When I went down for a swim one day, the water was rough so I stayed on shore and wandered around taking photos. There’s a hollow in a rock that the birds bathe in and I usually check that out. This was the scene on that day.
There are a lot of feral cats in this area, and I suspect that one of the bathing birds was rudely interrupted in its activities.
This week’s Sunday Stills color challenge theme is ‘Ruby Red.’ See more responses here.
The top photo shows a Crown of Thorns sea star, which feeds on coral, though not to a problematic extent in Hawaii.
The second photo illustrates a definite problem. When I stopped by the Harbor House restaurant at Honokohau, these were the only two Kona Brewing taps available. I was told the company has discontinued their Castaway IPA, which, if true, is a sad state of affairs, it being by far their best beer in my humble, but completely correct opinion.
The bottom three show a Gold Dust Day Gecko on a torch ginger, a Budweiser (not my beer of choice) sign at the Harbor House, and what I think is a Western Blood-red Lady Beetle.
When I first saw this spider on the front door, I thought it was a small Hawaiian Garden Spider. But after it had been there a while I got a closer look and realized it was something else and that it wasn’t going to get any bigger. I don’t know what kind of spider it is, and I don’t know if it’s going to survive there, since I’ve never seen it catch anything, but I like the shadow it casts on the door.
A Painted Lady Butterfly feeds on a Kiawe flower.
I saw this anole down at Honokohau Harbor in Kailua Kona. It was asserting its rights to a patch of territory there, though it didn’t look particularly promising as far as harboring much in the way of food. It’s also an area that tends to be thick with house sparrows, hanging around to snag leftover French fries at the Harbor House restaurant, which is where these photos were taken from.
This week’s Sunday Stills challenge theme is ‘Again the Solstice.’ See more responses here. I didn’t have any good ideas for illustrating the solstice so, instead, plumped for photos taken on the solstice.
The top photo, I’ve run before in 2019, but who doesn’t love a grumpy cat? The second photo, from 2021, is of a royal palm amongst other tropical foliage. These palms can grow to 70 feet tall and look very stately when planted in a row. This one was quite a bit smaller.
The bottom two photos show a Fiery Skipper butterfly on a Mesembryathemum flower in 2020, and a Pacific Day Octopus hunting in the company of a goatfish back in 2018.
A Sonoran Carpenter Bee forages on purple bougainvillea flowers.
This week’s Sunday Stills Monthly Color Challenge is ‘Pink.’ See more responses here.
The top photo is an appropriately named Pinktail Triggerfish. Below, we have a Gold Dust Day Gecko cleaning the windows, a pink hibiscus fronting an orange tree, and an Hawaiian Stilt with an itch.
Graham's Island 