Vermilion Flycatcher at Orlando Wetlands Park, 2/5/2012

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Vermilion Flycatcher
I've heard that people have been seeing a Vermilion Flycatcher at Orlando Wetlands Park since it opened again on Feb. 1st.  Orlando Wetlands Park is my favorite place for photography, and I've been itching to go there since they opened.  This evening I had  a teaching engagement in Titusville (yes, I missed most of the game), and so I left early so that I could take about an hour and a half to find the Vermilion Flycatcher.  I made a beeline for the location where it's been seen, so I'm sure I missed many other species of birds, but soon after arriving at the nortwest corner of cell #17, I found one.  He was very far away on one of the Cypress trees.  I watched him for about 20 minutes or so, and at one point he flew over my head and  landed in a pine tree on the north side of the path.
 
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Vermilion Flycatcher
Photographically speaking, the lighting wasn't great, but I did the best I could. I had to overexpose by about 1-2/3 stops, leaving the background a boring white.  It seems to me that I need to return with my tripod and a 2x teleconverter to do this right.

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Vermilion Flycatcher
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Vermilion Flycatcher
There were other birds at the park.  I met a few other birders there, and one of them told me where I could find a White-eyed Vireo, and I saw him and a few Ruby-crowned Kinglets and Blue-gray Gnatcatchers.  I also found one Black & White Warbler.  On the way out I found a few Snipe and a Bald Eagle. I also saw one Gopher Tortoise.  Here's a list of the other species I found.

Mottled Duck 4
Blue-winged Teal 3
Pied-billed Grebe 2
Wood Stork 2
Double-crested Cormorant 2
Anhinga 2
American Bittern 1
Great Blue Heron 1
Great Egret 1
Snowy Egret 3
Little Blue Heron 1
Tricolored Heron 3
Cattle Egret 1
White Ibis 5
Glossy Ibis 1
Black Vulture X
Turkey Vulture X
Bald Eagle 1
Red-shouldered Hawk 1
Purple Gallinule 2
Common Gallinule 25
American Coot 50
Limpkin 1
Killdeer 3
Wilson's Snipe 3
Royal Tern 1
Mourning Dove 2
Belted Kingfisher 2
Eastern Phoebe 1
Vermilion Flycatcher 1
White-eyed Vireo 1
American Crow X
Fish Crow X
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher 2
Ruby-crowned Kinglet 3
Northern Mockingbird 1
Black-and-white Warbler 1
Palm Warbler 3
Yellow-rumped Warbler 5
Savannah Sparrow 3
Red-winged Blackbird 3

Comments

  1. Very nice phtographs. It looks like you had a good day.

    ReplyDelete
  2. This is a very cool post! Love the blog! Keep it up :)

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  3. Well done! He was much closer for you than he was for me. He never ventured out of the cypress trees in the middle of the cell when I was there.

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