Ravens, Willets and Kildeer, Oh My

Posted on April 10, 2020 by Lisa Rest

My love of corvids does not stop with crows. I tried to take advantage of any opportunity I had to photograph a Common Raven, a bird I never see at home. So I was delighted to discover the picture above. It’s not in sharp focus but that’s part of what I like about it. I think it looks more like a painting, and I credit the Raven with its artistic sense. There’s another slightly-different shot at the bottom of this post.

So even though most of these photographs from August 21, 2019, are of birds on land, so to speak, the presence of the sea in this part of the world is always dominant. I believe these were all taken on the island of Grand Manan.

Below is the habitat in which I was somehow able to find a Killdeer, followed by a series of photographs of the bird itself.

Later when we visited the beach, we spied a Willet which was even farther away and matching its surroundings.

More Ravens in flight…

Below is a lone Semi-Palmated Sandpiper, also barely distinguishable from the habitat. I love the scrubby vegetation and rocks and water and…

The group below is a few of many photographs that I took of a couple of Ravens on the beach. One Raven was foraging on a dead fish only to have another Raven crash-land in. I think they are young birds, because of the brownish cast to their head feathers, and they are probably siblings too, which accounts for their playful but non-threatening behavior.

A little flora break…

And the land and sea-scape…

A few images that didn’t make it into the last post are below. The upper left photo is a Double-Crested Cormorant, and the remainder of the photographs are of Common Eiders, birds I had never seen before this trip.

One problem with reviewing photos I took more than half a year ago is forgetting what they were of. I think these might be rosehips, related to the rose in the flora photos above. It looked like fruit to me but the leaves give it away.

Ravens in the mist…

Well, I may be back sooner with some more recent observations. Spring is sort of here. We had one or two very warm-like-summer days, then the winds shifted and we are chilly again, with snow in the forecast for next week although I expect it will not be substantial. It’s even hard to count on a forecast for the next few hours let alone next week. But sunshine is always welcome, and today we have had lots of it. Thanks for stopping by!

Back to Virtual Travel

Posted on April 7, 2020 by Lisa Rest

I didn’t go to The Gull Frolic this year. I decided not to when the invitations went out to Illinois Ornithological Society members last November. I was then looking forward to my trip to San Blas and the thought of coming back to stand on the lakefront in freezing temperatures after spending the early part of January in warm and sunny Mexico did not appeal to me. And anyway, my head was still full of images of Great Black-backed Gulls I had seen in New Brunswick and Grand Manan.

So this post features some of the Great Black-backeds and other species seen as we made our way from St. John to Grand Manan by ferry.

The photo below is actually a small section of a larger image. I was trying to focus on the White-Winged Scoters we were seeing from quite a distance. Or as Ann has now corrected me, they were Black Guillemots! We had some Scoters too. But this is sometimes the problem with processing photos half a year or more later.

More of the White-Winged Scoters. Oh they’re not, let’s fix this right now. They are Black Guillemots. I don’t know what happened to the Scoter. Maybe it’s in the third photograph on top — how far away we were at one point…

More Great Black-backed Gulls – and there’s likely a few Herring Gulls in the group shot, but it’s more like a warmer version of a Gull Frolic.

These Red-Necked Grebes were distant but delightful nonetheless.

Sooty Shearwaters don’t photograph particularly well at a distance.

A glimpse of a rugged landscape.

Great Shearwaters were abundant and easier to photograph than the Harbor Seals in the first two photographs below.

I thought this post needed a little color.

A few more Great Black-Backed Gulls.

Some of that lovely rugged stuff that grows on rock.

And an adult Herring Gull.

I will be back with the other half of this day’s photos. The focus will be on land birds. It took me a week to process the 740-or-so images on my recalcitrant pokey travel laptop. But I guess these days I can’t complain about how long it takes me to do anything.

Taking Stock

Posted on March 24, 2020 by Lisa Rest

I started writing this post on Friday, after I took a break from the work email and made a trip to The Feed Store to stock up on birdseed, peanuts and spray millet for those inside and out. Working from home is so strange. In my head I am still working, but home has all its necessary distractions. I keep thinking I will have gotten used to it only when I have to go back to the office. It was still good to get out, and even better to get exercise moving everything into the house and the back porch. It was a chilly, gray day, but it is March, which my mother always used to refer to as the “adolescent” month, so I endure its changeability with her blessing.

Speaking of adolescents, I suppose the bird below could be called an adolescent Purple Finch. I am at a loss as to why I took so many photographs of it, but when in this plumage maybe the last thing I’m thinking is “Purple Finch” so it’s a reminder.

As I may have mentioned previously, I moved a lot of photographs off the laptop recently. Many were of winter scenes never shared, but I was tired of winter and it’s more than enough enduring this winter of the soul, so I have gone back to the remaining pictures from my trip to New Brunswick last August. And in that location at that time of year, there were a lot of in-between looking birds getting ready to make their first trips south for the winter.

I particularly got a kick out of this Yellow-Rumped Warbler. My friend Lesa tells me she has already seen some of these guys locally as they start to go back north. I could fantasize this was one of them.

I’m too lazy to go back and try to reconstruct exactly when we were wherever on August 20 but my notes say we were on the Salt Marsh Trail and Callendar’s Trail with a beach picnic area in Kouchibouguac National Park, which likely accounts for the shorebird images and others with wide open spaces for a background. We also visited the C. Irving Arboretum.

Thanks for stopping by and joining this visual journey. I will be back soon with more images from last summer. Spring is coming, and with it, hope for renewal.

Cerro de San Juan / Pine-Oak Forest Birds

Posted on February 21, 2020 by Lisa Rest

After my one-day bout with whatever it was, I rejoined the group for a side-trip to higher elevations to see a variety of small birds. The few that weren’t small wound up that way in my pictures for the most part, being very far away.

I was delighted to manage a few shots of the Bumblebee Hummingbirds which were very tiny.

Most accommodating were one or two White-eared Hummingbirds.

I couldn’t find Red-headed Tanager on our triplist, but that’s definitely what this is. It’s likely it was on the list and I just wasn’t back up to speed enough to stay on top of Steve’s rapid-fire recitation of what we saw at the end of the day. As far as I can tell this is still a tanager and hasn’t been reclassified, which seems to be happening constantly.

Warblers were present. It was difficult to get a clear shot of the Rufous-Capped but these are good enough for identification anyway. Notice the similarities between the Townsend’s and the Black-Throated Green below it…

I was very happy to get such good looks at a Grace’s Warbler. This is another first-timer for me.

Our daily Western Flycatcher…

And another new wren!

We get Hepatic Tanagers sometimes in migration. This one seemed to be attracted to a gate resembling its own color.

A coy Black-throated Magpie Jay…

Another bird we see in the spring and fall…Ruby-Crowned Kinglet.

I nearly didn’t find this next bird in my photographs but when I did, even though it’s not fully visible, the beautiful contrast between the blue on its back and the yellow on the throat made me glad I managed to capture it at all.

I vaguely remember seeing a Cordilleran Flycatcher in Texas… And nice to see again a little bit better perhaps this time.

It’s always a bit of a surprise to see a bird that’s relatively common at home in the summer or during migration, like this Eastern Bluebird, and the Chipping Sparrow below it…

Bullock’s Oriole was another species I saw first in Texas.

I wish I lived closer to Acorn Woodpeckers.

There’s a distant Bat Falcon perched on the tree. I included this photograph more for the habitat.

Grosbeaks are so…distinctive!

I like Pewees…

Well I think I have two more days of photographs to sift through from this trip. Meanwhile, the real-time days keep getting longer here farther north. And the birds have taken notice. I have been hearing cardinals singing on sunny mornings at least for the past two weeks, but I have never heard what I heard this morning. My Northern Cardinal was practicing his entire repertoire. He sang four different songs, one right after the other, as if he was making sure they were all still there. Wish I could have recorded it but probably no one would have believed I didn’t edit it anyway. 🙂

Afternoon on the Rio San Cristobal

Posted on February 13, 2020 by Lisa Rest

Here’s the rest of the pictures from the day in my previous post. This was our first of two trips in a panga boat down the Rio San Cristobal near San Blas, Mexico. I was more often than not on the wrong side of the boat this time, but as we were slowly and quietly passed through the water, I managed to get some photos.

Though we saw mostly herons of one sort or another, the likely river raptor is the Snail Kite. This one I caught in flight. Yes, they eat snails.

We saw lots of White Ibis nearly every day, but for the most part they weren’t very easy to capture. This one stood out against the dark background from a distance.

It was still possible to see some of the usual passerines. Not so usual were the Red-Billed Pigeons. I wish I’d gotten a closer look at them.

Green Herons are some of the most cooperative subjects. I suspect they are really focused on their quest for food, to not mind me clicking away.

For good measure, more birds I will likely see this spring and summer: Great Egret, Black-Crowned Night-Heron and Great Blue Heron.

It was a real treat to see this Bare-Throated Tiger Heron out in the open.

Little Blue Herons aren’t so blue until they are adults, like the one below.

As dusk curtailed our excursion, we managed to capture good looks at a nocturnal species, the Northern Potoo.

A couple more of two foraging herons…

It’s especially nice to look at these photographs today, as a distraction from the accumulating snow that continues into the afternoon, to be followed by drastically dropping temperatures on my way home from work. It’s supposed to be somewhere between 1-2 degrees Fahrenheit tomorrow morning, not counting the windchill, when I walk to the train. But all is not lost. We warm up on Saturday so it can start snowing again. Maybe I can catch a few photographs of the hearty goldfinches at my feeders. The snow was beautiful this morning but it was too early for decent light.

I wish you safety and warmth wherever you are.

Ah, the Sewage Ponds

Posted on February 11, 2020 by Lisa Rest

It may sound awful, but sewage ponds are a good place to look for birds. And that is exactly where we went on our first morning outing in San Blas.

If I can trust my camera roll, the first birds we saw were an assortment of seedeaters and kingbirds, but I have given first position to this very attractive Groove-Billed Ani, because I never noticed the unique woven-looking pattern of the nape feathers before.

And now, the Seedeaters…

Tropical Kingbirds can be good subjects. Below this one is a Thick-billed Kingbird for comparison, but the name doesn’t seem all that descriptive to me.

Those of you who know me know I adore Crows, so I was thrilled to observe a new species doing Crow Stuff.

I don’t think a day went by without a Zone-tailed Hawk, either…

I was impressed with the graceful flight of a Wood Stork.

This falcon could have been laughing at me for as long as I waited for him to turn his head for a profile shot.

Unlike my last Texas trip, I don’t recall hearing the incessant chatter of a Bell’s Vireo, but at least we saw this one.

Great Kiskadees were ever-present but nearly impossible to photograph. I wonder why I bothered with this one.

Not sure I have any better images coming of Roseate Spoonbills, but here’s one flying.

All these species would have been way too many for me to get my head around without taking pictures. A new woodpecker!

Below, what an endearing little flycatcher for such a long name. I confess I don’t know what makes it “beardless.”

Not a day went by without a Blue-gray Gnatcatcher distraction. Some days were Blue-grey though.

I think we had a record number of pygmy owls on this trip.

The remaining images are…more birds seen.

This Yellow-Winged Cacique was having a bad hair day. Lovely flower though.

I didn’t manage to photograph many butterflies with a 100-400mm lens, but these are a few that we saw. I’ve put the Vermilion Flycatcher with them because unlike previous trips, I never got close enough to one to do it justice. I will try to identify the rest of the butterflies when my new butterfly book arrives…

Raptors aplenty – Short-Tailed Hawk is new for me.

I was going to include the afternoon river excursion photos, but I think they deserve their own space. So my chronicle of this day in San Blas will continue soon.

The Road to San Blas

Posted on February 7, 2020 by Lisa Rest

We had beautiful weather for the entire trip, which made the drive from Puerto Vallarta to San Blas, Mexico, along the Pacific coast in the state of Nayarit, that much better. It’s a long drive, and we made several stops along the way to look for birds. Some were familiar, like Yellow Warbler, Nashville Warbler, and Summer Tanager which visit my habitat during spring and summer.

We had San Blas Jays and Golden-Fronted Woodpeckers in abundance. The Golden-Fronted are common in Texas, but the San Blas Jays are endemic to Mexico.