It seems like everyone is getting into the blogosphere now, and I suppose its finally time for me to give it a try. I've been posting my nature and wildlife images to Flickr for a few years now, and have built up an archive of around 700 images as of this posting. While I enjoy the community that Flickr offers, I also often have more to say of the story that goes into the pictures I take, and I feel like a blog is a better place for that to be.
![DSC_7803_flickr_cp](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_ure3_R3K-hrFAbTXUUSvh3-iRRSaoEwKHnU5HoQqeMyJ-AfwdZQ8po9xg1VBWNNy-GuC3-7J9XK0HUGxoeL3LEpwfbeizV038CcFNML0xiKuJR7e5daVtEuYRVn0jtUtY=s0-d)
Since shorebirds are my favorite subject, it seems appropriate to use them for the inaugural image. Here's a pair of semipalmated plovers along Limantour Beach in Point Reyes National Seashore. What I love most about this image is the expression of the bird in the background. From this trip, I came back with a variety of plover portraits, but the images that stood out the most for me had something cute or different in the background. I suppose some could consider it distracting, but for me, it shows the expression of the birds and gives it a bit more life. While this pose was just the finish of a stretch during some preening, I see a look of pure glee -- sort of fitting for these cute little birds.
Here's the more "normal" version of this image. I like this one too, but it doesn't pull me in quite the same way.