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Wantagh, New York, USA. February 20, 2019. Scene of split rail wood fence and beyond at Mill Pond Park on Long Island. 180 degree fisheye view, 3 digital versions.

180° Fisheye View: Mill Pond Park

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From LONG ISLAND – by Ann Parry (ann-parry.com)
February 24, 2019

Wantagh, New York, USA. February 20, 2019. During snowfall, 2 swans and some mallards swim in Mill Pond Park on Long Island. 180 degree fisheye view of Nassau County public park. (© 2019 Ann Parry/Ann-Parry.com)

Wantagh, New York, USA. February 20, 2019. During snowfall, 2 swans swim in Mill Pond Park on Long Island. 180 degree fisheye view of Nassau County public park. (© 2019 Ann Parry/Ann-Parry.com)

When it started snowing Wednesday, I decided to go to a local park to test my new Nikon fisheye lens* that arrived a few days earlier. 

I’d capture 180-degree fisheye, 31-degree Fahrenheit landscapes.

Wantagh, New York, USA. February 20, 2019. Split rail wood fence and beyond at Mill Pond Park on Long Island. 180 degree fisheye view. (© 2019 Ann Parry/Ann-Parry.com)

Wantagh, New York, USA. February 20, 2019. Split rail wood fence and beyond at Mill Pond Park on Long Island. 180 degree fisheye view. (© 2019 Ann Parry/Ann-Parry.com)

Eisenhower Park, in East Meadow, with its beautiful lake and Veterans Memorial area, was too far from the pet supply store also on my itinerary, so I went south to Norman J Levy Park, in Merrick, where I found a “Park Closed Due to Weather” sign on the entrance gate. 

So I headed east to Wantagh and parked along Merrick Road near the wood gazebo at the gate-less south border of Mill Pond Park.

Wantagh, New York, USA. February 20, 2019. Snow falls at Mill Pond Park, with partly shoveled path leading to wood gazebo on Long Island. 180 degree fisheye view of Nassau County public park. (© 2019 Ann Parry/Ann-Parry.com)

Wantagh, New York, USA. February 20, 2019. Snow falls at Mill Pond Park, with partly shoveled path leading to wood gazebo on Long Island. 180 degree fisheye view of Nassau County public park. (© 2019 Ann Parry/Ann-Parry.com)

Slowly, I walked on the partly cleared path, passed the wood gazebo, and very slowly approached the snowy shore, with a pair of swans swimming nearby and a small flock of mallards further out.

*Nikon AF-S Fisheye NIKKOR 8-15mm f/3.5-4.5E ED Lens

  • fisheye lens set at 170-degrees – cropped series, swan in pond:

3 views of swan looking around on pond during snowfall at Mill Pond Park, Wantagh, NY, Feb. 20, 2019.

180-Degree (Fisheye Lens – Nature):  MY GALLERY

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Photo Illustration: Cammanns Pond in Merrick, New York, USA, © Ann Parry, FromLongIsland.com

Cammanns Pond: Or, New Year’s Eve in Space

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From LONG ISLAND – by Ann Parry (ann-parry.com)
December 31, 2018

Cammanns Pond

Tonight, ten days after the shortest day of the year, and hours before the stormy last hurrah of 2018 would become the dawn of 2019, I stopped at Cammanns Pond on my way home.

Struggling through the downpour, the light from the street lamp behind me surrendered before reaching water’s edge.

Merrick, NY, USA. Dec. 31, 2018. A raft of ducks sleeps hidden at Cammanns Pond during rainy New Year's Eve. (© 2018 Ann Parry/Ann-Parry.com)

Merrick, NY, USA. Dec. 31, 2018. A raft of ducks sleeps hidden at Cammanns Pond during rainy New Year’s Eve. (© 2018 Ann Parry/Ann-Parry.com)

Rain coated the windshield seconds after each sweep of wipers, and dashboard lights bounced on the glass and water, so my bullseye view was light from distant buildings slashing an abyss.

But, after countless visits, I knew waterfowl must be near. Once my eyes adjusted to the darkness and I covered the instrument lights with an infinity scarf, I saw hints of a silent, nearly still raft of ducks midway between shores.

Aiming my iPhone from the space between steering wheel and windshield, I captured rain smeared photos of two bare trees standing sentinel in front of the pond.

Going outside, I stood behind one tree trunk then the other, to avoid throwing a shadow, and leaned out to take photos of the ducks, pond, shores and beyond.

No home is an island

Then I sat silent and still in my car as ducks slept at the Merrick pond, on the deluged south shore of Long Island…

on the northeast coast of the United States on Earth as it orbited the Sun, in a spiral arm of the Milky Way, in the Virgo Supercluster…

as we made our way in the universe this New Year’s Eve –

forty years after the world understood global warming and still had time to avoid crisis.


• NASA: Global Climate Change Resources
• Bloomberg: Climate Changed
• NYTimes: Losing Earth: The Decade We Almost Stopped Climate Change
• United Nations: Climate Change

fyi fLI
What’s the correct spelling of the name of the Nassau County park on the south side of Merrick Road between Lindenmere Drive and Babylon Road? Several versions appear, including on government sites. 

The park’s named after the Cammann family. In 1890 Hermann Cammann bought the Carmen farm house property on the north side of Merrick Road, across from where the park is now located, and he rebuilt a larger version of the house.

So – despite its glaring absence of a possessive apostrophe next to the “s” – I’ll go with the name on the park sign: “Cammanns Pond“

Cammanns Pond: MY GALLERY

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