Distinctive & Weathern Farm Buildings, Colorful Road Ditches, and Strange Bird - Photos by Bob Kelly

Today's drive a few miles south west of Ames yielded more distinctive, weathered, and tired farm buildings, still standing proud where their purpose was formerly served.  The road ditches now are filled with colors and textures as the warm weather and plentiful rain nourishes flowers, crops, and weeds.  I first saw, and then heard an unusual bird perched on a fence post.  I approached in my car slowly and grabbed a few first frames, in the event it flew away, which is often the case.  This bird was content to hold its ground....or post, and remain doing what it was doing not bothered by me.  It looked to be a type of wading or shore bird, so what was it doing atop a fencepost?

These tired farm buildings with rusty and ventilated roofs and accompanying retired truck bodies, rest proudly in a sea of corn, the very crop for which they were most likely built originally.

 The skeletal remains of a windmill, a silo, and other farm buildings, along with machinery from previous decades all rest here, surrounded by soy beans.  The farmer most likely cannot afford to tear them down, so here they stand, abandoned in place for other to see, reminding us of a times past.  We see them not only for what they were, but also for what they are in today's world, a visual reminder of a different era in agriculture that involved silos to store chopped corn to feed to cows in the winter, and barns in which the cows were milked, and kept out of the cold.

 The tassels of the corn are spread, exposing the pollen grains that blow and fall down onto the silks of the ear.  This pollination causes each of the kernels of corn to form on the ear so it can be harvested for animals and people.  In the foreground are delicate white sculptures called Queen Annes Lace, and for good reason!  The yellow Black Eyed Susans are scattered about, with a few lavender blooms of the Wild Bergamot.  In the lower center is a small clump of purple Horary Vervains.  The rusty woven wire fence, with a row of barbed wire above it, and the rusty fence post which helps to hold them up have most likely been in place for many decades.

 In the road ditch on the opposite side were a large grouping of lavender Wild Bergamots, mixed with some Cattail Reeds, displaying their long hot dog shaped seed pod, that in a month or so will erupt and blow all over the area, planting new seeds.

I believe my mysterious bird turned out to be a species with a common name of Greater Yellowlegs or pectoral sandpiper.  It is primarily a shore bird found along marshes and other bodies of water, where it eats on small insects.  So what was it doing atop a fence post, next to a bean field?  Maybe surveying a road ditch or a farm field for puddles of water, then again maybe not.  I would welcome a more conclusive identification if you know of one.  It was still fun to see and photograph, and was a perfect way to end an afternoon shoot.