The Mountain Bluebird (MOBL) is a small sized thrush that prefers open space habitats in Western North American desert and mountainous regions. They are year around residents in the western states however migrate as far north as Alaska to breed and as far south as Central America during the winters. The male MOBL is a vibrant blue colour while the female has more subdued colours with strong blue wing colouration. The Mountain Bluebird is the state bird of Idaho and Nevada.
A few weeks ago a lone female Mountain Bluebird arrived in an open field on the western reaches of Lynde Shores Conservation Area in Whitby and quickly became a local celebrity amongst birders and bird photographers. For many it was their first time seeing one of these beautiful birds.
I was twice able to visit this bird and I’m thankful for one of those opportunities being with nice light for photography. The following are some of the images I was able to obtain of her. These photographs were taken last Friday morning, December 11th.
The object of an image is generally obvious and we always think about it before releasing the shutter however care must always be taken to consider the back ground of every image you take. Often the difference between a snapshot and a great photograph is the back ground. The first two images in this series have the black walls of a barn creating the back ground which creates a high contrast with bird. The great distance between the bird and the barn allowed the use an aperture of f/8 to keep all of the bird in focus and still blur the back ground enough that the barn was completely indistinguishable.
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For the next two images I moved not more than ten feet in order to replace the barn as the back ground with a coniferous tree line in order to replace the black back ground with a green one. Although this is very subjective, I prefer the green which is a bit more natural looking and provides a better contrast with the beak of the bird. Compare images one and four and then two and three. Each pair is pretty much the same compositionally except for the back ground colour. Do you have a preference?
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The remaining images are from a different perch which was located such that overgrown grasses provided the back grounds. The first three images are against a ‘white’ grass/hay back drop creating the brightest of the BG’s and great contrast with the bird….and it also complimented the rather ugly bamboo perch!
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The final three images are against darker grasses that create a back ground shade which is perhaps my favourite of all we’ve looked at today with a nice warm tone that compliments the colours of the bird nicely.
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When a rare bird makes an appearance hundreds of birders and photographers will make a point of seeing the celebrity. Typically that means a plethora of photographs will show up on various photo sharing websites and soon they begin to look quite similar. It’s wise to observe the bird and its various behavioural displays and look for that unusual shot. Sometimes even the very common act of preening will provide that unique image.
The Mountain Bluebird was last seen early Saturday morning when just after sunrise it was observed flying west, presumably to return to its home territory. Often these lone birds that get off track while migrating don’t survive the rigours and dangers of travelling long migration distances alone without the help and safety that comes with travelling in numbers. She certainly looked healthy when I took these pictures the day before she left so I trust that by now she has been re-united with her family.
All of these images were taken using a Canon 1Dx and 500/4 lens with 1.4 x TC for an effective focal length of 700mm.
More than a couple of months ago, when the mercury was hanging around in the mid -20°C range I met up with my good friend and fellow bird photographer Arni long before sunrise and headed towards Niagara Fall’s for a day of winter photography. If you have never ventured out with your camera in the dead of winter, I would highly recommend that you give it a try. There are a few minor technical challenges the cold presents, with reduced battery life and condensation when bringing the gear back into a warm temperature being the primary ones, however these are easily dealt with. Take spare batteries with you and keep them in pockets close to your body to keep them warm and before taking the cold gear back indoors, make sure you pack lenses and cameras back into their cases and don’t take them out until you’ve allowed enough time for the gear to reach room temperature. I always take the CF cards out of the camera while outside so I can start processing the day’s work without waiting for the gear to get re-acclimatized to the house temperature! By far the biggest challenge in winter photography is keeping yourself warm, so always have lots of layers of good clothing, warm boots, gloves and head coverings. A supply of hand warmers always comes in handy.
We arrived at a cemetery in Burlington before sunrise looking for Eastern Screech Owls, where both red morph and the more common grey morphs have been known to nest. We were unable to find the owls so headed on to Niagara Falls and arrived at Dufferin Island which is about a kilometre from the brink of the Horseshoe Falls and home to many birds.
The primary bird we were looking for was the Tufted Titmouse, a non-migratory bird whose historic range was in the central and eastern United States, however as winter food supplies have become more available, the Tufted Titmouse has been slowly moving its range northwards into Canada, primarily in the eastern Great Lakes region. The Titmouse prefers a wet climate and in fact you only find them in areas with more than 24″ annual rainfall, and even more common in areas with 32″ or more of annual rainfall. The Tufted Titmouse rarely ventures more than two kilometres from the nest in which it was born (which accounts for why the expansion of their range takes place very slowly).
Soon after picking a location on the island where the light and back ground were both ideal, we were able to attract a number of these beautiful birds with a little bird seed (there are numerous feeders in the area that are maintained through the winter months to ensure adequate food for the local birds). We were able to get a few decent images of the Tufted Titmouse. The following images were taken with a Canon 5D MkIII and 500mm f/4 lens (some with an attached 1.4x TC for an effective 700mm focal length). As much as possible I tried to use an aperture of f/8 or greater in order to provide enough depth of field to keep the whole bird in focus….at least in profile!
The Tufted Titmouse is the largest of the Titmouse family and they are easily recognizable by their crest and black patch above the upper mandible.
Their colouring is relatively subdued although mature adult birds have a golden yellow flash along the sides of their chest. Juvenile birds lack this colouration.
The appearance of the males & females is very similar, so differentiation between the two is difficult.
The normal diet of spiders & insects is not available in the winter months so the Titmouse release on seeds and frozen berries in the winter. The presence of winter feeders is important for them in the winter as they are non-migratory birds.
The above image was taken at f/10 in order to get as much depth of field (DOF) as possible to keep the whole bird in sharp focus. With long telephoto lenses the DOF is very thin even at small apertures; in this case about 4cm (700mm focal length with a full frame camera at about 25′ away from the bird). I really needed an even smaller aperture as the tip of the tail appears soft. The next image was also taken at f/10 which is OK as all of the body of the bird is within the DOF so everything is sharp. Managing DOF with telephoto lenses is one of the most important factors in getting great photographic results yet is often overlooked by many. Fortunately with today’s cameras that are so good at high ISO’s it is much easier to balance the tricky relationship between shutter speed, aperture & ISO in order to get the best possible results.
It was a cold but beautiful winter day in Niagara and we were treated by a number of other birds who provided some great poses for Arni & me. Here are a few of them.
A Dark-eyed Junco with an over the shoulder look.
….and another Junco enjoying the snow.
Cardinals often top the list of people’s favourite birds, and in fact the Cardinal has the unique distinction of being the official state bird of seven American States, far more than any other bird. At one point in time there were four pairs of Cardinals at our location. The male Cardinal is best known for its vibrant red colour but the female with its more subdued colours is equally, if not more photogenic.
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The ice crystals on the beaks of these next few birds shows just how cold it was!
The White-breasted Nuthatch is a common bird however its propensity to be upside down most of the time always presents an interesting photo-op.
On almost every perch they are facing in the downward direction.
We also enjoyed a visit from a male Red-bellied Woodpecker.
This particular male had a very vibrant red head and belly patch compared to others I’ve seen. The next image shows both patches with a complimentary red back ground provided by one of the male Cardinals! Check out the Woodpecker Gallery for more images.
After a couple of hours in the freezing temperatures we warmed up at a local Tim Horton’s with lunch and large coffees and then just couldn’t resist a walk along the Niagara gorge from the Horseshoe Falls to the Rainbow Bridge. This was mostly to photograph Niagara Falls and the Niagara River, which was completely frozen over this year due to the uncharacteristic cold temperatures. Frozen falls images will be the subject of an upcoming blog post. From a birders perspective it was an unexpected surprise to see the fastest animal on the planet perched in a tree along the rim of the gorge…the Peregrine Falcon. As we were only expecting to use wide angle lenses along the gorge we were not prepared to photograph birds, so this Peregrine Falcon was captured with a Fuji X-E2 and 55-200mm zoom lens.
After a cold but productive day at the falls Arni and I headed back home, taking a brief detour back to Woodland Cemetery in hopes of seeing the Screech Owl. Fortunately we were able to find the grey morph sleeping in his tree. Not the most photogenic poses, but it’s always great to see another owl.
Sleeping in a gnarly tree cavity.
….and a rare day time peak from the very nocturnal Screech Owl.
More of this owl as well as pictures of a red morph Eastern Screech Owl can be seen in the Owl Gallery.
I trust you all have an enjoyable summer and didn’t mind this blog post looking back on the very cold winter we experienced this year.
Well, as it is for everyone, time slips by at what seems like an ever increasing pace and we find ourselves already into February while Christmas feels like it was only yesterday. It’s also been over a month since our last blog post and although I have a number planned for the upcoming months, there just hasn’t been enough time to prepare them, so I thought I would post a few quick bird images taken over the last month or two.
Before Christmas I spent a morning at Lynde Shores Conservation Area with Joe & Harv, two wonderful photographers who I’ve known for many years and have learned much from when it comes to capturing great bird photographs. We had a terrific time kibitzing, telling stories, arguing over camera gear and even taking a few pictures in the process. The images that follow are a few of them.
Deb’s favourite bird is probably the Black Capped Chickadee (BCCH) and I never tire of trying to get a good picture of one. They are extremely cute and friendly little birds that dart from branch to branch and follow you along through the forest paths and readily landing on your hand if it contains some black oiled Sunflower seeds.
From a technical perspective, the close proximity of blacks and whites on the Chickadee presents an exposure challenge. How do you preserve the details in the whites without underexposing the blacks and how do you expose to see detail in the blacks without blowing out the highlights in the whites? The short answer is that you can’t, especially in strong light. An overcast sky is your best friend in cases like this! Personally, overexposed whites that present as white areas with no visible detail ruin pictures more than anything else, so my rule of thumb is to always expose for the whites and if needed improve the dark areas in post processing (this is another reason to always shoot in RAW format as doing so provides about 3-4 stops of exposure adjustment on the computer).
Compositionally, practice taking shots in both landscape and portrait orientations. This is easy with birds like Chickadees that will allow you to get close to them and provide you the privilege of ‘cropping in the camera’. When getting this close make sure you move your focus point to allow for proper positioning of the bird in the frame. There is nothing worse that being treated to taking full frame images of a bird in portrait orientation only to find you’ve placed the bird in the middle of the frame and have no margins left for cropping on the computer. With today’s high megapixel camera sensors, you may be happy to shoot everything in landscape orientation and simply crop for portraits later but doing so always costs by way of reduced detail.
The following four images show two portrait and two landscape images with the bird facing in opposite directions for each similar orientation. If you make a practice of getting these different views in the field, you can be relatively certain of getting some good ‘keepers’ every time out.
In the same family of birds as the Chickadee we find the White-breasted Nuthatch (WBNU), which happens to be my Mom’s favourite bird.
They are known for spending most of their time upside down on three trunks. In fact you may not recognize the bird when perched as it is above, but it certainly looks more familiar in the next two images as that’s the way we see them most often.
They look very different when foraging for bugs the way the other birds do as seen below.
Another friendly bird in our area is the Blue Jay (BLJA) which will gladly take peanuts from your hand. Their brilliant blues and superb primary wing feather patterns also make them very photogenic. The first two Blue Jay images are very similar portraits however the first is a much better photograph due to the more natural appearing body shape of the bird (the disproportionately wide neck in the second created by the forward posture of the head is distracting). Also the dark back ground along the lateral edges of the first frame provides a natural vignette effect which is pleasing. It’s enjoyable to be able to choose from a number of similar images to pick the best one and this can only happen by taking lots of images!
The beautiful blue, white and black feather patterns of the Blue Jay.
The Blue Jay gets its vibrant blue hues as light is refracted when passing through the unique structure of its feathers and not from blue pigments in the feathers as most presume. The next time you find a Blue Jay feather on a trail, crush it up with your hand and watch the blues turn grey as you alter the structure of the feather and hence the refractive properties of the feather. You will be surprised!
This Red-bellied Woodpecker has been a popular resident at Lynde Shores for a while now, however this was the first time I’ve been able to photograph this beautiful bird. This first image shows the characteristic red belly from which it gets its name.
The male and female of this species are similar other than the cap, the male has a red cap while the female’s is grey. These images are of the male.
Interestingly, the males forage on tree trunks while the females prefer the tree limbs. Males also have longer beaks and wider tongues than females.
The Red-bellied Woodpecker is near the northern limits of its normal range so we don’t often get a chance to see them around the Durham region .
The darker brown eye of this bird indicates that it is an adult.
Now that winter is upon us, bird photographers often turn their attention to owls, especially the Northern Owls (i.e., Great Grey, Snowy and Northern Hawk Owls) that will often get displaced southwards from their Arctic breeding grounds when food supplies are scarce. The environmental situations that arise to force more owls south tend to become acute about every eight to ten years. These years during which a disproportionate number of a given owl species arrives this far south s known as an irruption. This winter is an irruption year for Snowy Owls with many being found in Southern Ontario. So the goal this winter is to get some great images of the Snowy Owl. Unfortunately it hasn’t happened yet although we’ve been out looking a couple of times! The following two images were taken just after Christmas and are both cropped images taken at a distance of about 70 yards…..much too far away for a good image.
The most enjoyable part of this day, during which we traveled about 400km and saw ten or twelve different Snowy Owls was that were joined by our friends Arni & Dianne. So the times we spent standing out in the very sub-zero temperatures were off set by lunch in Angus and hot chocolate and coffee at Arni & Dianne’s place.
This past Friday Deb & I spent another day travelling around looking for Snowy Owls and although we saw one owl, there were no photo opportunities. That’s the nature of wildlife photography but it’s always fun to get a day out enjoying creation. Our day was cut short by the weather as an intense snow storm hit while we were travelling from Minesing to Orillia, forcing us to head south on HWY 400 to get out of the storm and head home. Here is a short clip of the snow we found while out looking for Snowy’s 🙂
Sometimes, when you take the time to scout out the perfect location, place a unique looking perch where the lighting is perfect and there is great separation from the background and you’ve created the ideal outdoor studio for bird photography, other ‘models’ come along with well groomed manes to show off their best poses for the camera…..always make sure you oblige them!
All the images in today’s post were taken with the Canon 5D Mk III body and Canon EF 500mm f4 L IS lens (the Snowy Owl images also used the 1.4X TC to provide 700mm). The video clip was taken with an iPhone 6.
Todays post will only contain three different birds, however all three have stories and images that I trust you will enjoy.
The Painted Bunting is arguably the most colourful North American bird with its vibrant red, yellow, blue and green colours. It is a relatively common bird found in South-Central and South Eastern ares of the United Sates and into most of Central America. It’s a bird that is not often seen as it prefers the cover provided by thickets and underbrush although it does frequent back yard feeders for seed. It is such beautiful bird it is sometimes trapped and sold in Mexico & the Bahamas as a caged bird. Fortunately this practice is illegal in the United rates. For the last few years Painted Bunting have wintered on Merritt Island and these next two images of a male were taken there in March of this year.
Approximately thirty miles south of Merritt Island you can find the Viera Wetlands which is a favourite location for bird photographers while visiting the Space Coast of Florida. The Viera Wetlands are home to hundreds of species of birds and the topography of the area makes it possible to get quite close to the birds if you are patient. Of the many Heron species, the Green Heron is one of my favourites. Although not a large bird its feather colouring and detail is impressive. They tend to stay in heavy reed cover at the edges of swamps and marshes where they stealthily hunt small minnows and fry that unknowingly swim under their perch. This year it was a pleasure to see a Green Heron fishing and a pleasant surprise to be able to photograph the action. Deb & I watched this particular bird move throughout the reeds for about thirty minutes until we actually saw him capture his prey.
Posing for the camera!
Intently looking for lunch.
Having a closer look.
Taking a stab at it.
Success!
The last bird in today’s post is the Black Skimmer, a common bird with a most uncommon beak. In fact, it is like none other bird in North America as the lower mandible is about half to three-quarters of an inch longer than its upper mandible. A most unique design that makes digging for worms or picking berries next to impossible, yet is perfectly designed to do what the Black Skimmer was made to do….skim along over the calm water with the extended lower jaw just below the water’s surface and extracting food from the water as it travels up into the mouth of the bird before exiting in a stream of water from the base of the mandible.
Although Deb & I have watched skimmers skim in the past, it was not until this year that we were able to take some decent photographs of the action. So it was a great experience that was only heightened by the fact that they were about ten years in the making!
X marks the spot.
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This last skimming image was taken in the rain and in a different location that provided a dark back ground, not ideal for isolating the Black Skimmer from the back ground but nevertheless creates an interesting result.
A number of other Black Skimmer images, including close up pictures of the unique mandible and normal in flight images can be seen in the Gulls, Terns & Skimmers Gallery.
All of the images in today’s post were taken with the Canon 5D MK III and EF 500 f4 L IS lens, sometimes with the 1.4x TC attached (allowing the 500mm lens to function as a 700mm lens).
This brings our March Break 2014 bird photography to a close and we will return to our tour of Europe for the next few posts. In the mean time we are heading into another time of year when there are an abundance of great looking birds fairly close by, including many species of Warblers that are passing through the Oshawa area on their way north country for nesting and breeding. Hopefully we will be able to have a Warbler Blog post this spring!
The Florida Scrub Jay is Florida’s only endemic bird and one of only fifteen bird species endemic to the United States. It is believed that there are approximately 8,000 Florida Scrub Jays alive and their numbers are decreasing at a rate of approximately 10% every ten years. As a result of their rarity and decreasing numbers they have been listed as Vulnerable, which means that unless conservation action to restore their dwindling habitat is taken they will become threatened.
As the Florida Scrub Jay is only found in Central Florida, the bird tends to be a celebrity among birders who travel long distances to see one. In fact, Deb & I met a couple from Sweden who had travelled to Florida last month just to see a Florida Scrub Jay. It was our pleasure to take them to an area where Scrub Jay’s were nesting and they were able to check another species off their life list. An interesting characteristic of the Scrub Jay is their inquisitive, social nature that renders them very tame. They readily land on your hand, shoulder or camera lens waiting to be fed a peanut. This comes as a complete surprise when you first encounter Scrub Jays as although they may be rare and difficult to find, when you do, they are instantly your best friends.
They do look similar to our Blue Jays and are about the same size as well.
Due to their friendliness and unique stature Florida Scrub Jays are among the most studied of all the birds. Consequently most seem to banded, much like we see with our Gray Jays in Algonquin Park. Scrub Jays normally have three or four bands, a silver metal band with an ID # from the US Fish & Wildlife Service, plus two or three coloured plastic bands which indicate when and where the bird was banded. The banding of birds allows researchers to monitor the movements of birds within their range as well as record other data. The next image shows a banded bird.
The next profile shot illustrates their lack of wing colour and detail as typical with our Blue Jays.
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It was hard to get a good shot of the back of Scrub Jay, so please excuse the busy back ground in this next image.
From a photographic perspective, getting bird images that are more than just snapshots requires controlling as much of what the final image will look like as possible. For me that involves thinking about the back ground as much as the object, which is not an easy thing to train yourself to do. When was the last time you looked through your viewfinder and thought as much about what was in the back ground as you did the object? If you are like me, you may not have thought about the back ground at all! A few suggestions to help improve your results next time out are; look for the least cluttered back ground as possible, look for uniform light density throughout (avoid bright spots, especially ones that encroach on the object), try to get as much distance between the object and back ground as possible which helps blur the back ground and isolate the object. Don’t forget to move around with your feet or zoom with your lens to help accomplish the above suggestions. In terms of thinking about the object, next to ensuring proper focus, exposure and light direction, for me the most important thing is to avoid shadows on the bird. This is not always possible due to the nature of bird photography however it is always the ideal. Have a another look at the second image in this post and see how distracting the shadow on the tail is…almost ranking up there with the bands! The last image is greatly hampered by the cluttered background (which is exacerbated by the lack of separation between the object and back ground) and that half of the tail is under a shadow, however as is often the case, it was the only frame that clearly showed the back of the bird, no matter how hard I tried to get that ‘keeper’ shot of the back.
So next time, try to think about the things that will help move your results from snapshots to photographs, but never think so much about the results that you don’t enjoy your time out with your camera!
All the above images were taken with a Canon 5D MkIII and 500mm lens using a Jobu monopod and Jobu Jr. 3 gimbal head.
While in Florida this month Deb & I spent a couple of days visiting Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge on the Space Coast of Florida. Actually Merritt Island is the Space Coast as the Wildlife Refuge shares the island with NASA. We were fortunate to see and photography a number of different birds on the refuge including Scrub Jays, Northern Shovellers, Greater Scaup, White Pelicans and the subject of today’s post, Painted Buntings, which neither Deb nor I had ever seen before.
Painted Buntings are native to North America and generally noted as our most colourful bird. This makes identification of the male Painted Bunting very easy, even though not many get to see them. The female, although more uniform in her yellow green colour, is also easy to identify as they are the only all green bird found in North America.
These beautiful buntings are from the same family as the Cardinal and the three pairs of Painted Buntings we observed were foraging for seeds with a Northern Cardinal pair. The buntings are a little smaller than the cardinals. Painted Buntings are mostly found in dense thickets and shrubs and are relatively hard to find birds that don’t often provide for nicely perched photographs. You need to be fast, prepared and fortunate to get a good shot.
Painted Buntings are found the southern American States and into Central America. Their numbers are on the decline with an estimated 60% reduction in population over the last fifty years. This has been attributed to factors including egg destruction by Brown Headed Cowbirds, urbanization of the riparian habitat they enjoy (transition vegetation between rivers and forests) and climactic change. Although illegal, male Painted Buntings are sometimes trapped, caged and sold as pets which has also reduced their numbers. The Painted Bunting is listed as ‘Near Threatened’.
As mentioned earlier the female Painted Bunting is green in colour (a unique distinction for North American Birds) which makes it perfectly camouflaged for its chosen environment. They are easy to hear but difficult to spot as the next couple of images illustrates.
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Painted Buntings often forage for seeds along the ground as seen in this last image, which although not a great shot, does show the bird’s many colours and that it truly deserves its reputation as the most colourful bird in North America. Often times bird photographers just get lucky (or have been prepared and given the opportunity enough times) even while ‘breaking’ all the rules of good photographic technique. This shot is one of those times as it was a single frame taken hand held, looking down at the bird using an aperture of f/4 and shutter speed of 1/250 sec with a 500mm lens. I wont take the time now to explain why, but if you are a photographer you will know that this shot could be attempted a hundred times and would be blurry and out of focus ninety nine of those times. There must be some truth to the old adage of it being better to be lucky than good!
All of the images in this post were taken using a Canon 5D MkIII body and Canon EF 500mm IS L lens.
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