Maybe some of you are getting tired of seeing photos of the Swainson’s Hawk, but they are the closest easiest subject I can practice on with my super-tele. I hope to see a difference from the first few I took when I first got the camera, so I leave it up to you to make that call. Hunting season is right around the corner, so perhaps I will have something else in the wildlife category other than birds and my pets! This morning was pretty cool though; one of the Swainsons had a rabbit and that attracted the attention of the other two, and caused a fair amount of screaming among them. Then the American Kestrel showed up trying to muscle the hawks out, but was out-gunned and out numbered, especially since the Kestrel was about a third the size of the hawks! The usual assortment of carrion birds arrived to clean up the leftovers, but I didn’t get any shots of that action. I did also photograph a Western Kingbird, a species I hadn’t seen around here before.
You can just make out the rabbit this one has in his talons.
This one was trying to get some of the other's snack.
A few quick shots taken this morning while walking Malie at the Broomfield Commons open space. The Swainson’s hawks were uncharacteristically tolerant of my presence today, which made for a couple great shots!
For you who don’t know already, I recently bought a new camera and long telephoto lens, which opens new doors for me in the realm of photography. The lens that I have been wanting most is a decent telephoto; well I fulfilled my wish with a new Sigma 150-500mm OS lens. I have felt for a long time that a 300mm lens just doesn’t have the reach to get good shots of wary wildlife, such as hawks. In the open space near the house, I have seen Red Tails, Swainsons, even a rare Harlan’s race Red Tail. Most of which I couldn’t get really clear shots of, until now! This is the first test drive, so I am still learning a bit of what the camera is capable of, and getting used to the lens. Check out the details for yourself.
Swainson's Hawk on the lookout for a snack.
Swainson's Hawk
Swainson's Hawk
Swainson's Hawk
Swainson's Hawk
Swainson's Hawk
Swainson's Hawk
Amazing to watch thhem halt in mid air when they see something.
So my cousin B. Petro and I have been meaning to go out for one of those lengthy photographer hikes for some time now, and finally last Friday we made it happen. When she asked me “where should we go,” I said “Rocky Mountain National Park at sunrise!” Now watching the weather reports leading up to that day, I began to get a sinking feeling that there would be no sunrise (at least one we could see) on Friday morning. I won’t go into how most of the time weather people can’t predict the weather, especially spring weather in the Rockies, but this time they were right. We awoke at 4:00 am to partly cloudy skies that were only partly cloudy to give us a tiny glimmer of hope that the sun might shine long enough to get some of that great morning light that landscape photographers chase. As the sky lightened from dark grey to light grey, we decided not to enter RMNP, and instead stop short of entering the park. We instead made a brief stop to shoot the St. Malo Chapel on the rock in the gathering light. Unfortunately for us, Mount Meeker, the usual backdrop for the chapel, was shrouded in the low clouds. On the other hand, it made for some spectacularly moody light on the stone church. From there, we headed toward the Long’s Peak trailhead that can be accessed from near Allenspark. While Long’s is contained withing Rocky Mountain National Park, this trailhead can be accessed without entering the park itself. We took a short 1.4 mile hike to the Eugenia Mine through the somewhat hard packed snow. If you have never taken a trail hike in April in the Rockies, let me tell you that it is more work than you think. Snowshoes aren’t required if you stick to the packed trails made through the winter, but the possibility of slipping off to one side of the track and into thigh deep snow is very high, making for a bit of work, and wet socks. The Eugenia mine itself wasn’t much to speak of, making for quite an anti-climactic end to the hike. However, the low clouds made us turn our camera lenses down to the forest floor for some nice macro shots in the even light. On the return hike, we were visited by a very curious Grey Jay, also known around here as a Camp Robber, due to their tendency to snatch unattended food and flit away without a sound. We also caught a couple Grey Squirrels munching on pine cones recently uncovered by the receding snow. Back at the trailhead, we thought we would drive a bit down the road to see if there was anything of interest at Lily Lake. Just off state highway 7 between Allenspark and Estes Park, Lily Lake offers a short walk on a graded path around the lake itself, and great views of Long’s Peak (when not overcast). We were less than thrilled at the flat lighting and lack of mountain views, but we did our best with what we had to work with. Until we reached the north side of the lake, and found the forest awakened with bird life! I counted seven species of birds that we could see just standing on the path; American Robins, Mountain Chickadees, Mountain Bluebirds, Northern Flickers, Clark’s Nutcrackers, and Ravens. Too bad only one of us brought a telephoto lens, and it happened to be mine, who’s only favorable attribute is its ability to shoot closeup macro! But again we chose to make lemonade from apples, and traded said lens back and forth between us (good thing we both shoot Canon SLRs) and got a few good clicks of the Clark’s Nutcrackers flying to and fro. It was good to spend time with my cousin again, since life gets in the way of what we want to do so often. Here’s the results from the our morning out:
The chapel at St. Malo retreat center. The black and white seemed fitting for the day.
Water, ice, rocks, sticks...
Forest floor in spring.
A Grey Jay, also known as a Camp Robber
Grey Squirrel munching on a pine cone.
Quick little sucker!
Another Grey Squirrel
Alternating reds and yellows of a willow in winter.
I love Aspen trees, something about the white-gold bark, black spots, green leaves turning gold, even standing naked in winter.
The layers of color and texture are what caught my eye.
The smoothness of the water in this run-off pond made for some great reflections!
Wide angle of the waking pond.
View of the rocks north of Lily Lake.
The striking black and white of the Clark's Nutcracker certain demand attention.
Photographing birds in mid-flight is always challenging, escpecially when the lens focuses slower than the camera!
Clark's Nutcraker diving to the ground to nab a tasty treat.
Well, it’s been a week since we returned from Montrose, and I am just now getting around to posting some photos from that return trip! Since Interstate 70 had only one lane open through Glenwood Canyon, we took the “scenic” route via US285/US50 which takes you past a great variety of climes in this great state. My opinion is that you get a bit of every type of landscape Colorado has to offer along this route; plains, high mountain passes, fourteeners, high mountain parks, down to the arid semi-desert dotted with stunted pines on the western slope. Along the way we had seen mule deer, pronghorn, golden eagles, bald eagles, bluebirds, and ravens. Coming up to Cerro Summit, we paused a few minutes so I could take a couple clicks of a Bald Eagle perched in a cottonwood watching Cedar Creek for a nice fish (who can blame him?) We then stopped for lunch near the Blue Mesa Dam, and looked down at the start of the Black Canyon of the Gunnison. Next, we stopped along US285 with a great view of Mount Shavano and company to let the dog stretch her legs a bit. Afterward, we just drove straight on home, as we were both fairly exhausted by that point and wanted to get home.
A Bald Eagle watching Cedar Creek for a nice fishy snack
Black Canyon of the Gunnison from a view point near Blue Mesa Dam
A Mountain Bluebird holding on to a fence in a strong wind.
From left, Mount Shavano (14,229'), Tabeguache Peak (14,155'), and Mount Antero (14,269')
No, it’s not a company run by birds, just a fancy way of saying “bird gallery”. I was searching through photos from the past five years, and I realized that I have more bird pictures than of any other wildlife. Why? I guess it’s because as a younger man, I wanted to be a pilot and I could feel myself flying. That dream didn’t materialize, but I never stopped watching the birds fly. Again, living close to an open space area gives me an opportunity to see more kinds of birds than one would normally see in a suburban setting. I have also made a concerted effort in recent years to identify the birds I see as well, so here is a collection of some common and not-so-common avians.
Another American Kestrel.
The smallest raptor in North America, the American Kestrel.
The rare Harlan's race Red Tail Hawk, an elusive bird to photograph.
Another shot of Harlan's race.
A Red Tail Hawk gliding about an evening sky.
Red Tail Hawk floating lazily on the warm spring air.
Swainson's Hawk taking off from a telephone pole.
Golden Eagle soaring over the foothills near Louisville.
A pair of Golden Eagles in aerial maneuvers.
Still in combat.
Couldn't stop watching them, just amazing.
Red Wing Black Bird, found in their usual habitat of cattails near water.
Profile of the Red Wing Black Bird.
A Red Wing singing.
A Rufous Hummingbird resting among the Aspens.
The irridecent orange throat feathers of the Rufous is visible here.
Mountain Chickadees, female on the higher branch.
This Raven was a big boy, almost 25 inches beak to tail!
Mountain Bluebird taking a rest in the summer sun.
The Magpie, part of the Corvidae family, includes Jays, Crows, and Ravens.
Magpie.
American Robin enjoying itself at Beaver Creek Resort.
Mourning Doves catching some morning sun.
Northern Flicker.
A Double-crested Cormorant and a Great Blue Heron share a perch over the water.
I haven't been able to identify this duck, he's a diver.
While driving home from some mundane Saturday chores, my lovely wife spotted a single bald eagle fly over the car and land in one of the long dead cottonwood trees in the Broomfield Commons Open Space right near the house. So she leashed up the dog, I grabbed my camera and we walked the half mile to where Jen spotted the eagle. On the way, we passed a man walking his dog, and he mentioned that there was not one, but two bald eagles in said tree. We have quite a few Red Tail hawks, Swainson’s Hawks, Peregrine Falcons, and American Kestrels visit the area, but in six years, this is the first Bald Eagle I have seen. One was keeping a watch out on a high branch, while the other was munching on what I deduced to be a prairie dog, more by the color of a spot of fur than anything else. At first I didn’t give the general populace the benefit of doubt when I said that we were the only ones that saw the eagles, quite the opposite was true; there were about a dozen people that stopped to pull out a camera phone, and snap a few shots. All in all, quite an unexpected sight, these magnificent birds.
I woke up one morning last week disgusted with the fact that I haven’t really been outside of a city block in almost four days. I know, yuck. So I headed off before sunrise to catch some of the great winter morning light on the front range, which I missed by about 10 seconds, also the fact that there were some clouds hanging out over the eastern horizon limited the light to about 45 seconds total! Brushing that off, Malie and I headed west toward Brainard Lake, thinking about what that area looks like in the winter, and I was not disappointed. The road from Ward up to Brainard has a winter closure gate about a mile and a half from the lake itself. From that gate, there are a couple snowshoe trails and a nordic-ski-only trail up to Brainard Lake, and the nordic ski trail continues on up another two miles from there to Lake Isabelle. It was easier to just walk up the road where there wasn’t enough snow to require the snowshoes, and I could avoid the other people as well, since I was in need of some alone-in-the-wilderness time. I reached Brainard Lake in about forty five minutes and was continuing on to the Long Lake trailhead when I spotted what I thought were a cow and bull moose browsing in the willows on the south side of the lake. Not expecting to see much wild life at all, I left my 70-300 lens in the truck, arming my self with only my 18-200. After watching the moose for a while through a measly 200mm, I could see that I wasn’t looking at a cow and bull, but three very large bulls! All of them quite mature, with their great palmated antlers stretching at least sixty inches in width. The wind biting at any exposed skin forced me to move back from the lake shore, into the trees, and on to Long Lake. After another mile and a half, I reached the trailhead to Long Lake. The last time I was at this particular trailhead, my close family and I were beginning the fifteen mile, one-way journey to Monarch Lake, a smaller tail-lake of the enormous Lake Grandby. Here are the images from that journey. The short quarter-mile trip to Long Lake was the only section that required showshoes. I was completely amazed that no one else had broken a trail in the snow from there, it brought to life again my inner explorer to know that I was the first one to tread here for some time. Although it was a nice sunny day in the upper forties down in the city, the wind up at ten thousand feet dropped the temperature below the zero mark. The extremely strong winds prevented me from staying as long as I wanted to. All said, it was a good day outside, with some good photographic results:
My snow dog.
Apache Peak (L) and Shoshoni Peak(R)
From left; Pawnee Peak, Little Pawnee Peak, Mount Toll, Paiute Peak, and Mount Audubon
Once again, fall in Colorado has shown how very bi-polar it can be. One day the temperature can be in the upper sixties, and the next day can be thirties and snowing. These images demonstrate that, since they were taken on two successive days in early October. For me, one of the things that heralds the arrival of fall is when the Canadians invade (geese that is), so I took the telephoto lens and shot some waterfowl, Mallards and Canadian Geese.
