Photographs by Frank

20 April 2016

Spring Birds

Filed under: Birds,Spring,The Yard,Wildlife — Tags: — Frank @ 12:00 PM

Monday (18 Apr) afternoon was warm and sunny. I spent a few hours watching (and photographing) the backyard birds.

In addition to the year-rounders (nuthatches, chickadees, titmice and woodpeckers) a number of returning migrants have appeared. There were good numbers of American goldfinches, sometimes as many as a dozen or so at one time. I am always amazed at the brilliance of the yellow coloring of the males at this time of year. Smaller numbers of purple finches were also present.

Small flocks of juncos (eight or ten) came and went all afternoon. I am unable to get a sense of what stimulates the entire flock to make an exodus. When they leave en mass they seem to startle everyone else (including me!) and often cause all of the finches to flee as well.

Lastly, I saw two singletons… a red-breasted nuthatch (which I did not photograph) and a chipping sparrow.

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9 March 2016

Spring Training

Filed under: Birds,Monadnock Region,The Yard — Tags: — Frank @ 10:15 PM

Just like baseball players, the skills of small bird photographers get rusty over the winter. Thus for the past two days, in anticipation of spring bird action,  I headed about twenty feet out the back door for a bit of spring training.

Even though it was 70 degrees F this afternoon, the tufted titmice and the chickadees still seem to be in their winter mixed-flock mode. At times, there were seven birds at the feeder (with nine feeding ports). Also present were white-breasted nuthatches  and downy woodpeckers. A single red-bellied woodpecker made a brief appearance as well. There were also blue jays and crows present nearby but, as is usual,  neither species showed much interest in the feeders*.

All of these species spend the winter in our neighborhood and there was no sign of any spring birds these past two days. We did, however, catch a glimpse of a purple finch at the seed feeder a few days ago. I also heard the call of a pheobe this afternoon on a number of occasions.

Spring can not be too far away.

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* In the depths of winter we will get an occasional blue jay on the suet, but not when the ground is bare.

 

24 October 2015

Sachuest Point & Second Beach

Filed under: Autumn,Birds,Wildlife — Tags: — Frank @ 11:30 AM

Last Wednesday evening I judged the nature competition at the Hockomock Digital Photographers club. I left the house early that morning and headed for the Sachuest National Wildlife Refuge in Middletown, Rhode Island.

I was hoping (but not expecting, since it is early in the season) to photograph diving ducks (including Harlequins) that winter in the waters off Sachuest Point. There were surprisingly few ducks. I saw a single female Common Eider and a single American Black Duck; that was it. The ledges off the east side of the point held a couple of dozen double-crested cormorants. And, of course,  gulls, mostly herring gulls, were ever present.

On land, the most common bird, by far, were migrating yellow-rump warblers; there were dozens of them. Two different types of sparrows (also migrants?) were also common along the edges of the walking paths.

I had seen groups of small birds at the surf’s edge on Second Beach on my way out to the point. They were still there when I stopped after spending a few hours at the NWR. I spent more than an hour photographing sandpipers as they foraged at the waters edge.

These birds are a never-ending source of entertainment as they scurry about trying to avoid the waves, dogs and people while pausing intermittently to forage for a morsel of food.

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29 September 2015

A Long Weekend at Star Island

Filed under: Autumn,Birds,Landscapes — Tags: , , , , — Frank @ 11:00 PM

Last Friday afternoon we boarded the M/V Thomas Leighton and headed to Star Island for a birding weekend organized by Eric Masterson. This trip is timed to be able to see southward migrating birds, especially warblers*. We arrived back on the mainland about 3:30 PM on Sunday.

Saturday dawned blustery and although there were birds present, they were pretty much hunkered down inside the brush and therefore impossible to photograph. The wind died down on Saturday evening and Sunday was much calmer and the photography more productive.

I discovered that (compared to the spring time) photography was much more difficult since most of the plants which were bare in the spring were still more-or-less fully leafed out. Thus getting clear views of small birds was difficult.

The most common warbler we saw, by far, was the yellow-rumped. In addition we observed two rarities for New Hampshire… a lark sparrow and a lazuli bunting; both are western birds. The bunting is the first sighting of this species in NH (if it is accepted by the Rare Bird Committee).

Anyway, without further excuses or ado, here are the photos:

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Another difference between our spring trip and this one, was the number of people. The spring trip occurred before the official opening of the season so the only people on the island were the maintenance staff and a couple of dozen birders. This past weekend us birders shared the island with at least three other groups… the Star Island board of directors, sailors participating in the Gosport Regatta and a group of kite fliers.

I took time away from birding on Saturday afternoon to photograph the sailboats as they neared Star Island (both the windward mark and the finish line were close by).

Here are the sailing photos:

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The sunset on Friday night was spectacular. Here are a few photos of that and a mishmash of other subjects:

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* We participated in a similar trip, timed for the spring migration, in May of 2014; see this post and this one for the details.

 

13 September 2015

Powdermill Pond Shorebirds

Filed under: Birds,Early Fall,Monadnock Region — Tags: — Frank @ 1:00 PM

The water level in Powdermill Pond remains very low due to the work on the paper mill dam. (See Solitary Sandpipers for more information.)

Yesterday (Saturday, 12 Sept), Joan and I spent the afternoon paddling the pond from the launching spot on Route 202 to the covered bridge and back*.

Amazingly, the only company we had during the roughly three and a half hours we were on the water was a lone fisherman in a kayak. We did, however, see a large group of birders (the spotting scopes and binoculars, were the field marks we used to make this ID!)  scanning the pond from a spot on South Elmwood Road.

We saw a nice assortment of shorebirds, but no really rare ones.

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* We also spent some time out on the pond last Thursday afternoon. We saw lots of migrating shore birds, as well as a juvenile bald eagle and at least two dozen great blue herons. The skies were heavily overcast and thus conditions were lousy for photography; I did not get any “keepers”. Yesterday, the skies were mostly cloudy but the clouds were thin, This made nice light for photography.

 

9 September 2015

Solitary Sandpipers

Filed under: Autumn,Birds,Monadnock Region,Wildlife — Tags: — Frank @ 11:00 PM

The Monadnock Paper Mill in Bennington has drawn down the water level in Powdermill Pond so that they can work on their dam. This has exposed large expanses of mudflats. The last time this happened (according to the Fall newsletter from the Harris Center*) thirteen species of shorebird were found using this temporary habitat during the Fall migration.

This afternoon, I headed over to the NH Fish and Wildlife boat launch in Greenfield to see what was around. As I was standing on the boat ramp (which ends a good thirty feet from the nearest bit of water), I saw four peeps come in for a landing on the flats and promptly lost them. They really blend in well!

I shouldered the tripod and Big Bertha and headed over closer to where they landed. By the time I got the tripod set up at kneeling height, one of the peeps showed itself at the waters edge.  I spent the next hour watching six solitary sandpipers “do their thing”. (I’m not sure if the additional two where already there or if they flew in and I did not notice.)

The birds spent most of the time foraging and twice I saw dragonfly nymphs being consumed. There was also some bathing and preening activity.

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* Eric Masterson from the Harris Center will be leading a trip to Powdermill Pond on 16 Sept. to look for shore birds; check out the Harris Center calendar for details.

 

7 September 2015

Juvenile Ruby-throated Hummingbirds

Filed under: Birds,Monadnock Region,Summer — Tags: , — Frank @ 12:00 PM

For the last few weeks, we have had many juvenile ruby-throated hummingbirds in the yard near the feeder and flowers. They seem to come in groups of three or four feeding and flying around.

The juveniles also seem to perch near the feeders much less frequently than did the adults, especially the males, did earlier in the summer. The juveniles prefer perches higher up and farther away from the feeder than the adults. The flight of the juveniles also  has a much more “playful” character than that of adults.

All of this is, I imagine, tied into to territoriality. The adults were protecting “turf” by perching near the feeders and flying to drive away interlopers. The juveniles are eating and flying around in a “pack” at breakneck speed just for fun.

When they return next spring, this summer’s juveniles will be as “serious” the adults were a couple of months ago.

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11 August 2015

The Past Week’s Birds

Filed under: Birds,Monadnock Region,Summer,The Yard — Tags: — Frank @ 2:00 PM

No special “photo sessions” in the past week… I keep the camera set up on the deck and “catch-as-catch-can”.

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Suspicions… Confirmed!

Filed under: Birds,Monadnock Region,Summer — Tags: — Frank @ 12:30 PM

Regular readers will remember that we have had a pair (one male and one female) of red-breasted grosbeaks visiting the feeders for most of the summer. In the past few weeks, I have noticed that these birds would make their exit from the feeder in the same direction while carrying a seed. I suspected that there was a nest in the neighborhood, but I had no real evidence.

Yesterday my suspicion was confirmed. Just before lunch, I was able to make two photographs of the adult male feeding a juvenile. There was a five second interval between these two frames. In another second, the adult had flown off.

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13 July 2015

Saturday Birds

Filed under: Birds,Monadnock Region,Summer — Tags: — Frank @ 6:00 PM

Warning… photo geek talk ahead!!!

Saturday (11 July) afternoon I set out to experiment with adding extension tubes to Big Bertha (my 600 mm f/4 lens). Extension tubes which are mounted between the camera and the lens, shorten the minimum distance at which one can focus a lens… this, of course, means the subject can be larger in the frame. However, there one never gets something for nothing. The “downside” is that one loses the ability to focus on distant objects when using an extension tube.

I added a 20 mm extension tube to Big Bertha and set up to photograph the humming birds near the feeder. Big Bertha’s minimum focus distance is about 18 feet. With the extension tube, I could focus on the humming bird perch which was about 14 feet from the the camera. I did not do any formal testing so I do not know what the actual minimum focus distance with the extension tube is but from the bit of “playing around” I did I got the impression that it might be between 12 and 13 feet. The suet feeders were about 24 feet from the camera and I could still focus on them with the extension tube mounted.

All of the photos shown below were made with the extension tube mounted.

The humming bird photos shown here (at a relatively small size on the web) may not look very different from those I made back in June (see this post). However the older photos are more heavily cropped (they are about one-third of the full frame) than the current photos (about one-half of the full frame). This difference is not critical for posting small files on the blog but it important when one wants to make prints.

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