Taken the same day as the previous post, one of my better outings during the Winter. There didn't seem to be many adult males in full breeding plumage at the time, mostly juvenile males and females. I was still happy to get these shots, this species tends to favour more open ocean and greater expanses of water than what existed at this location at the time.
The title suggests this will probably be the theme of the blog for awhile until I clear my backlog of duck photos. These images were taken on a cold day in mid February as the background will indicate.
I haven't seen many Magnolia Warblers this Spring. This was one I was lucky enough to get an image of. Likely a second year male, he still doesn't have all the colours of the adult.
There had been a couple of drake Green-winged Teal hanging out in the local pond in late Spring. Along with the males, at least one female which is still hanging around. She is acting like she has a few young ones hanging out nearby although I haven't seen them. That would mean there has been at least 3 different duck species raising young in the pond this year.
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I have featured the drake Ring-necks in a post or two. Here is the female in her first showing this year, at least in any detail.
I have spent several days recently photographing Red-winged Blackbirds. They have moved into my neighborhood in the last couple of years so I have lots of opportunities to do so without going very far. In this case it is the female or females of several pairs that are nesting nearby.
My last day of doing Winter waterfowl photography although not the last pictures I'll be posting from this past Winter. I got up extra early to be at the site before sunrise only to be disappointed that the area was fogged in. Temperatures didn't get below freezing during the night even though it was during the last few days of February. Eventually the fog burned off but these images were taken before that happened. There are 3 species of Mergansers here and both male and female Hooded mergansers, possibly both juveniles. Can you tell the difference? Female Common Merganser and Red-breasted are featured as well.
A few of many images I took of Ring-necked Ducks this Spring. These are some of the earlier shots I was able to capture but there were many later of both males and females in many different lighting situations.
A couple of individuals that I found at the same location in late May. It has always been a reliable spot for Chestnut-sided Warblers along with a few other species.
This post along with the last 2 are a good example of how the light changes as the morning progresses. I was all but ready to call it a morning when I spotted these two geese. It turns out they spotted me around the same time and came to check me out. I had abandoned my previous location but quickly went back there to see what kind of images I could get. These are some of the results.
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More early morning photos of waterfowl. This time a drake Green-winged Teal and a Ring-necked Duck. The difference in the light from before sunrise and then after is quite apparent in the last two posts. I do have some close-up images of these birds to share in upcoming posts.
These images were taken before sunrise one day this Spring. There are Ring-necked Ducks in one shot and a drake Wood Duck in the other. It was a chilly morning with lots of mist hanging over the water. I think these birds were just making their first move of the day.
Another batch of images from last Winter as you can tell from the snow and ice in the background. In many ways it's my favourite time to get out to shoot. While it's true there are fewer birds around there are also no biting insects which we have to put up with this time of year.
Since it's warbler season, most of the Spring returnees' are nesting now and some even have young mouths to feed, it seems like a good time to start posting some images from recent weeks. This species is one of the more common warblers in this area.
Black-headed gulls are actually a European species that showed up on the Atlantic coast of NA several decades ago mostly in Canadian waters. They're very similar to the more common Bonaparte's Gull but are slightly larger and can be identified fairly easily by their dusky underwing. We generally see them in Winter when they lack the dark (actually brown) head they exhibit in breeding plumage. These shots were taken last Winter.
The juveniles and females seem to outnumber the adult males at about twenty to one, so getting the male in breeding plumage is always a treat. These were taken a few days apart at different locations in the same general area but under different lighting conditions.
From this past Winter when I was spending most of my photography time shooting waterfowl at the same location. Things were still mostly frozen at the time so it wasn't that difficult to find where the birds were hanging out.
While this years trip to Brier Island might have been a bit of a disappointment in terms of bird numbers and photographic opportunities it more than made up for it as far as the overall experience considering the good company, good weather, great food and bad jokes. This year included one of the largest group in all the years we've been making the trip, eight, ranging in age from 9 to ? Let's just say I turned 65 years old this year and there were a couple individuals older than me.
I travelled there as usual with Carmen, but Danielle came along as well for the first time in several years. We made the traditional stops along the way but it wasn't birds so much as flora that had the biggest visual impact on us on the drive there including several trillium that caught our attention.
While the whole bird may not have made an appearance we did find this feather which possibly came from a Broad-winged Hawk, a bird we were able to see later on the island.
We saw a few more birds on the way to Brier including a few terns which is something we almost never see on the island these days since the gulls have taken over their nesting area on Peter's Island in recent years. We heard a Pied-billed Grebe singing from the marsh on Digby Neck which was a bit of a treat.
On the island we met up with Mark and Gretchen and daughter Lucy as well as Christo and Allie who had driven all the way from Ottawa to be there. The weather was a little dreary the first evening but a walk on the beach at Pond Cove turned up a few late Purple Sandpipers.
It's a little hard to believe these are the same birds I photograph in the Winter here. Their breeding plumage is totally different and they loose the bright orange bills and legs they sport in the colder months.
The next morning things were a little uneventful but I did manage to get a distant shot of a Scarlet Tanager which was one of the highlights of the trip for me. He disappeared shortly after I took this photo and wasn't seen again
There was a smattering of warblers around, the Black-throated Green being the most common. Also seen but keeping their distance were a bright male Blackburnian, several Northern Parulas and a female Cape May.
By the third day there were lots of singing Gray Catbirds. Among them was a singing Brown Thrasher which was briefly seen by Carmen. Lucy received full marks for her birding skills when she noted and recalled that Gray Catbirds are not just gray but have rusty red feathers under their tails.
Warblers were still a bit of no show except for a Chestnut-sided, a brief showing back at camp by a Black-throated Blue and of course the ever present Yellow warbler and Yellow-rumped Warbler pictured here.
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