While George Boyd was training for marathon runs, he listened to the birds and tried to identify their call. This helped him take his mind off the training. Soon, listening wasn’t enough – he also wanted to know what they looked like. So, Boyd began bird watching.
With book in hand, this new student of nature often spotted the bird, only to have it fly away before he could correctly identify it.
The solution: take pictures.
For more than 10 years, Boyd has been photographing the area around White Rock Lake and, in April as in years past, displayed his portraits as part of the Earth Day Celebration at the Bath House Cultural Center. Visitors to the Center have had a rare opportunity to see nature’s wildlife and wildflowers up close and personal. Boyd’s amazing portraits depict the animal and plant life that call White Rock Lake home.
Before last year’s show, Boyd began to make stationary note cards out of the extensive photograph collection he accumulated over the years. Now, under the name Nature Images, you can buy the note cards at such places as the Dallas Arboretum and Wild Birds Unlimited.
For this year’s show, he added framed photos of wildflowers. Boyd also is taking slide photographs during his daily excursions to develop presentations.
A retired businessman who has lived in our neighborhood most of his life, Boyd also has catalogued more than 150 wildflowers during his nature walks. His interest in wildflowers blossomed when his mother was unable to travel to see the dog-toothed violets. Boyd took pictures instead, bringing them back for his mother’s enjoyment.
“It has a spiritual side,” Boyd says. “It’s a real blessing seeing the artistry of God and photographing it big enough to really see the detail and appreciate it.”
Boyd says photography and birding go hand in hand.
“It is a challenge to take a good picture, an action shot that is magazine quality. It is a fatal disease.”
