Chattanooga's Tennessee Aquarium: Part 3

in #photography7 years ago (edited)

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After my wife and I exited the excellent reptilian exhibits, we found ourselves in an unexpected exotic environment filled with excitement!


We had walked around the aquarium and met some seahorses and starfish in the first installment of the Tennessee Aquarium series. Then we watched giant river rats, swam with alligators, and found a turtle doing stand-up comedy in the second installment. Now it was time to check out the seasonal exhibits atop the Ocean Journey building. Only this time, our journey was going to take us into the world of some dry-land creatures.

This is what we saw...




We reached the top of the escalators and stepped into a warm and sunny world. I saw a small furry animal high on a ledge at the back of the first exhibit. It was some sort of small, dog-like thing.


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He spotted me and appeared to be saying something...

"Why don't you take a picture? It'll last longer."

It was a good suggestion. A little blurry, but it really captured the brief moment we had together.


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I already knew what these next animals were! They're stripe-tailed rock monkeys! I read an article about them in the National Geographic magazine back in the 80s. I retain knowledge very well.


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This one preferred sitting in a fake tree. He probably knew it wasn't real though.

"Hey, guys. Check out my tail!"


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What do these guys see? Should I be worried?

Oh, great...now I'm worried.


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This guy really just wanted to eat. That's my kind of monkey right there.


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And this guy just wanted to play with the jugs. That's my kind of monkey right there.


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"Guys. For real. Check it out. My tail. Pretty cool, isn't it?... Right???... Guys???"


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We moved on from the needy monkeys and entered an enchanted and quite humid forest of insects. But they were the good kind of insects...

Butterflies!


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They were all shapes, colors and sizes, but the Indigos Giganticus were pretty hard to miss. And they also liked posing everywhere, which didn't hurt their chances of being photographed.


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"Hey! Look! I'm on a sign! Take my picture!"


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"Hey! Look! I'm on your camera bag! Take a picture!"


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"Hey! Look! I'm on a picture of me! Look! It's me! Take a picture of me...ON ME!"


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And here we have a butterfly on a wood hand rail.


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This butterfly is on a plant. It's an exotic plant. And an exotic butterfly. What a combo!


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Here is an orange and black butterfly on green leaf.


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Orange and black butterfly on green leaf, Part Deux.


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Butterfly on a stone bench. Maybe it was tired?


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Two butterflies fighting for food. Things were pretty intense for a moment. Can you feel the hostility?


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These friendly neighbors decided to share. As it turned out, there was plenty of food for everyone.


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I couldn't tell if this one was a boy or a girl. Color schemes can be confusing.


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Black on white.


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White on black. On white and green.


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What's this?

It's a bird!

It's a plane!

No! It's...

Oh...nope. Sorry. It's just another butterfly.


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That's all for episode three! We'll wrap things up in Part 4, coming soon!


Thanks for stopping by and I hope you enjoyed the photos. If you have any critiques or advice on photography, let us know in the comments. I don't have a true macro lens, so forgive the lack of fine details on the butterfly close-ups. Perhaps I'll get a good lens for those photos someday.

All photos were taken by me with my Canon 6D.




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Image courtesy of @mynameisbrian


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Sweet butterflies, colours are great and such a large variety

all the butterflies are very beautiful and I really like them.
I always follow your post, and thank you for sharing your adventure to us all @ats-david

Great pictures! Those lemurs are pretty crazy. Their tails are so long compared to their bodies.

The lemur is a wonderful animal ... with those eyes ... But butterflies, they are perfect models ... Not easy to photograph in all their beauty. Good job

Today there is something wrong with me,but after read you post, i find small animals also live happy, i shoud be happy too ,thanks

I enjoyed reading this post and looking at the pictures! The format is great too, just the right amount of writing and images! Such beautiful butterfly pictures!

Thanks for the animal post @ats-david .... only problem is everytime I see a stripped tail monkey (or whatever resembling a ringtailed lemur), I think of King Julien....damn Dreamworks meme!



I've followed and Up-voted you!

Hiii,,,,@ ats-david looking so beautiful different colours of butterflies.u have excellant choice of photography.original and creative asa wel as great article

😃😃😃 Thank u & best of luck

Hi @ats-david enjoyed reading your post, the monkey tail was something else and I've tried to get butterfly photos, but I've never seen so many in one place like that. When you were talking for the butterfly I was wondering what its voice sounded like. LOL

What voice did you come up with?

I was thinking the donkey in Shrek! ha ha

That photoggraphhy skills and those buttterflllıes daaaaamnnn you are true man of art

A man of art. A man of the people. A man among men.