Semipalmated Sandpipers, Conneaut, Ohio

Hi everybody,

As I work through processing images from my recent trip(s) to photograph fall shorebirds at Conneaut, Ohio, I’ll be posting a few of my favorites from each species together. I’ll start with one of the more common birds that were present, Semipalmated Sandpipers.

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Elk on Dream Lake reprocessed, Dream Lake, Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado

Hey everybody,

This image is from last July at Dream Lake, in Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado. This morning was one of the most memorable experiences I have ever had as a nature photographer. Having a gigantic bull Elk wander into this scene was just incredible! I’ve been slowly (very slowly) improving my skills at processing, and thought I’d give this one another go.

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Sora out in the open (just like last year!)

Hey everybody,

Now I’ll begin sharing images I made from two visits to Conneaut. OH, to photograph shorebirds migrating southwards for the fall/winter! Just like last year when I went to Conneaut, I found a group of three Sora(s?) that ventured out into the open quite a bit! It’s always exciting to get a secretive bird such as the Sora to come out into the open. They’re always tucked away in some thick reeds, so photographing them with a clean background such as this is just a blast!

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To purchase a print or stock rights, please contact me. Feel free to view more of my work at my website.

Northern Hawk Owl in flight over snowy field, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

Hey everybody,

I’m making a serious effort to get some content up on this blog regularly. I’m currently playing catch-up, and still working through most of my images from late winter/spring. Back in February, I went up to Canada and shot with my friend Greg Schneider. One of the many birds we found was this Northern Hawk Owl in Ottawa.

Long-tailed Ducks in flight, Barnegat Inlet, Barnegat Lighthouse State Park, New Jersey

Hey everybody,

My lack of participation on this blog lately has gone on for too long! I’ve been working hard on preparing photos for my new website, and I’ve enjoyed a rare week of doing absolutely nothing at all! I’m getting caught up again with processing photos. Here are two images I made of Long-tailed Ducks at Barnegat this past February. I had a great visit and saw tons of birds, including but not limited to: Harlequin Ducks, Long-tailed Ducks, Common Loon, Red-throated Loon, Black Scoter, Surf Scoter, Red-breasted Mergansers. Barnegat really is a great spot and I hope to return for a morning or two this winter!

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To purchase a print or stock rights, please contact me. Feel free to view more of my work at my website.

Henslow’s Sparrow, Belmont County, Ohio, USA

Hey everybody,

Wow! It has been a while since I updated this blog. Sorry for that. I’ll be around a bunch more in the next few months!

I took a brief trip a few weeks ago to go photograph grassland birds out in Ohio, meeting up with Matthew Studebaker, Greg Schneider, and Brian Zwiebel, at different times. Overall, it didn’t go too well, but I had a few good birds, that’s for sure. Here’s a beautiful Henslow’s Sparrow that Brian found singing in Belmont County, Ohio.

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To purchase a print or stock rights, please contact me. Feel free to view more of my work at my website.

Puffin Preen, Machias Seal Island, Maine, USA (Or is it Nova Scotia, Canada? Depends on who you ask.)

Continuing with the theme of posting photos from my Maine outing, here’s a favorite of mine from Machias Seal Island. Ian Plant and I went out with Bold Coast Charters on a puffin tour to the island. We left out of Cutler, Maine and had absolutely perfect sea conditions for the hour long ride each way. Once we got on the island, it was ninety minutes of non-stop shutter clicking. I shot about 2000 exposures! We had excellent conditions with a light overcast cloud cover, and the wind coming from behind us, so I shot tons of portraits, head shots, group shots, and even some flight images that I’m really excited to process.

Anyhow, I’m tired and don’t feel like writing much at the moment, so I’ll shut up and post the picture 🙂 That’s all you guys are here for, riiiiight?

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To purchase a print or stock rights, please contact me. Feel free to view more of my work at my website.

Maine Day 3: Black-throated Green Warbler in breeding plumage, Acadia National Park, Maine

Hey everybody,

You know what? I really like doing an entry every day when I’m on multiple day outings. I don’t really like having to try to process images on my laptop, but I enjoy taking the time each evening to write one of these up.

Anyhow, today was a pretty good day. There was no dramatic light to be witnessed at sunrise nor sunset. All day long, there was a thin layer of high altitude clouds that basically acted as a diffuser for the sun. So, naturally, only one thing was on my mind. SONGBIRDS ALL DAY! I didn’t have the best luck with them today, but the ones that worked were amazing. I found this Black-throated Green Warbler that was a blast to work with. With all honesty, I probably got 5-8 keeper images of him today. Here’s one that was simple enough to process on the laptop.

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To purchase a print or stock rights, please contact me. Feel free to view more of my work at my website.

Blue Jay in snow

Here’s one from this past winter. I was up in Algonquin Provincial Park, Ontario, with my friend Greg Schneider. We came across an area with feeders that had over 100 blue jays, so we did what any bird photographers would do; we brought out the giant bag of peanuts and stayed for a few hours.

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To purchase a print or stock rights, please contact me. Feel free to view more of my work at my website.

male Common Yellowthroat

Hey everybody,

I’ve been shooting a lot this spring, but it has been almost exclusively landscapes. I haven’t been giving bird and wildlife subjects too much time lately. So, I took a visit to Huntley Meadows in Alexandria, Virginia, where I photographed this striking male Common Yellowthroat. I have very little experience shooting songbirds and warblers, so I’m really looking forward to seeing what I can do over the next few weeks.

Barred Owl staring me down

Here’s another from my great time with the Barred Owls!

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To purchase a print or stock rights, please contact me. Feel free to view more of my work at my website.

Update+Barred Owls

Hey everybody,

Sorry for the lack of updates. A lot has happened since my last post on here, including but not limited to: Burrowing Owls, Barred Owls, awesome Roseate Spoonbills, and unfortunately, the death of a D300! I’m going to keep this post short and sweet because I’m feeling rather lazy and in a hurry.

Anyway, here’s the camera story. I was out photographing on the north beach lagoon in Fort DeSoto State Park. The shutter mechanism on my D300 went nuts and somehow broke while I was using it, which was horrible within itself. Obviously I wasn’t happy with that, and I began to walk back to the car to grab my backup body. While I was walking back, I tripped and fell, sending my D300 to its watery demise. I guess it happens to everybody at some point… Right?

Here are two images I took while going after a pair of Barred Owls in Everglades National Park. I have Paul Marcellini to thank for telling me about the location. As luck would have it, he and Rick Gomez showed up and we had a good ol’ time trudging through the swamp.

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To purchase a print or stock rights, please contact me. Feel free to view more of my work at my website.

Oh yeah, and Happy Easter if you celebrate it.

Snail Kites!

Hey everybody,

Florida is awesome so far. Here’s an image of a female Snail Kite from Lake Kissimmee. This bird is endangered in Florida and I’ve been told biologists have concluded that there are under 900 of them left. Anyhow, I had a blast photographing them, and I hope to get back again before I leave in search of a nice looking male.

Anyhow, this fine lady had just finished consuming an Apple Snail, and just took off from her perch to go find another one.

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To purchase a print or stock rights, please contact me. Feel free to view more of my work at my website.

Florida Scrub Jay

Hey everyone,

I took this photo of a Florida Scrub Jay at Oscar Scherer State Park in Osprey, Florida. This endangered species is remarkably easy to see photograph at this location. They’re so bold and curious that they landed on my head and camera dozens of times!

Also, here’s a quick shot of a Scrub Jay on my head! Forgive me for the stupid look on my face. Unfortunately, there’s nothing I can do about that! 🙂

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To purchase a print or stock rights, please contact me. Feel free to view more of my work at my website.

Great Blue Heron up close

Well,

Like I said last week, I’m now with my family in Florida staying at my Grandparents’ place. I gotta say, it’s great having family in great birding/hiking/shooting locations. It’s definitely tough to properly balance time spend with family and time spent with the camera, though. Florida is just incredible for birds, as so many of you may already know. I’ve only photographed one bird so far, but that’ll surely change today!

I found this Great Blue Heron near the beach around Fort Lauderdale as it was harassing a few fishermen. I was able to approach it from within just ten feet and take this up close portrait with a 70-200mm lens!

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To purchase a print or stock rights, please contact me. Feel free to view more of my work at my website.

Incoming Sandhill Crane, Bosque del Apache NWR, New Mexico

Hey everybody,

Here’s another shot I’ve just recently processed. I took it back in November at Bosque del Apache. I’m getting some real progress done with processing the photos from my giant trip… It’s exciting!

Speaking of exciting, it’s spring break next week, and that means I’ll be visiting my grandparents in Florida like my family does most years. I can’t wait to get down there!

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To purchase a print or stock rights, please contact me. Feel free to view more of my work at my website.

Spring is coming!

…And I can feel it in my sinuses. Wahoo! It’ll only be a few more weeks until everything starts getting green again. I can’t wait!

As you may know, I’m still working away at processing images from last fall/winter. This is one from late October in the Wichita Mountains NWR, Oklahoma. I fired away at this guy when he looked up at me, because he was looking down at the grass he was eating about 95% of the time. I was lucky to capture this flock of birds behind him.

Ring-billed Gull #2, Humber Bay Park, Toronto, Ontario

The second of the series…

Ring-billed Gull #1, Humber Bay Park, Toronto, Ontario

Hey,

Here is a photograph of a Ring-billed Gull. I know it’s not the most beautiful or rare bird, in fact, you may know that they’re quite common. Anyhow, I feel like I have two shots worthy of sharing. Matthew, Greg, and I were hanging around Humber Bay Park East trying to get some flight shots of a Wigeon and a Bufflehead. While we were there I shot a few flight shots of the many Ring-billed Gulls that were flying all over the place. Now that I’m looking at them on the computer, I kind of like ’em!

Pine Siskin #2

I’m not talking about Pine Siskins pooping……

I know, it’s not funny.