with a menu of photography, books, jazz, poetry, and other items occasionally

Saturday, August 11, 2012

Hay Bales Within a Drought

Pictured below are hay bales in one of my favorite fields. This part of the Kansas City metro area used to have more open fields and undeveloped areas. Since I moved here in 1998, I have seen fields sold to create the parking lot for a big box store and have seen houses going for $300,000 and more built to the south and the west. Fortunately, there are a few areas that have escaped development. Whenever I am running errands or commuting, I sometimes get the chance to drive past this particular field. Although there are usually two cuttings of hay in this area, the drought has reduced the amount of hay that can be cut this year. Three or four weeks have passed since this most recent cutting. Like the grass in my yard, this field hasn’t seen much growth. Our first substantial period of rain in about seventy days fell a couple of hours after I took these pictures. The anvil shape of a developing cumulonimbus cloud is visible in one of them.

If you should decide that you want to see these pictures blown up a little, click on one and then zoom in by clicking on 150% or 200%.