Northern Saw Whet Owl (Aegolius acadicus)

I had the great opportunity tonight to shoot some video of a tiny Northern Saw Whet Owl in Red Deer County thanks to Phil French and Jim Potter. Alexander and I headed out and we drove about half an hour SE of Red Deer onto a lease road as far as we could and then walked into the bush for a couple hundred meters to an old snag. Everyone was being very quiet as I set up the camera so as not to disturb the owl if at all possible. When all was set and ready to go, I started the camera and gave the sign that I was rolling. Jim rubbed a stick against the snag and almost immediately the owl poked her head out to see who was there. I shot about four minutes of video until the owl was satisfied we were not of any concern and hopped back into her hole. I packed everything back up and we left quietly and headed back to the vehicles after seeing an amazing little bird! This image is a still image grabbed off the video, so isn’t of very high resolution, but I wanted to share it.

[Olympus E-M5, Canon FD 800mm f/5.6]

Avocet Courtship Display

I was fortunate enough to visit Slack Slough on Monday morning this week for a couple of hours. The avocets were around, but that was about it in my immediate vicinity. I would follow them around with my camera pointed towards them for long periods of time until they finally accepted me as part of the landscape and approached fairly close to where I was siting. One of the females then went into a beautiful courtship display where she would bow down with here bill on the surface of the water and her wings stretched up high. Needless to say my camera (Olympus E-M5) was in astroblast mode and I managed to capture about 5 images of the quick display of which this one tells the story best. Lighting was great and the reflection worked out fantastic. I had on my Tamron 500mm lens for this image and with the background far in the distance I was able to achieve a nice bokeh. I really like how the surface tension of the water is creating a meniscus up to her bill! I think that is how you would describe this, but if someone out there knows better, please let me know.

“Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?”  Matthew 6:26 (ESV)

 

[Olympus E-M5, Tamron 500mm f/8]

Not Black-Necked Stilts!

I know the Black-Necked Stilts are there because I saw one as I was leaving the other day, but it was impossible to get an image as it was almost dark already. A good friend of mine caught them in good light the other day and talking with other birders, they are telling me that they are seeing them too. I just happen to get out when they aren’t around. Last evening I spent a couple of hours waiting patiently, but to no avail. It’s OK too, as I really just enjoy getting out and watching whatever happens to be there anyway. This past week our ball-team had it’s first game and I had a hard collision in the outfield(didn’t call the fly-ball!!!) that did some damage to my ribs making it very difficult moving around so I only took the little E-M5 and the Tamron 500mm lens as the big Canon 800mm was just too difficult for me to manoeuvre. I managed to get a few decent images and I hope you enjoy!

I am not completely crazy about the bokeh I get from the mirror lens. I may look for a similar focal length from maybe Canon or Nikon. Something like the Canon FD 400mm f/4.5. I would love to see Olympus come out with a 350-400mm telephoto, maybe f/3.5-f/4.5 and also a small 1.4x converter for this kind of shooting.  Obviously my keeper ratio would go up with AF as well!

It was getting rather dark and the sky was still glowing pink and orange to the west and the Red-Winged and Yellow-Headed Blackbirds were still very active, so I stuck around for a bit and got a couple images which I wouldn’t consider “fine art”, but they do show the birds in their habitat nicely as opposed to a close-up portrait. I ended up using ISO 1250 at 1/60 sec, which really is going a bit far for this focal length of lens.

Recurvirostra americana

Otherwise known as an American Avocet. I think they look like they just flew off a Japanese painting! Man they are beautiful, and you can usually see them at Slack Slough without too much effort or waiting around too long. Again, I was using my Olympus E-M5 and a Canon FD 800mm f/5.6 lens.

 

 

[Olympus E-M5, Canon FD 800mm f/5.6]

 

 

 

Slack Slough

Slack Slough resides immediately beside HWY2(stupid busy road) in Red Deer, Alberta. It is home to an amazing amount of birdlife. I visited the slough this evening to take in the sights and sounds. Of course I dragged along my camera and telephoto lenses to see what I might capture. I got there kind of late so didn’t have a lot of time before the light was gone for the day. Using a Canon FD 800mm f/5.6 with an adapter to fit my Olympus E-M5, I ended up using only 1/80 sec. at ISO 800 when I finally packed it in as that is really starting to push the envelope of what can be done! This monster telephoto gives me the equivalent focal length lens as a 1600mm on a 35mm/full frame camera, or a 32x spotting scope. Obviously one must use a large and very sturdy tripod/head combo. In this case,for those that care, it consists of a set of Gitzo 3 Series carbon fibre legs and a Sachtler FSB8 fluid head.

All that said, here are a few images of some Lesser Yellowlegs (Tringa flavipes):

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Olympus E-M5, Canon FD 800mm f/5.6]

Fleming Slough, Red Deer County

I took my E-M5 out today to Fleming Slough which is just on the south end of Penhold, AB. I’ve never been there before and quite enjoyed the couple hours I spent there. Unfortunately it was extremely windy so much of the birdlife was hiding amongst the cattails and grasses. I still managed to grab a few shots  using my Tamron 500mm which is equivalent to a 20x spotting scope on this camera.

Mallards heading west…. and Canvasbacks heading east.

Thankfully Coots aren’t very shy, so the afternoon wasn’t a complete bust. Ducks were sure jittery today!!

I am including three images made last night which I didn’t get a chance to edit until today. They aren’t from Fleming Slough, but are in Red Deer County.

[Olympus E-M5, Tamron 500mm]

Another Chickadee, or maybe the same one, I’m not sure. They kind of all look the same.

Same time and day as the last Chickadee post. Same camera, same lens, same technique. Different pose. You know these guys are so tiny, look at the needles it’s perched on, they aren’t even bending over!

Black-Capped Chickadee

We spent the weekend up at my in-laws again this past weekend as Alexander was playing in a soccer tournament in St. Albert, Just before we left last night I mnaged to grab a few images of the chickadees coming to feed from the seed that Elmer puts out for them. I prefocused on the branch here hoping that one would land before my arms gave out holding the camera up. Sure enough, one shows up and I was ready to blast off a salvo capturing this little guy. I was playing with the new Canon 70-300mmL IS lens and am quite impressed. It would lose focus and hunt sometimes, but all lenses will.It is very sharp throughout it’s range due to a floating focusing mechanism and the speed really isn’t too much of a problem as you can simply turn up the ISO if need be a stop or two. the only drawback to the slower apertures is the loss of shallow depth of field, but for the images I was taking there is plenty of separation between the background and the subject allowing it to really pop off the background. The lens is almost the same diameter as the Canon 100-400mm but is 46mm shorter in length and 330 grams lighter, so it makes a for a nice carry around size. Keep in mind it does not come with a tripod mount which would account for some difference in weight. You can however purchase a tripod mount for it. This lens is also fully weatherproofed and has the latest Image Stabilization from Canon which claims usability at four stops. They’ve also incorporated a Flourine coating which resists smears and fingerprints and really makes it a breeze to clean the front element. Rain and dust just don’t like sticking to Flourine either.

[Canon 7D, Canon 70-300mmL IS]

Lost Creek Fire Zone

Back in 2003 a huge fire swept through the forest near the town of Blairmore in the Crowsnest Pass area of southwestern Aberta. This fire burned out of control for 30 days and consumed 21000 hectares of forest. It’s a beautiful area to visit as one can start to see life returning to the area amidst the almost complete destruction that occurred.

[Canon G10]

New York City 42

Looking north at Manhattan from Liberty Island which is located in New Jersey waters. The land of Liberty Island is within the territorial jurisdiction of the State of New York, a status that was established in 1664, reaffirmed in 1834, and which has never been officially disputed. Who knew?