In Focus Daily

We’ve been having unseasonably cool and cloudy days. It’s rare to have clouds in the summer here. I’ve heard there have been some spectacular sunrises which I’ve missed because although I’m out for my walk by 6 AM or so, I don’t arrive at the sunrise location until about 6:30 and it’s over by then. Since I haven’t photographed one of the gorgeous local sunrises, I decided to post a similarly unusual but also gorgeous sunrise from last year at Monument Valley. Before departing on our last morning, we photographed sunrise and what a spectacular sunrise it was with very rare morning fog enveloping much of the valley and the mittens. Can’t wait to return there next year.

According to Sibley’s Guide to Birds, Black-chinned Hummingbirds are the West Coast equivalent of the Ruby-throated Hummingbird. I’ve always been a bit puzzled by the name as I see the position of the black gorget more as a throat than a chin. Despite that, the dazzling band of purple at the lower edge of the male Black-chinned Hummer’s gorget is stunning. This image is from Madera Canyon last month but we have them here in California as well. The males seem to hide themselves around here most of the time. While I do see female Black-chinned Hummingbirds fairly regularly, it’s been quite a while since I’ve seen a male here. I’m happy I get to see them in Madera Canyon.

I’ve seen and photographed Barred Owls only in Minnesota where I photographed this Barred Owl late one very chilly afternoon in January, at about -4°F up from negative 15 when we started our shooting that day. Barred Owls have been in the news in California lately, the subject of a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service plan to kill about 450,000 of them in California, Oregon, and Washington over the next 30 years because they have been migrating steadily west for about a hundred and twenty five years and now compete with the endangered Spotted Owls. Spotted Owl populations have already been decimated by logging and human expansion into their territories for decades but somehow because another similar species is now competing with it, last year, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service decided to implement this plan. As the Los Angeles Times so succinctly stated yesterday, the purpose of this plan is “to protect one threatened owl by killing a more common one.” Fortunately, there is a move afoot to stop this and ironically, it is a bi-partisan effort probably for different reasons but if it gets the project stopped, that’s a good thing. Cost cutting measures will likely be the reason the effort is killed, not that the plan cruelly prioritizes one species over another. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that the Barred Owl gets a reprieve, and not a temporary one, from this threat.

Burrowing Owls have such expressive eyes. When you watch a Burrowing Owl for a while, and while it watches you, you’ll see lots of different expressions. The look in the third image was not directed at me but I think it was more annoyance at his mate who, as this one tried to nap, the other one was doing some housekeeping in the sandy burrow that kept a steady stream of sand raining down. This is from this past February at Brian Piccolo Sports Park in Cooper City, Florida. Several of the soccer fields were closed while the Burrowing Owls were in residence.

Back at Bolivar Flats in Texas last year, I photographed an adult Least Tern in full breeding plumage. It was alternately preening and scratching the top of its head, which I suppose could be part of its preening ritual. At the end, after several minutes, it squawked. As I recall, it either flew off or another bird caught my interest.

From all appearances, the Gray Catbird doesn’t look like a stand out at Magee Marsh like the Yellow Warbler and Prothonotary Warbler with their bright yellow feathers. But stand out it does. Not from its appearance but from its song…like a meowing cat, hence, I presume, its common name. It is a persistent sound, a mewing and actual meowing that at first is mere background noise until it is suddenly all you can hear. On several occasions at Magee Marsh in June, I would be focused on a bird when I would realize that all I could hear was the Catbird’s persistent meowing. Maybe it was trying to get me to pay attention to it. Well, it worked. It’s kind of a cute little bird and I swear, if I didn’t know it was a Gray Catbird I was hearing, I’d be convinced it was a four-legged cat calling out to be fed.

Yesterday, I made my first gallery print sale! I was thrilled. An hour later, I got another call about the print. So within one hour, I had my first and second gallery print sales, both of the same image! This print has been on display at Orchard Creek Lodge in Sun City Lincoln Hills for the past couple of weeks along with photographs from other members of the photography club at Lincoln Hills. There’s a lot of talent there and I was honored to be recognized.

March is traditionally kite flying season so I guess it’s appropriate that I’m returning to Florida next March to photograph Snail Kites! I love Florida Snail Kites and photographing them from an airboat piloted by an extraordinary captain who knows the birds and knows how to keep perfect pace with them while we photograph them is an absolutely magical thing to do. This endangered Everglades bird has been brought back from the verge of extinction both through the efforts of conservationists and through its own amazing very recent evolution. When the Florida Snail Kite’s diet, the Apple Snail began to disappear and a larger, Brazilian Apple Snail invaded the waters where these Kites live, an extraordinary thing happened. The bills of these birds, whose diet is almost exclusively Apple Snails, began to change within a decade or so to adapt to the larger Apple Snail so they could easily extract the snail from its shell. These birds are a remarkable example of survival of the fittest.

I’m still savoring my trip to Madera Canyon and the hummingbird extravaganza we experienced there in June. While the Broad-billed Hummingbirds outnumbered the other species of hummingbirds there, we had our fair share of Rivoli’s, Black-chinned, and even quite a few Beryllines. This is likely a juvenile Broad-billed male as he is not completely bejeweled with the dazzling colors of a mature male and his wing feathers have not filled out. But, regardless of what stage these hummers are in, they are still spectacular and I sometimes have to pinch myself that I am actually seeing them live.

A couple of months ago, my photography club had a project that had its members documenting various activities of residents in Sun City Lincoln Hills. I was assigned to photograph an outing of the Birder Group to the Linda Creek Open Space Preserve a few miles away in Roseville. I used a wide angle lens to document the members as they walked the trails and pointed out birds. After a couple of hours, I decided I wanted to photograph birds and I had documented enough pointing fingers, so I switched to my 400mm lens with the 1.4TC attached. This is the only bird I photographed that day, a White-breasted Nuthatch.

Every photography trip I go on, there seems to be one breakout star of the trip. At Madera Canyon last month, we actually had two stars, the Berylline Hummingbird and the Rivoli’s Hummingbird. The Berylline, who the past couple of years has been a tease, visited every day and seemed to favor the feeders at one end of our shooting gallery. But, to me, the true star was the Rivoli’s, the second largest hummingbird in North America. In past years, we had one or two throughout the week and their visits always provoked excitement. This year, we had several males and at least a female or two. We were told that at least a couple of the Rivoli’s had wintered over in Madera Canyon, becoming year-round residents. We always knew they were approaching as their loud hum was quite distinctive. Over the years, I have come to think of the Rivoli’s as kind of the epitome of the Madera Canyon hummingbirds. Seeing one makes my visit there complete.

This is a Barn Swallow perched on the side of the Road that I took from the vehicle when I was in Sierra Valley with my friends Truman and Greg a few weeks ago. I like this image because the Barn Swallow is kinda showing attitude.

Activity at Ferrari Pond has slowed and there aren’t many birds around. The Red-winged Blackbirds that were so prevalent and vocal into late spring have disappeared as well. This male Red-winged Blackbird was singing his heart out along the trail in April but has made himself scarce.

My regular morning walk takes me to Ferrari Pond, 1.5 miles from my house. I don’t bring a camera because my morning walk is about my morning walk, not photography. Yesterday morning, as I walked to the bridge over Ferrari Pond, my turn around point, someone I didn’t know told me excitedly that the pelicans (American White Pelicans) had returned. A squadron of ten or eleven was fishing for catfish. It’s fascinating to watch them gather in a semicircle and simultaneously dip their beaks into the water, often as not, emerging with a catfish in their pouch. I walked home but drove back, returning with my camera to capture a few images.

When a hummingbird hovers, it is possible to photograph that hovering bird in the air. Their wings flap but their heads seem to freeze in place, making it possible to get the eye tack sharp. When they feed, they will hover over a flower, dipping their beak into the blossom, then flying backwards a few inches, hovering, then returning to the blossom. If the feeders don’t have perches, the hummers treat them the same as they would a flower blossom. They hover, then move to feed, then move backward, making it possible to photograph them without the feeder in the photograph. When the perches have feeders, the hummers tend to land and stay until they are sated for that visit. That’s the challenge of photographing hummingbirds. Most likely, you don’t want to include the feeder in your image and this behavior makes it possible to eliminate it, at the point when the bird backs away from the feeder. They’re pretty predictable and they have a rhythm so you’re able to capture a few shots each time they back away. Once they are finished feeding, though, and they twist their bodies away from the feeder and fly off, it’s pretty hard to get a sharp image

I love Jays. Jays are smart, like all members of the corvid family. I’m most familiar with the California Scrub Jay, that large, raucous blue bird that squawks loudly and harasses smaller birds at back yard feeders. In Madera Canyon, the local Jay was the Mexican Jay. The Mexican Jay was every bit as raucous as the California Scrub Jay. They came in large numbers and marauded through the trees at the Santa Rita Lodge where we stayed and where we photographed hummingbirds. A single jay visited the area near our hummingbird shooting gallery one morning but didn’t seem interested in harassing the hummers.

Early every morning in Madera Canyon there is a feeding frenzy. The hummingbirds are awakening from their nightly torpor and they are anxious to eat something. Moose always puts out the feeders at first light, long before we start shooting, so they don’t have to wait. Sometimes, though, they will perch and watch instead of feeding. This Broad-billed Hummingbird took a break just a few minutes after we started shooting. That morning was a little cooler than it had been and he’s a little puffed up. He probably got an early start on the nectar and was just waiting to approach them again.

The Bridled Titmouse is the smallest titmouse and is even smaller than the Rivoli’s Hummingbird. When it showed up at our hummingbird shooting gallery in Madera Canyon last week, I couldn’t take my eyes off it. It only visited once and then only for a few minutes but I was captivated. It is irresistibly adorable with its little crest, tiny beak, and expressive eyes.

This is a juvenile Berylline Hummingbird, a hummer that in past years has been elusive. This year, however, we had at least one adult and a couple of juveniles like this bird and even a hybrid Berylline/Broad-billed Hummingbird. I first noticed the web caught on its wing when it flew to a feeder. About ten minutes later, it reappeared with the web still attached. You’d think that it could not stay attached given the speed with which their wings beat but indeed it did stay. It must have picked up the web when it flew into one of the nearby shrubs to perch. Because the sun was out, my shutter speed was pretty fast, freezing most of the motion of the wing and clearly showing the web. I am still reviewing my images to see if I managed to capture the hybrid thinking it was a Broad-billed. Watch this space in case I did.

Hummingbird feeders are not just for hummingbirds it would seem. An Acorn Woodpecker finally got up the courage to investigate one of the feeders that we were using to bring in the hummingbirds. There were quite a few Acorn Woodpeckers in the oaks directly behind our hummingbird shooting gallery in Madera Canyon and they were raucous and constantly on the move and apparently watching for an opportunity to try out the feeders. On our fourth morning shoot, a male Acorn Woodpecker flew to the feeder nearest to where I was sitting. He used his tail for support and grasped the edge of the feeder with his claws as there were no perches on the feeders. His long, narrow tongue seemed to fit into the openings so he clung to the feeder and sampled what was inside for quite a while as we watched.