Category Archives: Birds

Red Bellied Woodpecker

I have had a hard time getting this little fellow to pose for me, but I guess the hunger associated with winter and the need for bird seed from the feeder made him cooperate a little.

Red Bellied Woodpecker, Peek a Boo
Red Bellied Woodpecker

This is a great subject that I hope to have more success with in the coming months.
Have a great weekend!

Cold Winter

First I want to start the day off by wishing my beautiful wife a Happy Birthday! Lee Ann, you are the best!! 😉
This winter has been difficult on many of the birds that call New England home during the summer months. While I admit that I am a fairly new (young :-)) birder, I was amazed to see ice/frost on the backs of these Canada Geese. I need to do some research to see if this is a regular occurrence. Interestingly enough, none of the ducks or Brant Geese at this location had any frost on their backs. Im not sure why that is but I am now on a mission to find out!

Canada Goose at Sunrise

I was drawn to this spot originally by the sunrise reflecting on the water. But that quickly faded (it was an overcast morning). Since I had driven all the way down to the water and realized I wasn’t going to be able to make any sunrise images, I decided to practice long range bird shots. The two images here are taken with a Nikon 600 f/4 and 2.0 TCE III, the equivalent of 1200mm of glass. That is the longest combination you can get with Nikon gear. The focus on the images is pretty good, better than when I first started using this combination a few months ago. However I’m missing the sparkle of light I needed to make the eyes stand out. So much for overcast days.

Canada Goose Foraging

Many locations I wanted to photograph this winter have been difficult to access due to snow and ice. Given that we expect temperatures to rise this week and melt some of the ice and snow, I hope to get to some new locations. One such location is Barnegat Light in New Jersey. I look forward to sharing with you images from these new locations.

Northern Cardinal

As my wildlife and nature image libraries continue to grow, there are certain birds that are more illusive than others. One such bird is the Northern Cardinal.

Northern Cardinal

This fellow landed near me and while I would like to take credit for “stalking” him, the truth is these images were more luck than skill. Still, I believe I can do better with some more progress. While snow still covers the ground in the Northeast, seeing Cardinals fly around the yard makes me feel like spring is not that far away.

Northern Cardinal 2

Duck

No, you are not going to bang your head. 🙂 I’m talking about the bird!

Mallard Drake Foraging

I took a ride to Long Island Sound the other morning and loved the shimmer of the sunrise on the water around these Mallard ducks.

Mallard Ducks at Sunrise

Unfortunately, the birds down by the water this morning were not very habituated to humans. While I was the only person there (it was 18 degrees f), the birds wanted to have nothing to do with me. These images are taken with a 600mm f/4 with a 1.4 TCe-III. Still not enough glass which is the story of my life!

Have a great weekend.

Bufflehead

This has been a week of firsts for my image files. Unfortunately non of the firsts were files I would consider keepers. So goes the life of a photographer.

Bufflehead Drake and Hen

The difficulty in photographing Bufflehead is the location of the eye in relation to their dark feathers. You truly need to “catch light” (pun intended) in their eyes in order to tell they even have eyes!

Bufflehead Drake Catch Light

The other thing to try and do is show the different color reflections their feathers emit as the light hits them from different directions. In the image above you can tell that the drakes feathers are emitting a green tint given the light angle.

The real trick is to be able to show all these things and not end up with a butt shot!
Have a great weekend!

Hooded Merganser

I had the chance to add a new subject to my image files this weekend. One of my favorite things to do in photography is create images of wildlife I have not had the pleasure of observing and shooting before.

Hooded Merganser Male

As I mentioned the other day, I plan on exploring Greenwich Point Park this winter. I headed down there on Martin Luther King Monday at sunrise. As you drive down the main road, there is a pond on your left hand side as you pass the stone gates. This pond is part of a sanctuary. Due to recent snowfall, the walking path around this area is not plowed.

Hooded Merganser Male 2

The night before I saw what I thought was a Hooded Merganser in the pond. However, the subject was back lit and the light was not worth making any clicks. I decided to return in the morning when I could position myself so the subject would be front lit. I had attempted to get out of the car and move around the subject so it would be front lit. However the Hooded Merganser would have none of that and quickly swam off when I got out of the car. So I needed to use my car as a blind. The hope was the park would be very quiet in the morning so I could use my truck as a blind. It worked well. This was not practical the previous eveing given the park traffic and position of the sun at sunset.

Hooded Merganser Female

Caution: The park road is VERY NARROW and due to the snowfall shared by cars and walkers. This park is very heavily used and using your car as a blind is not always possible. It was 14 degrees fahrenheit this morning so I figured I would have little competition for the road from walkers/joggers!


The Blubb

Needing to use my truck as a blind gave me the opportunity to use a Christmas gift my wife purchased for me. The product is called the “Blubb” and is available through Art Morris’ Birds As Art website. I plan on writing a review of the Blubb in a week or two.

The above Male Hooded Merganser was with 2 females. One of the females appeared to be a breeding female. While I added some files to my image library I did not get a shot I am really happy with, due mostly to the fact that the Mergansers wouldn’t come close enough to the truck :-). Even with a 600mm f/4 and a 1.4 TC, I didn’t have enough glass. Another reason is that the morning was overcast and I think the subject would pop if the light was better. I look forward to bringing you captures of this great subject as I head back to Greenwich Point Park.

Note: Picture of the Blubb courtesy of Birds As Art website!

Greenwich Point Park

Ring Billed Gull Reflection

Recently I spent some time at Greenwich Point Park. In short order, I have become very fond of this location. I have seen several species of gulls, ducks, swans, eagles, starlings and geese in just 2 visits. I plan on spending a lot of time here over the winter. Why over the winter you may ask? This park is closed to non-Greenwich Connecticut residents from March 1- December 1, this is why I have not been there before now. 🙂

The only problems I have seen so far are the crowds. One visit was during the week while the other occurred on the weekend. During the week there were a lot of people, on the weekend it was mobbed!

Even with the crowds, I plan on heading down there this weekend, MLK weekend, to see what I can find!

Monday Musings – Fresh Snowfall

The east coast had fresh snow to deal with this weekend. Temperatures stayed cold all weekend and winds were minimal so many of the trees and bushes stayed coated in the white stuff. I tried to make as many “pattern” images as I could. Criss crossed branches with drifted snow on them creates an interesting design element. A difficult element to control when photographing patterns is DOF (depth of field). In most instances with good light, I prefer to utilize as much DOF as possible when photographing patterns in the snow.

Snow Pattern in Black and White

When I made this image I was thinking about black and white so while in Photoshop, I used Nik Silver Efex Pro to convert the image to B&W.

The other area of interest for my photography this weekend was, you guessed it, birds. There is nothing quite like adding snow as an element in bird photography.

White Throated Sparrow Hiding
White Throated Sparrow Eating Snow

There have been many White Throated Sparrows at the feeders this year. I would estimate at least 12. The other big resident in terms of numbers is the Dark Eyed Junco which is a challenge to photograph in the snow. While the Juncos are plentiful, they are not in the numbers that we had last year.

First Bird Images from Effortless Bird Feeder

I have been writing the last few days about this feeder. Its the first in a series of back yard projects I started building bird photography perches. Here are the first bird images taken using my perched out Effortless Bird Feeder.

Black Capped Chickadee

I have had a lot of fun using this feeder. Actually, so much so that I might buy another and take down the feeders I have hanging in the trees. The one warning I will give you is with squirrels. The baffle on the bottom of the feeder keeps them from climbing the pole. However, you need to keep the feeder far enough away from bushes and trees so that they cant jump onto the feeder platform. I learned that lesson the hard way 🙂

Tufted Titmouse on Perch

Backyard Bird Photography Studio

2 weeks ago I wrote that I planned to try 2 solutions to creating a perfect backyard bird photography studio. One would be purchased and the other homemade. Both would require some customization but my goal was to do this in a manner that would be easy enough for anyone to replicate. I decided on the “Effortless Bird Feeder” as my purchased option, you can read about it here.

So after a few days of using my pimped out bird feeder, I have to say I made the right choice. The results have been truly amazing. I was able to use this combo in the middle of the blizzard we had last week. I will post some of the bird images on Friday but suffice it to say that it held up well to 60 mph winds and 18 inches of snow with 4 ft drifts.

Below are some images I made of how I added the perches. Remember, my intention was to do this in a way that any of my readers could replicate with no need for power tools or mechanical knowledge. At some point after using the feeder, I might change the perches but so far I have been very happy with the results.

The first thing you need to do is find branches that will make perches suitable to the birds in your area.

Use Gardening Tape to Make Perches One Piece
Use Cable Zip Ties to Attach Perches to Base Using Drainage Holes

Below is the back of the unit once complete.

Back of Completed Unit

Effortless Bird Feeder from the Front

These might not be the best pictures of the unit, I only had my iPhone with me when I took them, but I think you get the point.

The most important element however is that the birds love it and I have had many different species on the perches in just the first few days.

Enjoy making your studio and let me know if you have any other customization ideas for this unit.