outdoor photography

Ebony Jewelwing It's been forever since I posted on my blog--terribly long.  I had my camera equipment stolen in early March, which took me a bit out of commission, but I have most of it back now, so I'm back in the swing of things, though I haven't done any blog posts at all in April.  Anyway, yesterday my father and I decided to visit Lake Mills Park.  I've only been there a couple times, and I've never had any luck there. However, a friend of mine found a Summer Tanager there a couple days ago, and I need that for my year list, so we gave it one more try. Downy Woodpecker The most obvious thing to check out there is the walk from the parking area to the lake.  This is the only area I'd explored before, and perhaps that's why I haven't been too successful there. There were surprisingly few birds there, though there were lots of Northern Parula in the trees.  It was fun to see a Bald Eagle, a Great Blue Heron and a Great Egret flying over the ...

Prothonotary Warbler This morning I walked the Osprey Trail at Spring Hammock Preserve in search of the Prothonotary Warblers I'd seen there a couple times in May.  With all the rain we've been having, there is a lot of water under the board walk, and it seemed to me a great place to look for breeding Prothonoary Warblers..  There were more mosquitoes along the trail than birds, but I was rewarded at the end of the boardwalk with the sight of a beautiful male Prothonotary Warbler.  He perched in the sunlight for me; unfortunately, it was so dark under the canopy of trees that I had my ISO set to 2000, but the photo above doesn't show the noise very much.  I walked to the very end of the board walk and heard a couple Purple Gallinules there before deciding to head back.  On the way back I found a male and a female, and the female was foraging for food; at one point she took off with a tasty morsel for the nest (that photo had to be shot at ISO 4000). Once get...

Ebony Jewelwing Damselfly Yesterday morning at Central Winds Park I took my first photographs of a damselfly in Florida.  I see dragonflies all the time here, but rarely see damselflies.  Perhaps I'm just not looking in the right places.  Anyway, I believe that this Damselfly is an Ebony Jewelwing.