robert Capa
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