Downy woodpecker

On my last trip about a week ago I did get one nice photograph of a downy woodpecker.  I have been consistently seeing one every time out.  However they seem to always avoid being photographed. They always seem to hide on the back side of the tree, or climb where you can't get the shot. But I did capture one shot of him doing a little dance like motion, where he was bobbing side to side.   I'm hoping that I can soon get back out and do some more photography. This is the first year in a while that I have no photographs of bald eagles. I have seen plenty now, but nothing within range.  I know that the season here is short and coming to and end.  So I would really like to get some nice photographs before most of them fly back north.  I will post some more shots after my next trip. Hopefully the weather cooperates and I get out soon.  Enjoy the photograph. Until next time.

Rainy Day

I took a couple more trips out since the last post.  The bald eagle count has been low, but the weather has been very cold.  Even though the eagle count is down the trips were not uneventful.  I have been seeing a pair of cardinals, blue jays, nuthatches, dark eyed juncos, black capped chickadees, sparrows, a downy woodpecker, and a red bellied woodpecker.  The male cardinal has cooperated, but the female has not been where I could get a shot of her.  

Also I did get a shot of the red bellied woodpecker that I was happy with.  Today has been a rain out but I’m hoping to get out again soon.  The rain did give me a chance to go through my photographs from the last few trips at least.  I was very satisfied with the way some of them came out.  I am really hoping I start to see more bald eagles soon, but if they don’t decide to show up at least ill have fun photographing the smaller birds. 

The weather report for the coming week does not seem promising but hopefully I will get a few good days.  Hope everyone enjoys the photographs. Until next time.  

Small Bird Extravaganza

I know it has been a long time since my last post.  But I have now graduated from college and have more opportunities to go out and photograph wildlife.  On my trip yesterday I was looking for Bald Eagles but I didn't see many.  The numbers have been low so far this year, and I'm hoping they get better soon.  The few eagles I did see were not in range to get a shot.
 

However while I was out I did see an abundance of small birds.  I saw a downy woodpecker and a red bellied woodpecker.  Also there was a pair of cardinals and probably a dozen or more blue jays.  There was also many other small bird species including dark eyed juncos, sparrows, and black capped chickadees.  I was surprised that I did not see any nuthatches.

Overall it turned out to be a fun day, and I am looking forward to seeing more Bald Eagles this year.  From my trip I did get some nice photographs of small birds.  Included in the post our my favorites.  Hoping to get out a few more times this week and get some more photographs.  Hope everyone enjoys the photographs.  Until next time.

Photo's from Bashakill and Reverse Ring Test

It took me a little longer than planned to go through the images from my last couple trips from the Bashakill, and the flower photographs that I was trying to take with the reverse lens.  A lot of the flower photographs didn’t come out as planned and I think next time I will try using a tripod to eliminate blur.  I am not sure if it was just the tiny depth of field or if some hand held movement caused some of the blur. 

However I did take one photograph of a dandelion (pictured above) that I thought was decent.  I am also uploading the garter snake photograph that I took when I was outside photographing the flowers.  

The one photograph from the Bashakill trip is the baby Canadian goose photograph, which I was pleased with.  Hope you enjoy the photographs.  I will hopefully get out a few days this week and get some more photographs.  Until next time.   

Home for the Summer

Since my last post I have not had many opportunities to get out and photograph anything.  Partly due to me being away at college.  Now summer is finally here and I am home, where there are many more opportunities to photograph wildlife and nature.  A couple days last week I was messing around with the Reverse Lens Technique trying to photograph flowers.  I mounted my 55 mm lens in reverse, using my reversing ring and mounted that on a stack of Kenko extension tubes.  I was surprised by the results.  With a regular mounted lens the extension tubes would allow you to be able to focus on closer subjects to the lens.  With the reverse lens mount on extension tubes, I found that it lets you stay further away from the subject which in some cases will be very nice.  I was happy about this because with just the lens you sometimes would be right on top of the subject in order for it to focus, but with the set of extension tubes it allowed me to be a little further away from the subject.  Hopefully this will help a lot when photographing insects, where as before it was a challenge to focus on animals because you had to get so close.  I also stumbled across either a ribbon or garter snake not sure which, when I was experimenting.  So I took a few shots with the normal mounted lens as well.  I have not had a chance to upload the images to my computer yet, but hopefully I will get to it this week and post some of the images by the end of the week.  Until next time.