Archive for July, 2009
A Cool Texas Day
Jul 25th
It was a surprisingly nice day for the end of July it was down in the 80′s this morning here in Texas. I got rained on a few times while out shooting today, but that didn’t seem to bother any of the birds. Ran across an American Bittern these birds are always fun to watch as they work there way around in the tall grasses of the marsh. Anytime they think they have been spotted by a threat they get really tall and straight up and down sort makes them look like the grass it’s interesting behavior.
The Bittern below was on a low branch in the weeds just hanging out.
Added the rest of the images to the Fort Worth Nature Center Gallery
Slow Day…
Jul 18th
Some days the shoots are just slow. However the one bright spot was having this Green Heron drop drop right in front of me. This is the first time I have gotten some shots of a Green Heron so it was fun watching its behavior. As you can see from the image I caught it in the tree, but it did go feed for awhile as well. Hopefully I will have a chance to observe another one pretty soon.
I am also trying a few new things with Lightroom.
For the rest of the Nature Center Gallery.
Another Trip to the Wichita Mountains
Jul 15th
This trip to the Wichita Mountains was far better than the last one. We got a much larger variety of shots this time around. I think it also helped that we had some idea of the places we wanted to hit up and what to expect. I personally got shots of Bison, Coyote, Blacktail Prairie Dogs, Canadian Geese, Texas Longhorn, and a Painted Bunting. The biggest negative about the whole trip would have to be the heat of course it was 105 outside when we arrived on Saturday around 5:30pm. It did cool however in to the mid 90s as the sun went down.
This image was taken around 7pm as you can see the sun is starting to set. This image was probably my favorite of the shots I took on Saturday. The prairie dogs were surprisingly active given how hot it was, but they also had there share of lazy moments too as you can see from the image below.
I am really pleased with this next image not because its a great shot, but its a Painted Bunting. I have been trying for awhile to get a shot of one of these.
See the rest of the images in the Wichita Mountains 2 Gallery
The Marsh
Jul 9th
I finally got my new Canon 50D so of course I had to go give it a test run and I must say I am very pleased with the results.
In this first image I am really pleased that I managed to catch both the wings and the splash while this Great Egret was fishing. It would have been even better had he come up with a fish this time, but you can’t have everything right.
This next image is of a Snowy Egret which I caught just as he was landing on this stump. I have put a second image of this in the gallery. I really have a lot of fun shooting these birds. Watching them splash around chasing fish is quite amusing.
And of course I had to post this little surprise. It’s not everyday you run into a gator in the wild in Texas. I knew there were some in the marsh, but you really don’t expect to see one.
The rest of the images can be found in The Marsh Gallery
Marsh Birds
Jul 6th
Still working on my Egret and Heron project. Today I saw Great Egrets, Snowy Egrets, American Bitterns, and Great Blue Herons.
Snowy Egrets
Jul 3rd
Had some good luck shooting some Snowy Egrets today at the nature center. I have an on going project photographing the different types of marsh birds there. The heat wasn’t too bad this morning around 8am though it certainly got hot by noon time pretty sure it was over a 100 degrees.
