Bird Day Thursday-- Bird's Eye Review

So far haven't done much promoting of my own Etsy shop in these blog posts. So for today's Bird Day Thursday, I am going to feature one of my personal favorites from my shop, and give a little background info.


"Hidden in the Holler" is a photo that I took a few years ago while visiting my family in West Virginia. On the long, winding dirt road that leads to my Dad's cabin, deep in the heart of the state, I came across a group of Turkey Vultures (or buzzards) sitting in the newly-turned Fall foliage. The "holler" is what the locals call hollows, the deep valleys that run through the countryside, creating scenes like this one-- the dirt road was at a higher elevation than the trees, giving me a rare "bird's eye view" of the tree tops and the bird's perch. [For a more detailed definition of the term "holler", I came across this blog ]

I love this photo on a personal level because of the wonderful memories of visiting my family, and the fact that Turkey Vultures are such an inaccessible bird to me (I usually only spot them soaring high up in sky). Artistically it's a favorite because of the brilliant colors of the Autumn leaves contrasting with the dark tree trunks and nearly hidden silhouette of the large vulture on the branch.

Currently this photo is only available in the Photo Tile format--The photo has been mounted on a 4" x 4" recycled ceramic tile, with a hanging wire that is also recycled--hand-fashioned from wires reclaimed from an old chandelier. But I will be offering many of my photos as prints and in other formats in the near future....so stay tuned.

Since my immediate family (and some extended) resides in West Virginia, many people make the mistake of thinking that I am from there. I grew up in New York State, in the Mid-Hudson Valley-- Poughkeepsie-area, specifically a smallish town called Wappingers Falls. My family, including my Mom, Dad, and younger brother and sister, migrated to WV in 1992. I stayed in NY with my aunt, and then moved to Seattle about 6 months later. So I have never lived any part of my life in West Virginia. My paternal Grandma, aunt, and cousin soon followed my family to WV, providing me with a convenient one-stop visiting situation. For about the past 12 years, I have been making the trek, usually by train, back to the East coast about every year or two, giving me lots of great photo opportunities that I don't get here on the West Coast.