Hi there my Hivean friends and followers!
Welcome to the 123rd round of my special weekly photo challenge known as Appreciate Beauty of Nature with @phortun :)
I know a lot of photo contests with nature as the main theme were/are/will be hosted by various people on the Hive blockchain but I wanted to come up with something more than just another photo contest where participants would submit their best natural photos. Therefore, I decided to go for quite an unusual concept that I am going to introduce in the following lines.
The aim of the Appreciate Beauty of Nature with @phortun photo challenge is not to make you dig up your photo archives and submit the best pictures of nature that you have ever taken. Instead, I want you guys to go out and appreciate the beauty of our nature right now.
The internet (and the Hive blockchain as well) is flooded with picture perfect shots of landscapes, mountains, forests, beaches etc. taken years ago. But this is not what I want to see in this challenge. I want to see shots that may not be necessarily stunning but they must be fresh, proving that you have just physically spent some time outdoors in the fresh air. But remember that nature comes in many forms. It doesn´t have to be a pristine jungle or a deep remote forest. An urban park, a botanical garden, a little grove on the outskirts of your town - pretty much any place with some trees, plants, rocks, bodies of water or any other natural features would be just as fine ;)
Obviously, there is no way for me to verify whether the photo that you submit in the challenge is really fresh or if it was even taken by you so I am relying on your honesty guys. The prizes for the winners (as described below) are more symbolical than overly motivating so I don´t expect too much fraudulent behavior in this challenge anyway.
I want to keep the rules of this challenge as simple and benevolent as possible so let´s agree on just this:
Only one entry (photo) per person per round.
The photo must be yours and not older than one week.
Add a few words about the photo, at least where and when you took it.
You can start submitting your entries to this round in the comment section below from now until the next round.
Prior to publishing the next round post, I will pick 3 winners, give my full upvote on their entries and feature them in the next round of the challenge. As long as the response is not too overwhelming, I will also try to give some smaller upvotes on all of the other entries to reward all participants.
I might change the concept and/or the rules of the photo challenge later on, depending on how things go. I usually host the challenge on Thursday but when needed for some reason, I can host it on some other day so better check my blog regularly not to miss out on it ;)
To keep up with you guys, I submit my own fresh natural photo to every round´s post too :) Here is my contribution to start out this round:
Summer is officially here, which means the colorful blooms are slowly disappearing from nature. I mean some flowers and trees are still blooming of course but generally, the colors in the parks, forests and meadows here in the Czech Republic are not as vibrant anymore. I tried to capture something beautiful for you today as I was walking around what the locals call the Central Park here in the Prague neighborhood of Stodulky and after checking out the pictures that I took, it was actually this thistle close up what looked like the best shot so I´m sharing it with you :) I took the photo just about one hour ago while getting baked by the scorching noon sun :D
In the last round, we had 9 participants. After some thorough consideration, I decided to pick these 3 winners:
@bilgin70 with this entry from Turkey:
First of all, I would like to thank you for such a competition. Thanks to you, we had the chance to discover new places shot instantly. I hope we come across many great photos. I also want to contribute to this round; yesterday, I had a lake cruise with my friends and I had taken pictures. I want to share one of them with you. Location: Karaman, Turkey.
@friendlymoose with this entry from the Netherlands:
It's always a pleasure to follow this great initiative. Lot's of cool nature photo's again. As a lot of flowers and plants are in bloom, there are a lot of bees in my backyard too. I took this one yesterday. Location: the Netherlands.
@ander.alban with this entry from Iran:
Hello and what a good challenge, I like that concept! It might be a bit unfair but luckily I was hiking last week in the mountains of northern Tehran, Iran but it counts ;) It was amazing to hike to 2600 m with a whole view on Tehran and see the city lights wake as the sun sets. That's not visible here in this picture, it will be a dedicated post probably so if you wanna see that, you might soon.
Congratulations guys! It was my pleasure to give you 100% upvotes on your entries :)
I am looking forward to what you will come up with in this round.
Have fun and appreciate the beauty of nature!
I post this series in the Amazing Nature community, a great community for all nature lovers. Feel free to check it out ;)
This post was created by me for the Hive blockchain exclusively. All rights reserved.
Interesting contest!
I'll try to participate.
I took this photo on 06/22/2022 during a lunch break walk in my city near Moscow.
On this flower, several insects acquaint with nectar at once. Large Eurasian bee beetle (Trichius fasciatus) . From a distance, I thought it was a bumblebee. And it turned out to be a beetle unfamiliar to me, which I had to identify using the Internet. Amazing yellow and black pattern. Interestingly, there is also a small beetle at the top left of the frame, and also with a beautiful pattern.
Hey there, welcome to the challenge and thanks for this beautiful entry! :)
My entry:
We visited yesterday the Biopark in Fuengirola Spain
I normally wouldn’t visit a zoo for many reasons, but this zoo is different. It has space for the animals. They can run around almost freely, lots of area and nature. Rivers and waterfalls. So many trees that it almost feels like wandering through a jungle. They are well cared for. Luckily.
High up in one of the trees I spotted this Golden bearded Gibbon. It was enjoying itself.
The day was rather warm, as it is summer in south Spain, but being under the trees in the shade made it almost comfortable. A nice breeze was going through the area.
It is nice to see the animals here are well cared for. So it didn’t make it too hard to have a look around. I was showing hubby the zoo, as he had not visited it yet in his 15 years being around here.
It was a lovely day out. 😎
Enjoy your Monday @phortun 👋🏻
Thank your for this great entry and interesting personal write up as always! :) Honestly, my relation with zoos is also complicated, I guess for the same reasons like yours or any other nature lover´s but it always makes me happy to find out about a sanctuary or similar facility where the animals really have the chance to live happy and cofmortable lives. This one in Fuengirola looks exactly like this, at least from what you wrote ;) Thanks again, have a lovely day!
I think we have the same thoughts there… but this one is different luckily. Otherwise I sure wouldn’t go. Not supporting animal cruelty. It is nice to see there are parks created around the animals and not just animals put in small cages. Going crazy and running in circles.
They looked happy and very healthy. Lots of little babies around all different kinds.
I visited many many years ago, must be 10 years now, and it so changed even more now. The nature grew more vast… and I saw the animals thriving.
Thank you kindly 👋🏻You are welcome @phortun 😁
I´m so happy to hear all of this ;) Thank you for sharing these great news with us!
You are welcome @phortun 😊 enjoy your evening!
Lots of great submissions again!
I'm joining again with a post from my backyard here in The Netherlands. This one was taken with my phone just 5 minutes ago.
I've just posted a blog about my Ox eye plant which attracts lovely insects when I saw another butterfly on it again. A peacock butterfly.
Awesome shot! He looks so cool on the yellow background, wow :) Thanks for another great entry man, picking the winners is getting harder and harder every round :D
Thanks mate!
I know what you mean. I'm also running my own contest and the winners is always hard.
I took this photo from the terrace of my friend yesterday. I just saw a great golden hour and wanted to take the photo.
Location: Istanbul
Nice one, thanks! Good to see you here again after a while :)
!LUV it! I'm a sucker a good sunset shot! As you'll see from the comment I'm about to share in this thread 😁
Let me join this week with a photo of Rick on the peach 🍑 tree…
Photo tAken on 22 of June 2022 in bulgaria at my village Resen.
Namaste 🙏
@tipu curate
Aww, this is adorable! Excellent timing of the shot :) Thanks for this lovely entry my friend!
Upvoted 👌 (Mana: 12/32) Liquid rewards.
Oooooh. Cute!!
From Bangladesh - I took this picture this afternoon while enjoying the sunset on the river bank 🥰
Interesting place, thanks for sharing it with us :)
Hi @phortun and all nature lovers,
Every time in a while it also rains on the island where I live, Ibiza. I go out almost every day for a walk in the countryside of the north of the island, and a couple of days ago it rained lightly during the whole afternoon. Since I love the smell of wet earth, I decided that even if I got a little wet it wasn't a big deal, so I grabbed my camera and headed out to the northern territories. During the walk among the crop fields there are usually carob trees, many of them consumed by time and lack of care. This one in the picture I am submitting to the contest is an example of survival, it still has some live branches, but from experience we know that soon, the tree will be dry and will be used to make firewood for the fireplace.
Hey Xavi, I´m glad to see you here again :) Thanks for sharing this interesting picture with us. Greetings to Ibiza!
Many thanks to you as well for creating this funny room.
Po dlouhé době se také přidám :-).
Fotil jsem to 22.6.22 při služební jízdě. Zrovna jsem se vracel z jedné chaty v údolí říčky Vydry na Šumavě. To kamenité koryto si zaslouží detailní snímek. Tak snad někdy příště :-)
Ale ale, to jsou k nám hosti :) Moc pěkná fotka, díky. Jen ten text prosím příště prožeň překladačem, účast tu mívám už téměř výhradně zahraniční, tak ať si můžou ostatní počíst ;)
:-)
Měl jsem toho včera "plné kecky" a na nějaký překlad si ani nevzpomněl :-)
Chápu :)
:-)
Last light! It was INTENSELY bright orange when I thought to take a photo and then only minutes later when I finished whatever I was doing this was all the light that was felt in the day.
Location: Brisbane, Queensland, Australia.
Beautiful, thank you :) Love the palm tree silhouettes and the gently changing shades of the sky :) Great shot.
Ta! (As we say in Australia 😀)
Next time I'll see if I can capture one earlier too! 🌇🌆
Congratulations to all the winners!💚
Hello @phortun and Amazing Community!
Here's my entry for this week Appreciating Beauty of Nature.
Taken this photo yesterday morning on our way to the school of my kids. Along the way, we stop for minutes and take a photo of this wonderful beauty of the nature, "clear blue sky and the big tall trees".
📍Marawi City, Philippines
Beautiful scenery, the trees look so majestic! :) Thank you.
I !LUV your photos and your contests!
Today I ll share two images I took yesterday.
I was walking around an abandoned house, that has some plants which I enjoy seeing and taking photos of.
On a green leaf, a big locust was sitting.
I used to be afraid of them (still am when they are flying around me) - but now I like watching them and getting as close as possible.
And a close up :)
I hope I made you smile a little bit.
Are you afraid of locusts? (grass hoppers?)
What do you call these in your country? I call them ;ακριδα' (akrida) in Greece
Good Luck everyone!
Hey there, good to see you here again :) This is a lovely close up. I love grasshoppers, they like to pose for some cool shots. Here is one I took in Costa Rica years ago, that´s one of my favorite animals shot I have ever taken actually :)
The Czech word for this animal is "kobylka", which literally means a little mare (female horse).
Oh wow, this is an impressive kobylka :)
Never seen a similar one here in Greece.
!LUV !BEER
Thank you for your kind reply! A pleasure to (always see and sometimes) participate to your contests :)
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Thank you :) I think this tropical species may only be native to certain places in Latin America...
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Appreciate Beauty of Nature with @phortun: round 123
Currants (Ribes rubrum) from my garden ..
It has a specific taste ... On Saturday I visited the garden and saw ripe currants ... I picked the fruit until someone else ate it .... 🤭
I took a picture of her on Saturday after the rain ...
I hope you like currants, and that you have at least tried them🥰
I love currants! All of them, the red ones, the black ones and even the white ones :) This fruit is very common and popular in my country too ;) Thanks for this nice entry!
I also love all kinds of currants ... 🥰
My pleasure @phortun 🤗
sir for the beautiful scenery.Wow the extraordinary natural images bring to life the scent of the noise of beauty. Thank you so much @phortun
Thanks for your kind comment and feel free to join the challenge with your own entry ;)
Congratulations to the winners 🥳🥳 great entries!
Hope to go out this weekend, last weekend we were too busy with other things and no nature around us hehehe
Have a wonderful day today all 👋🏻😎
Cool, we will be looking forward to your new entry :) Have a beautiful day yourself too!
Thank you so much @phortun 😁👋🏻☀️
Thank you 🙂
You are welcome 😁
Congrats to the winners!
I thought you would like the winning shot from Turkey ;) @bilgin70 has been doing a great job promoting the natural beauties of your country.
I'm glad you like it. Thank you again for choosing. It encourages me to work harder 🙂
Yes, it is very good. I didn't know that Karaman has such natural beauties.
Thank you 🙂
Hi Phortun! Is that Thistle native to the Czech Republic? We have Thistle that grows here in Australia but it's a weed! Though I know it has to be native somewhere !LOL 😀 It's a great shot BTW.
@bilgin70, your photo entry from Turkey is gorgeous! It makes me want to visit Turkey😊
again?Now, to peruse my phone and see if I've taken any great shots in the last few days. Can I share one here that I've used in a post elsewhere @phortun? Or is that kind of missing the point; do you want us to get outside
Thanks for your comment! I believe the thistle is native to our country, there are actually many different thistle species to be found in Czech nature :)
Oh and yeah, you can use a picture that you already used in a post, sure ;) I just need the picture to be yours and not older than 7 days, that´s it ;)
On it! And good to know, thank you !LUV 😁
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I'm glad you like it. There are many such places in Turkey for sightseeing. I hope you have a chance to visit 🙂
I hope so too. It's on the list!
Wow!!!! Beautiful post
Thanks.