Snowy Friday Backyard Birds

If you remember I was very envious that Tom got to photograph our birds in the backyard on each of days for the President's birthdays. Well today...Hehe...while Tom was using the snow blower this morning I was using his 300mm f2.8 lens on the deck. I just love these photos with the snowflakes coming down! Here are photos that I took today in the snow...



This little downey woodpecker landed so close to me I almost was too close to focus (I had to lean back a little)

I was playing around with this image in photoshop and came up with the Black and White and Red.
I apply this affect a lot for our brides and I am always silently ecstatic when I get to a Bride's house and see color in her bouqet. I know that white flowers with her white dress is always classic but I miss the opportunity to be able to apply this selected color technique.


This Tufted Titmouse just posed for me.

Tom put our Christmas tree out back when we took it down so that we could use it for our photos. The entrie time that I was outside only this one bird landed on it (it was very close to me and there was no food near it) but I just love the little gal (female Junco) on the evergreen with the snow.


4 photos of male Juncos

Another female junco

Bluebird wins HM

Lisa received an honorable mention from the Photographic Society of America for her photograph of a bluebird with a moth in its mouth. In this competition the New England Camera Club Council (NECCC) competed against five other camera club councils from around the United States. NECCC chose 10 photos from among the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and HM winners from the 2006-2007 Competitions to represent the council in the recent Council Challenge at the just completed PSA Convention in Tucson. NECCC finished FIRST with 130 points. Four photographs (3 from NECCC) earned perfect scores of 15 points and then the judges broke the tie and Lisa's photo was awarded an honorable mention.

Nature Photographers Network Editor's Pick Award

My (Lisa) photograph of a bumblebee on a flower (http://www.naturephotographers.net/imagecritique/ic.cgi?a=vp&pr=90906)
won a Nature Photographers Network Editor's Pick Award this week in the macro/close-up section.



Every week, a single photo is selected from each of the NPN photo critique galleries and placed on permanent display in this special gallery. At the end of the year, three photos from each category are selected from this gallery and receive an Editor’s Pick Award.

The Editor's Picks 17 Feb. '08: Some really outstanding work posted this week! Congratulations to Ron Dudley (Avian), Ellen deBoer (ESS), Lon Sharp (Fauna), Jeff Mitchell (Flora), Lisa Cuchara (M/CU), Arthur Sevestre (M&N), David Kelly (PA) and Stan Rose (WC #318 - "Valentines Day") Go see 'em all here. You guys and gals rock - thanks for your participation!

More birds in our backyard

Tom was off from work today for the President's holiday. He spent the afternoon outside in the backyard photographing the birds that come to our feeders. Here are a few photos that he took. I had to work today so I was very envious that he had this opportunity!

The Carolina Wren is one of my favorite little birds. I just love the way that Tom captured her with her wings flapping. These little guys made their nest on our front door last Spring and we got to watch them feed and fledge 4 babies.

We have both white-breasted (above) and red-breasted nuthatches in our yard. As a child the nutchatch was one of the first birds that I looked up in the bird book. My mother taught me the obvious like the robin and the cardinal, but what was this strange bird walking DOWN the tree trunk. The bird book said "you can usually identify this bird as a nuthatch because of its atypical behavior of walking DOWN the tree". I can remember being was so excited that I identified my first bird.

It has been so cold lately and the weather so strange and erratic that the birds have been very hungry, needing a lot of energy just to stay warm. The cardinal usually comes to our feeder very early in the morning and then again very late in the evening when the light is less than optimal. I put out the food in the mid-morning and they both came right away. Tom was lucky to be able to photograph the cardinal in the nice winter afternoon light.

We are blessed with 5 different types of woodpeckers that visit our backyard! A little bit of suet on the log and these little guys were very happy.

The last two photos from today -- two photographs of a female Junco.

Birds on President's Day

Tom was off from work today for the President's holiday. He spent the afternoon outside in the backyard photographing the birds that come to our feeders. Here are a few photos of the beautiful red-bellied woodpecker that he took today.

Lisa's article published on Nature Photographers Network

My article about the Great Horned Owl was just published on nature Photographers Network. You can check it out here: http://www.naturephotographers.net/articles0208/lc0208-1.html

My two that accompanied this article. Lisa

Birds in Our Backyard

My first bird for 2008 was a red-bellied woodpecker. Tom went out this afternoon and took some photos near the deck at our bird feeders. He used the Canon 40D with MY Canon 500mm f4 IS lens...

We have had 4 kinds of "woodpeckers" in our yard for the past 3 years (Hairy, Downey, red-bellied and yellow shafter flickers). This winter we gained a fifth with the yellow-bellied sapsucker.

The black capped chickadees are not at all shy and will even stay at the feeder when I go out to fill it. They love it when I open the bathroom window and scare away the squirrels, they don't move as the dozen squirrels scamper off and happily fly right down for a nut.


We always have lots of juncos too. Here is a male and a female.

The carolina wrens nested on our front door last year. I had left a grapevine wreath up last March when we went away for ten days to Florida. When I came home there was a nest in the wreath. I carefully moved the wreath to the wall next to the front door (the front door was the "back" of their nest) and we were treated with seeing them hatch and fledge 4 babies. I would come home from work every afternoon and put put meal worms for them. Tom put out some dried meal worms and they were quite happy today. I think that they remembered...

Coppers Hawk gets dove

I heard a loud thwack the week before Christmas and ran upstairs and saw this Cooper's Hawk with a morning dove in its talons. Cool! It was still moving. Here are two grab shots through the window. You can see the bird in its talons in the first photo.

Wolves

We photographed wolves at the Wolf Conservation Center yesterday. It was very cold (despite 4 layers and lots of "hot hands" my hands froze up a couple of times where I could not even feel the shutter). We photographed a pack of three wolves, Apache (the alpha male), Kaila and Lukas (I believe he is our favorite) and the Atka, their "ambassador wolf". We have been photographing them for three years now and we have several photos in the WCC 2007 and 2008 wolf calendars, including Tom's photo of Atka on the 2008 COVER! You can purchase the 2008 calendar from their website. http://www.nywolf.org/

You can also attend an educational program, or even an evening "wolf howl" in the summer months. This place is great for so many reasons, the conservation efforts of the wolves themselves but the education even more so. Wolves are such magnificent animals. Founded in 1999. The Wolf Conservation Center (WCC) promotes wolf conservation by teaching about wolves, their relationship to the environment, and the human role in protecting their future.

Here is Tom (I know, how can you tell? It is so cold that you cannot even tell that it is him). You can view many more wolf photos on our website: http://www.tlc.smugmug.com/gallery/1380405




The first three photos are Apache. Apache (10 years old) is the alpha male of the pack. He is a mixture of Arctic and Rocky Mountain/Canadian wolf. What an awesome sound to hear them howl. Tom had a photo taken two years ago of all three wolves in this pack standing together and howling -- a once in a lifetime photo! I didn't get the photo but just being there -- we were all very awed and affected by the experience. There is a great photo that I took of Apache in the 2008 WCC calendar, one where the snowflakes are falling all around him.










This is Kaila (the oldest at 12 years). She is a Rocky Mountain/Canadian wolf, and is the most "wolfish" of the bunch, preferring not to have anything to do with people.





This is Lukas, now 9 years old. He is a Rocky Mountain/Canadian wolf Lukas presently occupies the beta wolf position of the Ambassador pack. Can you tell that he is our favorite?? He just seems to capture our hearts just a little bit more than the others with his intensity and his character.

Atka is now 5 years old. He is an arctic wolf. Atka travels to schools, nature centers, and other events helping us educate people about wolves. He is the wolf that Tom photographed that is on the cover of the 2008 WCC (wolf conservation center) calendar. Tom had fun yesterday taking photos of Atka as he jumped back and forth over a small brook/pond. The action is always what Tom looks for.

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