A new 3-part series to help us learn bird songs, appreciate bird migration in our yard, and support nesting birds will begin tomorrow, April 9th, with monthly installments following on May 14th and June 18th. Presented by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, we all recognize that an important part of spring is to acquaint or reacquaint ourselves with bird songs we haven't heard for many months, and the Cornell staff will give you a boost of help with identifying the songs you hear – even without seeing the birds doing the singing.
Join the excitement of being a member of "The Biggest Birding Team" during the Global Big Day, celebrated each May during peak bird migration around the world! Global Big Day is an annual celebration of the birds around you, wherever you are, wherever you go, and you can participate as long as you wish – 15 minutes or 15 hours on Saturday May 9th. Last year during Global Big Day, birders collected more data about birds during a single day than ever before, with birders reporting more than 7,931 different species of birds collectively during a single day in 204 countries worldwide!
Adjacent to the Lake Erie Marsh Area in northwest Ohio is an area known as the "Warbler Capitol of the World," which offers some of the most intense and enjoyable spring songbird migration experiences in North America! The Biggest Week in American Birding will take place May 8 to 17 to celebrate the peak of spring songbird migration during 10 days of birding events and activities hosted by the Black Swamp Bird Observatory. During this period the Magee Marsh Wildlife Area stands as one of the best birding destinations, and it is bordered by Ottawa National Wildlife Refuge and Oak Harbor – and admission is Free!
Initiated in 1984, the World Series of Birding (WSB) is the biggest competitive big day of birding, featuring a variety of categories for individuals and teams to participate. The WSB draws attention to the habitat needs of migrating birds, provides birders a chance to test and use their birding skills for great conservation causes, generates hundreds of thousands of dollars for many worthy conservation organizations, and it provides a forum for interaction between birders, conservation organization representatives, and businesses in the birding market – all while focusing national attention on the challenge and adventure of birding – and it's Fun!
Mid-afternoon of the second of 4 snow days I broke away with the hope that roads were good enough to check on the Ferruginous Hawks, and while the roads were clear and dry, the hawks were both available on territory. The female was standing on the top of the low hill the pair seems to prefer and I saw the male flying toward the tree he sometimes perches in, but his flight angle took him to the ground where I lost sight of him. As I continued south past the nest, I suddenly realized the male was flying by my car with a branch in its beak, headed past me to the nest – a very fun sighting to witness.
Now through April 20th, the Leica Spring Sale features a $100 savings on the popular Leica Trinovid 8x42 HD Binocular that provides exceptionally bright images with ultra-sharp resolution, high contrast views, and natural color fidelity that will inspire any birding experience. The Trinovids have phase-corrected prisms with Leica's fully multi-coated HD optics that increase light transmission through the lenses to produce high-contrast images and show the true colors of the birds you see. Plus, the Trinovids guarantee a steady grip and intuitive handling with quick, precise focusing any time you are birding.
Actually, you don't need Air Jordans for birding walks or hikes, but Nike has such a variety of functional, comfortable, colorful, and stylish shoes you are bound to find a Nike pair that meets your interests and budget. Among the variety of choices of men's, women's, and children's footwear, you can choose from hundreds of styles and colors available from Nike. With most Nikes on sale now, try starting with the highly rated Nike Cortez models that are priced at 30% off.
Choose among the variety of 60 different Oriole Feeders that are available this spring from Duncraft! Orioles go wild for grape jelly and oranges, and depending on the number of orioles you expect to feed, there are oriole feeders with larger jelly bowls, or more than 1 bowl, as well as spikes for you to affix cut orange halves. If orioles in your neighborhood feed on sugar-water nectar, there are combination feeders that offer a nectar basin, jelly bowls, and orange spikes to provide a full-service menu for orioles in your yard.
After the 4-day snowstorm that dropped at least 15 inches of wet snow, Saturday afternoon’s sunshine was especially welcome! And the bright sunlight with blue sky from horizon to horizon and an abundance of waterfowl and other birds evident showed it was a textbook example of a day when every birder should be in the field with their camera. I was an enthusiastic participant and eventually realized I was going to retrace the same big circle as I drove 8 days earlier: South to the border of the Dakotas, east to Hecla Marsh, then turning south and west to Sand Lake National Wildlife Refuge – returning home after a memorable 6-hour birding extravaganza in heart of the northern Great Plains.
Beautiful afternoon sunlight with the clear blue sky reflecting on calm water provided an exceptional setting for species portraits of the Greater Yellowlegs (top) and Lesser Yellowlegs, easily distinguished in the photos above by their size and bill length (600mm zoom lens, f-9 aperture, 1/2500 shutter speed, 800 ISO.)
At Sand Lake Refuge I was surprised to find a variety of sandpipers – few but enthusiastic. There were 8 Lesser Yellowlegs with a couple Greater Yellowlegs and a surprise flock of 17 Dunlins with 2 associated Baird’s Sandpipers and 1 Pectoral Sandpiper – all new for the year except the Greater Yellowlegs! The yellowlegs provided some beautiful species portraits, and the Dunlins provided some fun action photo ops as they flew in formation from location to location to forage in a tight flock along a shoreline bordered with snow.
Using a wider aperture than usual to keep multiple birds in focus, the Dunlins’ flight was stopped in motion by the ample shutter speed as they began their landing approach. Note the slightly down-curved tip of their beak (600mm zoom lens, f-10 aperture, 1/2000 shutter speed, 800 ISO).
There were also at least 4 young Bald Eagles active in the northern part the refuge, 1 was a yearling and 3 were nearing adulthood as indicated by their plumage, which suggested they were 3 or 4 years old. The eagles provided some nice photo opportunities while 2 were feeding on a snow-covered ice shelf in the company of an American Crow, and while 2 perched on a bare branch. As I photographed the branchers, the younger eagle flew directly toward me, providing a head-on view with its wings spread straight from its sides. But it provided the closest photos as it turned more directly into the sunlight.
The lower photograph shows the yearling Bald Eagle after taking off from a mutual perch with a sub-adult eagle. As it approached the camera, the young eagle provided a close photo in flight (top), illuminated by the lower angle of the afternoon sunlight that eliminated any underside shadow (600mm zoom lens, f-10 aperture, 1/4000 shutter speed, 800 ISO).
Certainly, the key to all the Sand Lake photographs was the ample afternoon sunlight that provided the best angle of light between 4pm and 6pm with the sun beaming directly from the west. The clear blue sky reflected in the calm meltwater, and by luck and a bit of planning the birds were positioned in excellent locations for me to photograph them as they fed and interacted.
In the above photo series, the top photo is focused on a 3rd-year Bald Eagle as it waits to feed from a distance on a snow-covered ice shelf on the shore of Sand Lake. The second photo provides an overview of the scene with a 4th-year Bald Eagle dominating a carcass as an American Crow also waits. The lower photograph provides a closer look at the adult-looking eagle, although its head plumage is not entirely white, and its tail feathers actually have more dark-brown coloration than white (500 to 600mm zoomed lens, f-9 aperture, 1/2500 shutter speed, 800 ISO).
Although there were limited photo opportunities beyond the refuge, there were plenty of ducks to check out, along with sightings of an adult Cooper’s Hawk, a Turkey Vulture, and a Northern Flicker along the way. About 5 miles to the east of the refuge 2 Short-eared Owls were beginning to hunt and a trio of Northern Harriers was also hunting a nice expanse of grasslands. Overall during the drive, I observed about a dozen American Kestrels, another dozen Northern Harriers, and a third dozen Red-tailed Hawks too.
As flocks of geese covered miles of sky, flying from an unknown wetland stopover site to feed in harvested cornfields along the border of the Dakotas, a portion of a flock of White-fronted Geese provided closure to an exciting photo trip – after the snowstorm (600mm zoom lens, f-9 aperture, 1/4000 shutter speed, 800 ISO).
Male Ring-necked Pheasants became especially active the last hour of sunlight, and I tried to photograph them walking across the snow, but the colorful birds were especially wary in the open. During that same period flocks of geese spanned miles as they flew from the south to feeding fields closer to the Dakota border on the way home – mostly Snow and Ross’s Geese, plus separate flocks of White-fronted Geese in fewer numbers. It was a fitting exclamation point for a memorable birding photo drive punctuated by a welcome sunny blue sky afternoon to break the series of 4-day snowstorms.
