Today’s photo is some farmland. Some rice and just harvested barley (I think).

About

They rotate these patches every year here. This year they have rice and barley. It looked like barley anyways to my cityslicker eyes. I took this several weeks ago so the rice was only a few weeks old which is why it’s so low. Nice place here to walk and enjoy nature.

Today’s photo is a pleasant scene from a rice field with the multi-colored light from the sunset poking through and highlighting the clouds nicely.

About

If you look closely, you can see a bunch of people walking in the photo. Towards evening, many drive to the rice fields just in order to take relaxing walks through them. I’m sure this amuses the farmers to no end.

Today’s photo is from Shirakawa-go, a small farmhouse in the middle of some rice fields, and a weary farmer sitting down for a rest.

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My big shot of Shirakawa-go (which I’ll repost below) has become by far my most popular HDR, with more hits than all of the rest of my photos combined. So I thought we might revisit the village today. If you want to learn a bit more about the village, see this post where I talk about it a little.

Compared to the other farmhouses of Shirakawa-go, this one is somewhat small. Maybe it’s not a farmhouse then, but rather just a shed for storing the harvested rice and tools. I’m not sure. The farmer here is taking a well deserved break. That farming is tough work!

Other Shots

Here’s the other Shirakawa photo.

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Today’s photo is a nice sunset taken from some rice fields. The rice is only a few weeks planted, so still plenty of water visible in the paddies to give us a nice reflection.

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Rice has always been the most common crop in Japan. The volcanic activity of the island makes the soil very acidic which makes growing rice ideal.

These days, however, the popularity and consumption of rice is decreasing rapidly as more and more people turn to bread and other Western foods. Not only that, but the rice fields themselves are disappearing. Young people don’t want to be farmers, so no one is replacing the aging ones. No one is quite sure what is to come of this situation.

If you look closely, you can see some school kids hanging out in the photo. I suppose a patch of rice fields is as good a place as any to avoid adults and get some privacy.

What do you think? Let me know in the comments.

Remember, I offer the full-size version of this. Zoom in and let it fill your screen. I find HDR works best when the photo is too big for you to take completely in, so your eyes have to wander around. Try it.

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A few other rice field shots

There are always a lot of people walking around enjoying the atmosphere of the place so it is sometimes a challenge to get a photo without anyone in it, but sometimes I get lucky. Here’s one I rather liked from this past fall. I have versions of this photo with the camera at ground level so as to better capture the rice, but for some reason I liked this one the most. Can’t really say why, just do. Enjoy!