Scouting for flowers with a smartphone… before pesticides kill them all
Armed with a smartphone to scout for flower photography locations, you are faced with the somber reality: municipalities controlling weed growth are killing wild flower gardens everywhere they reach.
A smartphone is not the camera I want to use it for my photography, but it can be useful if you’re scouting locations to pave the way for your next workshop or photo session. Or just to chill out! I was lucky to find a place, today, where some groups of flowers are a clear invitation to one or more visits the next days. I just don’t know how long those flowers will survive!
With some loosening of the social distancing rules, a return to photo workshops is, probably, about to happen, especially if you can do it with safety for all participants. Small groups (3 maximum, in my case), some distancing, participants that are easy to contact - just in case -, and you might have the conditions to go ahead.
I was out today, scouting one more of the locations I like to visit. It’s getting harder to find flowers, or places where you can photograph them without trouble. Yes, two things seem to contribute to make it harder to photograph flowers: municipalities using pesticides to limit weed growth, and apparently killing everything else, too. The second problem is different: the growing number of rules in many public parks, limiting the practice of photography.
Pesticide Free Towns
Where I live, I’ve to contend with the two problems. From public parks to roadsides, some municipalities seem to be overusing herbicides to control weed growth, not aware that their action limits biodiversity. Pollinating insects and other beneficial insects, soil micro-organisms, birds, amphibians, pets and so on — including humans — suffer with this option, which goes against the general concept that asks for cities free of pesticides.
Many communities around the world have made efforts to get rid of harmful toxics. In Europe, the PAN Europe (Pesticide Action Network) fights to get Pesticide Free Towns. Portugal joined the project, in 2018, with a parish in Lisbon, Estrela, becoming a pioneer in Portugal, signing the pledge and taking steps by using non-chemical weed control methods in the public areas in the parish. We’re in 2020 and only a second Portuguese parish appears in the project’s page: Fornelos. Apparently, not many cities care about the idea of reducing pollution, as herbicides used in urban areas are a major source of water pollution and other problems.
Cutting out pesticide use in cities is common sense. Cutting out pesticides will lead to spontaneous plant growth occurring. The concept of allowing a few wild plant species to grow on pavements, along footpaths and in cemeteries is slowly gaining popularity, and hopefully one day we will see real nature developing in the towns, according to the PAN Europe (Pesticide Action Network).
My travels across the area where I live show that wild flower patches are simply vanishing. Yes they are still present, but in the three municipalities I cover — Mafra, Loures and Sintra — many of my regular destinations for flower photography are no longer offering me the same experience I had years ago. The problem is that wild flowers growing in public parks and areas closer or within towns are also being “cleaned” in ways that show a clear lack of understanding of the importance of those “wild gardens”.
Wild flowers are vanishing
The last couple of weeks, driving around in search of places to visit, to create photographs of flowers “My Own Way”, I confirmed that wild flowers in open areas are vanishing, and with them biodiversity. The same happens in public parks and roadsides, due to excessive cleaning, and as noted by many, the use of herbicides.
Public parks should be pesticide free areas, but they should also be free areas for photography, and in an age where everybody photographs everything with smartphones, photography is being forbidden or limited at many parks. This is an experience I’ve had for years in my region, but it’s getting worst, especially if you’re serious about your photography.
I understand that public parks place limitations to the use of the area for fashion or wedding shoots or anything similar, but since when does a photographer need to ask for permission to photograph a frog in a pond in a public park? I was stopped from photographing one, once, and I’ve had other similar adventures at different parks. As soon as you spend a few minutes studying a composition and show your long, probably white, lens, someone will appear and say that you are not allowed to take photos. It’s as if only smartphone shooters can have fun, these days!
Using a smartphone for visual documenting
As I mostly use a 100–400mm lens for my flower photography, it’s very hard to keep a low profile, and I am usually singled out and told that I need to ask for permission and pay a fee, before being allowed to photograph inside a public park. So, being able to shoot these initial images of flowers, does not mean I will be able, in a few days, to share with you, here my results with the proper gear.
The photos published here reveal potential flowers to add to my collection of flowers photographed My Own Way, but as any scouting expedition, I’ve documented other photographic opportunities that may also give me some good photos, and excellent reasons to spend a whole day at this location.
Although these are essentially visual documents for reference, I’ve captured both vertical and horizontal shots in some cases, because it helps to understand the options available. General images that show a whole group of flowers and then others with single elements contribute to create a clear notion of the variety of opportunities available. Browse through the images and imagine how much better and how more options you’ll have with a real camera and different lenses. Despite the limitations of a smartphone, some of the shots published here are good, showing it pays to find ways to control a smartphone go beyond snapshots. That’s something that never ceases to surprise me, although I prefer my DSLR and a good lens..
