outdoor photography

Bald Eagle Flying Away with a  Stolen Rock Pigeon I walking around  the marina  in Sanford a  little while ago, and I  had a pretty memorable experience. As I walked by a tree, a young Cooper's Hawk with a Rock Pigeon flushed and flew up into a different tree. That was surprising and cool enough, but a Bald Eagle must have seen all that happened, and it  flew over to investigate the tree with the Cooper's Hawk. Bald Eagle It was so close to me that this is a full frame image. With its eyes on the Cooper's Hawk it didn't seem to care about me one bit. It then descended into the tree, and the Cooper's Hawk freaked out, flew into another tree, and dropped its prey. This photo is not as sharp as I would like, but I believe this is a full frame image, or nearly so. The action took place so close to me, I didn't even have  time to back up. Cooper's  Hawk Freaking out and heading into another tree with a Rock Pigeon Bald  Eagle...

Cooper's Hawk This morning I took a little walk around the Econ River Wilderness Area.  My biggest hope was to find a chickadee.  No luck there, but it was still a pretty fun morning.  Most of the normal birds were there, and both a Blue-gray Gnatcatcher and a Tufted Titmouse were willing to pose for photos.  The best find of the morning, though, was a Cooper's Hawk. This is only the second Cooper's Hawk I've seen in the park, and I believe it gave me my first presentable photos of the species in Seminole County.  Most my Cooper's Hawk photos that I've kept have been taken at Mead Gardens in Orange Co. Blue-gray Gnatcatcher Tufted Titmouse

Anhinga This morning I decided to visit Mead Gardens for a few minutes.  I haven't been visiting this park as much recently; traffic in the morning has just become ridiculous.   But I always enjoy the park after I arrive, so I try to visit from time to time.  There wasn't a lot here this morning, but it was fun to find a Hermit Thrush, Cooper's Hawk, Yellow-throated Warbler and a Yellow-bellied Sapsucker.  And an Anhinga decided to pose nicely for a photo as well. Hermit Thrush Unfortunately, I blew the highlights of this Hermit Thrush, so you can't see detail in the chest feathers.  I was following it flying under tree cover, and it happened to land in the sun just for a second before disappearing back into the trees.  I didn't have time to adjust my exposure, but I like the shot anyway. Cooper's Hawk

Marl Bed Flats I took my point and shoot with me to Marl Bed Flats this morning, but the lighting was pretty poor until I began to head back to my car.  The above photo was from the trail back to the parking lot.  It was a little contrasty, but since Canon's S100 lets you shoot RAW images, I was able to get something out of the scene.  The S100 also has an HDR mode, but it only produces JPEG images.  I plan on testing that out more in the future.  I've tried it a few times but haven't reached any conclusions; so far I think I'll be better served taking three RAW images and doing my HDR work on the computer. Cooper's Hawk The wildlife at Marl Bed Flats was pretty fun.  I found a Northern Harrier far off in the distance while out on the flats and heard a Sora, but things were most interesting right at the parking lot when I returned to my car.  There was a lot of activity--Tufted Titmice, Carolina Wrens and Northern Cardinals were all callin...

Cooper's Hawk This morning Mead Gardens was incredibly slow, but as I was walking back to the car, this Cooper's Hawk flew right by me and landed in a tree not far from me.  I walked a circle around the bird and photographed it from many different angles.  From some angles, the background was pretty far behind the bird without bright patches from light shining through tree leaves. Cooper's Hawk These photos also illustrate some of the best ways I've found to distinguish Cooper's Hawks from Sharp-shinned Hawks: The tail has a thick white stripe at the bottom--especially in the fall, when their plumage is new, this is a helpful way to distinguish between them.  The bottom of the tail looks more rounded than squared--this is the easiest way to to distinguish them when their tails are fanned. The pattern on the chest extends to the belly. Sharp-shinned Hawks usually have a white lower belly. The gray on the top of the head looks more like a cap than a ho...

Cooper's Hawk I finally had a little bit of time to give my new Canon EOS 50D camera a little bit of a workout at Mead Gardens.  For the most part, I'm pleased with the results.  Especially at lower ISOs, the 50D gives me more detail than my 40D without any more noise.  At higher ISOs, though, it's a different story.  I'm not sure that the 15 megapixel sensor is any benefit over the 40D's 10 megapixel sensor at ISO 800 and above.  Part of the problem, though, may well be that I also decided to try out Canon's new "highlight tone priority" (HTP) feature.  I'll explain more about this in a future post, but for now, suffice it to say that I do not think it's beneficial for wildlife photography--in fact, I think it makes my photos noisier (and more importantly, uglier noise) in the shadows.  The next time I go out, I will turn HTP off an compare my results. Wood Ducks and a Green Heron Wood Ducks Other than that, I had a pretty good h...

Cooper's Hawk There's a nest of Cooper's Hawks at Mead Gardens, and it's fun to see the two young ones out of the nest testing their wings in the tree. On Monday, we saw both adults with their young, and the female was feeding them in the nest.  At one point, one of the adults flew so close to me that I was able to get full frame photos of the bird--it's just too bad I couldn't get rid of a mildly cluttered background. Cooper's Hawk Cooper's Hawk Cooper's Hawk

Chuck-will's Widow This morning I went to Mead Gardens again with the great people with the Orange Audubon Society. We had a wonderful morning.  Easily the best highlight of the morning was seeing a Nightjar, in particular, a Chuck-will's Widow.  We saw one our way to the board walk.  On the board walk, we were happy to find an Indigo Bunting and a beautiful Prairie Warbler.  When we circled back to where we saw the Chuck-will's Willow, we saw it again, and when it flew away, another came and perched on another branch. Chuck-will's Widow I don't know if this is the same as the first I saw Indigo Bunting Prairie Warbler We saw some nice Red-bellied Woodpeckers and Great Egrets, and on a few occasions, I saw Northern Cardinal fledglings.  While I saw only one at at time in the same general area, I'm pretty sure there were more than one there.  It was also great to see a Cooper's Hawk. Cooper's Hawk Cooper's Hawk Cardinal ...