It's monarch season! Not the parasitic sort with the fancy titles, butterflies! Monarch butterflies are probably the only royalty that I can say I'm fond of.
We're about half overrun with zinnias and cockscomb and the butterflies seem quite happy about that. The swallowtails have mostly cleared out it seems but the monarchs have replaced them. Along with about million other, smaller flying things.
All the butterflies really seem to love the zinnias but the monarchs have been the most skittish by far. For all the other butterflies I've been able to shoot with my 50mm but for these I had to drag out my 70-300mm and ended up shooting almost exclusively at 300mm.
The zinnias are as tall as I am now so it's damn near impossible to shoot them from above. I was a bit surprised when this one landed on a marigold, I'd not seen them on those before but I couldn't pass up the opportunity.
Was trying my damnedest to catch them in the air but these suckers are fast. About like trying to find a squirrel with a rifle scope.
Had a few close calls but I was still off by a hair.
"Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee." Did y'all know Muhammad Ali was from here in Louisville?
This guy was just here to watch the show.
That's enough out of me, time to fly on out of here.
