Hi Keith Yes, 1/4000 is usually fast enough to stop the wings, depending on how close you are to your subject. When you try to stop a hummingbird in flight you may need more speed, again depending on how close you are to him. When I shoot hummers I usually ask the camera for a little more speed, just in case. All of the pictures up to now have been of the first fledgling. Here are three more shots. The first is of the second fledgling of the three, and the last two shots are of the third fledgling. I have cropped them 100 percent. If you look closely, you can see the nest dust flying off them. Also you may notice that the first shot was taken at 1/5000 sec. I shoot in aperture priority. On Tuesday I set the ISO at 1000 and the lens wide open (f/2.8). The camera decided the appropriate shutter speed. Maybe there was a change in the available light. All my cameras are capable of 1/8000. I often dream of cameras and lenses too. :-) Dave

Thanks! Still behind; I have another web album of photos I've not yet posted. We camped in the yard last night as usual in our screen tent, and apparently the jaguar is back..the dogs suddenly went crazy and we heard the strangest, loudest noises. I went online and found some of what we heard on this link-scroll down to audio clip http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/mammals/jaguar.html Besides the wails, grunts, rumbles, it also kept making explosive snorts..like an alarmed deer, except MUCH louder, more explosive, lower down, and dragged on and on until my bones vibrated. It seemed the sound wrapped around the tent, and I didn't know where to point the huge spotlight we keep next to us. DuBois plant to take a tape recorder with us this time, in case it returns. I also plan to download jaguar sounds and play them next to my web cams on the hill to see if we can lure it in for a photo. We've not seen its tracks since this march..guess it has a huge territory. Our neighbor was approached by a half grown black jaguar while hunting on our property in the fall of 2006 so it should nearly mature now. Just this spring, another neighbor a few miles away spotted a black jaguar on his farm, so it's still alive. Photo of suspected jaguar track, click on "full screen" http://picasaweb.google.com/rachelbro3/BigFootTracksScat#5317982295991557506

Thanks for sharing your techniques. I saw a peek-a-boo in F&P (I think) and I have been wanting to make one. They are cute. Rosa

Annie, I don't think anyone objected to your answers. I have to remind myself to use salt because a lot of foods taste naturally salty to me. When I'm cooking for the elders, I have to balance enough salt so their worn out taste buds are happy (they don't eat enough when the food seems bland, so I salt with more verve than usual), but not enough to put them over "go easy on the salt". Luckily, they're not restricted, beyond things like salted pretzels and fast food (the latter of which they wouldn't want to eat anyway). It's interesting about the perception of chain restaurants as salt palaces, however, because I find some of them tolerable on that level. Not that the food is great, but I have some friends who for convivial occasions only want to eat at those places. In California, at least, there's some basic nutrition info on the menus, and the salt isn't nearly as bad as in a lot of fine dining restaurants where they believe in "layers of flavor" or "every component must be seasoned [i.e., salted]." Every now and then I eat something out that's really delicious and I realize that, while it doesn't taste salty, it is a heavier hand on the seasoning that is the thing that makes it so. That's rare. Often, I'm presented with food that's otherwise well prepared, but overwhelmingly salty. The food at the chain chain restaurants my friends take me to may not be wonderful, but they really don't overdo the saltiness. Hm.... They're the kind of places where seniors make up much of the early rush. Maybe that's why? BTW, I do make the brisket with coke recipe because it's universally loved, and who am I to object (it's one of the recipes that came up when packaged foods first started having rabbinical checkmarks that they were kosher--especially at Passover when everything has to be new and more kosher than kosher, have premixed, certified for Passover, sauces and seasonings can be a massive help). It's a whole brisket (or about 10 lbs.), a 12 oz. can of coke, a bottle of Heinz Chili Sauce (i.e., fancy ketchup) and a packet of Knorr onion or leek soup mix. It doesn't necessarily all get used. Enough to cover. There's plenty of salt! It doesn't make the meat salty tasting, although it does a good job breaking down the connective tissue. I've made a GF version which calls for soup base (Better than Bouillon, which has been recommended in this forum), but that's way, way saltier, and I had to rewrite the recipe to use my own concentrate! Which didn't have enough salt, and the brisket was fine on the cook but underseasoned. I think that might be part of the reason why soup mix became so popular in the first place -- because it's more aggressive on the salt than many people would have the courage to do. I remember a couple of decades ago reading that the secret to every Italian (in Italy) mamma's cooking was bouillon cubes. The piece was kind of alluding to the food shortages following WWII as an origin for this. All I could think is the secret is not "soup"! It's salt and MSG! (My mother's "secret" is good homemade chicken stock which has no seasoning in it.)