Yet Another White-crowned Sparrow

White-crowned Sparrow

I haven’t had much time to get out and shoot lately, nor to process anything I do bring home. This blog has also fallen behind.

But I did get out for a couple hours on the weekend, and I finally squeezed in some time to at least review Saturday’s files. I was hoping to see and photograph a Rufous-crowned Sparrow that a friend discovered at our local spot, so I spent about 40 minutes sitting on the cold damp ground watching the area for any sign of the bird. I didn’t see the rufous-crowned, but had lots of opportunity to watch my friends the White-crowned Sparrows at close range. As a displaced eastern birder I never get tired of seeing these common western birds that were much less common in the mid Atlantic area.

The heavy rains we’ve had lately in central Arizona knocked down a lot of the seeds from the bushes at the Gilbert Water Ranch, and the sparrows were taking advantage of the seeds that had collected in this spot along one of the paths. These birds had no problems with me sitting close by with the camera at a low tripod height, even though they scattered back into cover every time a jogger or dog walker came along the path. After each interruption the birds would return to collect seeds, and sometimes they’d stage on the shrub on the other side of the path.

This turned out to be the best setting, and I was thrilled when one immature white-crown stayed long enough for over 30 frames. I was able to fidget with aperture, and also got various head positions. I always try to get as many frames as possible when an opportunity like this occurs as very tiny changes in head position can make or break an image – especially when working with directional light as I prefer to do. A natural catchlight in the eye is very important to giving life to an image.

I confess I rushed processing of this image to get it ready last night, and I may come back to it later to fine tune tones and brightness. And I might find that I prefer another frame from the sequence when I get time to process some more shots.

2/6/10, Nikon D200, 300/2.8 plus TC20E (2x), ISO 400, 1/350th second @ f/8. Natural light (no flash). Not baited, no setup, no cloning. Cropped to about 75% of frame.

Curve-billed Thrasher on Saguaro

Curve-billed Thrasher on Saguaro

I’ve written repeatedly that my photography is primarily about birds in habitat - I think there is a lot more to a good habitat shot than there is to a sterile shot of “nothing but the bird.” So, I tend to compose with the bird smaller in the frame than many other photographers do as it allows me to show the setting as well. But that sometimes results in images that some viewers find too cluttered.

This Curve-billed Thrasher from the Gilbert Water Ranch might satisfy both camps. The only habitat I’ve included is the top of a Saguaro cactus – hopefully enough to identify the perch and set the desert scene, but not so much of it as to overwhelm the thrasher.

There’s often a good opportunity for shots of this type just off the parking lot for the Water Ranch, especially during nesting season and when the Saguaro fruit is available for hungry birds. But the cactus stand is worth checking on any morning visit, like this one on December 2, 2008.

It can be difficult to compose these cactus-top shots – especially if you insist on putting more empty space in front of the subject and keeping it out of the center of the frame. I’ve hacked off the left side of the cactus with the frame edge here to avoid a dead center placement of the thrasher, but it still might be more centered than purists like.

The other thing I like about this image is the light – this is close to dawn so the light is very warm here.

Nikon D200, 300/2.8 plus TC20E (2x), ISO 400, 1/320th second at f/8.

Eurasian Wigeon

Eurasian Wigeon

I’ve been working on and off to update some of the images on my web site, and this shot from December 11, 2004, is one of the reworked images. This Eurasian Wigeon was on one of the many artificial ponds in the so-called Greenbelt in Scottsdale, AZ. Eurasian Wigeon shows up most winters in one or more places in Arizona, mixed in with flocks of the abundant American Wigeon.

I’d had my first digital camera, a Nikon D70, only 18 days at this point and was just getting a feel for it and digital in general. I had made the decision to shoot in raw mode from the very start, so there was a lot to learn about image processing as well. But at least I’d been using Photoshop Elements already for the slide scans I’d been doing at the time.

I was happy with my results, and with this rarity. And I’ve lived with the image I processed at that time for five years without thinking about it.

But I’ve learned a lot about post processing in that period, and I’ve moved beyond PS Elements to Photoshop CS3. Since I was smart enough to shoot in raw, and smart enough to save the original raw files (on an external hard drive plus a couple copies on CDs), I was able to start from scratch and see how I would interpret the image now.

OK – here’s the version I processed in 2004 with Elements to see the difference.

Eurasian Wigeon - old version

My advice: shoot in raw if you don’t already. Save all your originals, and back them up. Periodically review old favorites and see if its time for a tune-up with better software and improved post processing skills. It would be a shame to skip these advantages of shooting digital.

Nikon D70, 300/2.8 plus TC20E, ISO 320, 1/250th at f/11, fill flash from SB-800.

Loggerhead Shrike on thorny perch

Loggerhead Shrike on thorny branch

I’ve been fascinated by shrikes ever since seeing my first one (December 3, 1980, Houston, TX). Living in NJ we didn’t get to see many, but I always chased after reports of both shrike species and got to see a good percentage of the ones found there.

One of the treats of living in AZ is getting to see the Loggerhead Shrike more often. And I’ve even been lucky enough to see its close cousin the Northern Shrike twice in AZ (more often in NJ).

Shrikes are songbirds that have adopted the lifestyle of hawks as best they can. They prey on lizards and snakes, large insects, and small birds. Being high on the food chain like this they require more territory to support them and are less common on the smaller birds.

They often perch high on a tree or pole or wire so they can watch for potential prey over a large area. They’ll sometimes be attacked by smaller birds hoping they’ll leave the area. When they fly they drop lower to the ground and pull up at the end of their flight to another hgh perch.

Shrikes retain the small feet of other songbirds rather than the large talons of real raptors. They use their substantial hooked beaks to grab prey and dispatch it. Since they can’t use their feet to grasp prey and pull it apart they often impale what they’ve caught on barbed wire fences or on thorny branches, so it is no surprise to see this bird at the Gilbert Water Ranch on a branch like this.

Taken 01/20/10, Nikon D200, 300/2.8 with TC20E (2x), Gitzo tripod, ISO 400, 1/750th second at f/10, matrix meter at -1/3rd stop compensation.

Vermilion Flycatcher juvenile male

Vermilion Flycatcher juvenile male

I don’t usually rush images through processing, and I seldom post anything the day I shoot it. But I got lucky this afternoon and I thought I’d share the results.

I hadn’t been out to shoot for almost a week, and I really needed some time with the birds to balance some other stresses in my life. So I made an afternoon visit to my default location – the Water Ranch in Gilbert, AZ. I usually visit in early morning, but afternoons can be productive as well, and the change in light direction makes another part of the preserve worth visiting. There have been two Vermilion Flycatchers in this area – one full adult with the brilliant plumage; and this juvenile male with patches of color on gray. My portfolio has some good stuff on adults (use the search field to find some on this blog), but nothing on the immature birds.

This bird has been hanging around the SW corner of the Water Ranch, and has become more comfortable with people nearby. A friend and I watched and waited near some favorite perches with the light in our favor, and it didn’t take long for this bird to stat visiting them. I got really lucky, though, when he landed on a different branch closer to my position and I got a few frames before he moved on again.

Some may find the flycatcher is too centered in the frame here, but I loved the line of the branch. Also, I didn’t want to cut across the smaller twig projecting to the right and upward from the back of the bird, and that required including a bit more room on the right than I normally would have. I love this setting and the soft colors behind the flycatcher. I like the position of the bird as well. And if you look closely you can see a strand of spiderweb in from of the bird.

Jan 26, 2010, 4:20 pm, Nikon D200, 300/2.8 plus TC20E, ISO 400, 1/160th second at f/7.1, Gitzo tripod.