Off they go, into the wild blue yonder! US Air Force Thunderbirds epitomize the lyrics of the official Air Force song. I am awestruck at their precision and amazed that they willingly do this. In this diamond formation, they fly a mere 18 inches apart. It gives me goosebumps! What a spectacular feat to witness.
The U-2, known as the Dragon Lady, is a high-altitude intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance aircraft that has been flying for seventy years. Sixty-six years ago, both a U-2 and its pilot, Francis Gary Powers, suddenly became household names when they were shot down over the Soviet Union, causing an infamous Cold War incident. Today, most of the fleet is based locally at Beale AFB so it was a short trip from Beale to Mather. This Dragon Lady took off at sunset escorted by two F16s at the California Capital Airshow. I’d never seen one before and those long-ago memories instantly returned. Read about it here.
The final public performance of Canada’s Canadian Forces Snowbirds in their CT-114 Tutor jets took place at the California Capital Airshow, marking their last U.S. appearance on October 11, 2026. What a spectacular show they put on. According to the announcer at the show, their jets are now up for sale and it will be about 5 years before the Snowbirds are back. Watching them roll over as the sun was setting, lighting up the undersides of their jets was nothing short of spectacular.
The 2026 California Capital Airshow ended yesterday with a spectacular display from the USAF Thunderbirds. It was only the second airshow I’ve been to, the first in 2009 in Redding before I took up photography seriously. What a show it was! I was awestruck by the precision performance of these pilots. The Thunderbirds rock!
My favorite shorebird, the Sanderling, seems always to be in a hurry, but there always seems to be an abundance of them on the beach to replace the ones that hurry off. However, on my recent visit to Folly Beach in South Carolina, we were disappointed that we saw just a handful of Sanderlings on only two of our four days there. We didn’t have the normal experience of knowing that when one Sanderling scurried away, another would immediately show up to take its place. On our last morning there, the sun had just come up and we found a couple of Sanderlings but they were determined to hurry off just as we got down onto the sand. I was pleased that I got a few shots in the few seconds this Sanderling was in my viewfinder before it hurried off and disappeared.
Mama Kodiak Brown Bear spent lots of time snorkeling for salmon. When she emerged, the fur on her head was slick with water. Every so often when she came up for air, she also shook off the water, creating a huge halo of droplets around her head that spread out drenching everything that wasn’t already wet.
The three Kodiak Brown Bear cubs seemed like typical kids. One was afraid to leave Mom’s side; one was confident but not completely independent; and then there was the rebel, always wandering off on its own. But for some reason, they all three decided to join Mom in the river as she fished, no longer content to watch from the shoreline. It was obvious they weren’t used to entering the water from that part of the river’s edge, a couple of feet up and covered in slippery grasses. The first cub to start down was hesitant but determined. Then the other two, probably suffering from FOMO, began to slide down too. Finally, the first cub plunged ahead of the other two who seemed more hesitant to venture down the slope. Once in the water, they anxiously began to search for Mom. Ahh. There she is! We’re safe.
There’s sunrise and then there’s SUNRISE! When we arrived at Folly Beach on our last morning in South Carolina, there was a bank of clouds the hugged the harbor and fringes of color defined the clouds. Pelicans swooped across the tangerine sky, silhouetted by the orange backdrop. It was gorgeous, but when the sun actually rose above the clouds, wow! It’s a sunrise I won’t soon forget.
The Carolina Wren! South Carolina’s state bird! Photographed at Stono River County Park on John’s Island in South Carolina! I love it when I can photograph a state’s bird in that state and I did that just last week. And, it’s a three-fer! Not only is it Carolina’s state bird, it was the first time I’ve photographed a Carolina Wren, and the bird is perched in a native tree, a Yaupon holly.
The late morning sun offered both reflections and shadows on Folly Beach in South Carolina last week. A juvenile Piping Plover appears to be deciding whether to turn right towards me or go the opposite direction. It did turn toward me, but while I did get a few more shots, it quickly scurried behind me and flew off.
It’s been a few weeks since I’ve walked at Ferrari Pond. I went out early the other morning and was surprised that so few birds were in evidence. I saw this Green Heron immediately when I walked over the bridge from the parking lot and took a couple of shots baefore it disappeared. A Red-tailed Hawk flew over and disappeared from view as well and there were just two Canada Geese on the pond. I saw no other birds until I got to the Salt Pond and there a small flock of Least Sandpipers was foraging in the mostly dry pond. We walked back with no other sightings until we got back to the spillwater and found the Green Heron again. It must be the Fall Lull.
With salmon littering the river’s edge, the Kodiak Brown Bear cub triplets ate voraciously but this one seems finally to be sated. The cub even ignored a bit of salmon clinging to its nose, looking wistfully off, possibly thinking, “I’ve had enough.”
Our first day at Folly Beach in South Carolina was so windy that there were few birds on the beach and sand was blowing every which way. Because of this, we didn’t get down on the sand with our long lenses for that wonderful beach panning perspective. We did see a couple of shorebirds though and one of them was a young Piping Plover which is an endangered species, so it’s encouraging to see a new generation. This little Plover stood in the midst of rainbow-colored bubbles left on the sand by the ebb and flow of the surf. I would have loved to have been down at eye level with this bird but the colors on the bubbles surrounding the adorable Plover make up for the difference in perspective.
The gravelly shores of the Uganik River were littered with rotting Salmon carcasses and feathers from the thousands of gulls that stayed close to claim what was left after a Kodiak Brown Bear stripped the skin off (a nutritious delicacy) and munched a bit of flesh before casting it aside. The cubs were learning how to fish on their own and how to forage. The nutritious spring grasses were turning brown but sometimes a cub began to munch on what was left of the green grass and in this case, the cub tasted a large wing feather from a gull. It took a few chews before realizing it wasn’t edible.
It was about an hour before the sun went down Monday afternoon and we lay on the beach on Sullivan’s Island outside Ft. Moultrie with our long lenses and our panning plates. The only shorebirds we’d seen that afternoon were two Ruddy Turnstones and this Sanderling. As it approached me, I took my last shots of the trip, making the Sanderling, my favorite shorebird, a tiny bundle of nonstop energy, my goodbye bird.
On the last afternoon of our last day in South Carolina, we visited Sullivan’s Island and walked past Ft. Moultrie to the beach where we could see Ft. Sumter in the middle of Charleston Harbor. We didn’t see much else there. As I mentioned yesterday, shorebird sightings have been few and far between. We finally saw three birds, two Ruddy Turnstones and one Sanderling scurrying up and down the beach so in the end, we got to do some beach panning twice on that day. This Ruddy Turnstone is sampling, with some uncertainty, something it found in the detritus on the beach.
Yesterday was our last morning at Folly Beach, South Carolina. Shorebird sightings at the beach have been few and far between on this trip but we were determined to do some beach panning and hit the beach early. Despite the early Monday morning hour, there were quite a few people already jogging, strolling down the beach, or walking dogs. At first, most of the birds we saw were Brown Pelicans gliding low over the waves and gulls flying in the distance, but there were no shorebirds on the beach. Finally, a couple of Sanderlings appeared. As Sanderlings do, they scurried across the sand and were out of sight quickly. But, in the few seconds before they disappeared, I managed to lurch my body down onto the sand, stretch out, and aim my lens at them. I had them in my viewfinder for less than 40 seconds so I was happy to get a few shots before they flew off. They were the only shorebirds we saw.
The Clapper Rail, known for its distinctive clapping-like call, is an elusive marsh bird, about the size of a chicken. They tend to hide in the dense marsh grasses but the light was perfect early yesterday when we found the first Clapper Rail of the morning at Stono River County Park in Charleston, SC. The park’s boardwalk spans the grassy marshlands where we heard the harsh loud calls of Clapper Rails on either side of the boardwalk. When this Rail stepped from the shadows into the light, the busy grasses all but disappeared in the background.
So far this trip, strong winds and high tides have prevented us from laying on the beach and “panning” for shorebirds here in Charleston, South Carolina. But we’re discovering other places to photograph them. We found a lovely park that has a long promenade where marshy grasses and oyster beds are prominent features on either side of the path. We discovered a few birds there yesterday morning, including a single Willet that seemed almost out of place strolling over the oyster beds instead of over familiar sand, but there it was.
Yesterday was our first day on Folly Beach in South Carolina. At first we found no birds due to high winds that kept the birds grounded. But after a short reconnaissance, breakfast, and a visit to the other end of Folly Beach, we were lucky to find at first one Sanderling, then another, then a couple of juvenile endangered Piping Plovers. Beach panning was out of the question because of the conditions but we set up our tripods and focused on the Sanderling and the Plover. I’m used to watching Sanderlings run toward a wave only to reverse course and run away from the surf darting back and forth, rarely standing still. For some reason, this Sanderling had a different idea. It plunged head on into the foaming surf and ducked under to bathe. When it emerged, it preened for several minutes as it smoothed its body feathers and straightened each wing feather. The colorful bubbles from foam in the surf reflected the colors of the rainbow and made it appear that the Sanderling had a colorful bubble bath.