Easter Weekend Photos

I decided to get out Saturday morning and see if anything was happening at San Angelo State Park.  It had been several weeks since we had visited the bird blind there.  I got a few images there, then we drove through the park to see what birds if any, might be hanging around.  I really wasn’t very impressed at the time that I had anything of quality.  I uploaded what I had and I found that some of them weren’t too bad.  I’ll let you have a look at them.

White-crowned Sparrow

Curve-billed Thrasher

Canyon Towhee

Cedar Waxwings

Lark Bunting

I hope you enjoyed these pictures.  Click on any of them to see an enlargement.

 

 

Saturday Morning Humor

There I was, just trying to be a nice guy and get a photo of these guys displaying their magnificent feathers, and they decided to walk away; or you might say, they mooned me.  Well here is what I have to say…….

“the same to you, and the horses you rode in on….”

Click the image to see an enlargement.

More Spring Surprises

Tuesday afternoon, I got a call from my good friend Carl Williams.  He lives just a few houses down the street me.  He informed me that he had driven by our now familiar “K-Mart Creek”.  It is so named by the bar ditch that runs by an empty K-Mart store about four blocks from us.  He told that there was a Yellow-crowned Night Heron wandering about the place.

I high-tailed it down the street to get a good look.  The Yellow-crowned Night Heron, (Nyctanassa violacea), is somewhat of a rarity around these parts, so I was anxious to have a look and maybe get a few photographs.  Have I told you that I always have my camera with me?  

At first, I only saw the bird as he was facing away from me.  I was on the store parking lot at the time and was able to aim my 500m lens and 1.4 teleconverter out the drivers side window and get this shot.

Yellow-crowned Night Heron

After getting this shot, I decided to try to get around for a frontal view.  I took my camera with the 100-400mm lens attached and proceeded to cross the little bridge, giving the bird a wide berth so he wouldn’t spook.  By then he had moved closer to the bridge, and by being very quiet, I was able to get the shot below from there.

Yellow-crowned Night Heron

But the surprises weren’t over.  I got back in the car, drove a few yards and discovered a Wilson’s Snipe, (Gallinago delicata), poking around in the water under a large tree.  I had to settle on trying to aim my 500mm lens (again with the 1.4 tele-converter) between some tree branches to get the shot.  By using only the center focusing point, the job isn’t too tough.  Below is one of several images that I was able to get.  These little guys are quite the cuties.

Wilson’s Snipe

My publisher has announced a $10.00 discount on my book, “Birds, Beasts and Buttes”.  Click on this link:   http://www.blurb.com/b/3431406-birds-beasts-and-buttes.   Use Promo Code SHARE10 at checkout.  Offer good through March 31.

San Angelo residents, call me 325-944-1839.  I have some autographed books on hand.  The sale price is 47.95 hardcover, 37.95 soft-cover, plus sales tax.

American Robin – a Harbinger of Spring

What can be a better sign of spring than to see that traditional early bird, the American Robin, (Turdus migratorius).  This one was looking for an early worm out in Middle Concho Park last Sunday morning.

American Robin

Actually, now that I take a closer look, by the looks of that fat belly, I believe he has already had his fill of worms.  For the shot, I hand-held my Canon EOS 7D with a 500mm lens w/1.4 teleconverter.  Because the bird was outside the passenger side of the car, I was unable to use my window support and had to shoot across Ann’s lap.  Exposure 1/640 sec. @ f9 +0.07 EV adjustment.  ISO 400.  Shooting distance about 40 feet.  Click the image to see an enlargement.

My publisher has announced a $10.00 discount on my book, “Birds, Beasts and Buttes”.  Click on this link:   http://www.blurb.com/b/3431406-birds-beasts-and-buttes.    Use Promo Code SHARE10 at checkout.  Offer good through March 31.

For San Angelo residents, call me 325-944-1839.  I have some autographed books on hand.  The sale price is 47.95 hardcover, 37.95 soft-cover, plus sales tax.

A Thing of Beauty – The Great Blue Heron

Monday morning I took two framed prints down to Fort Concho, where this week they are having the Stribling Art Extravaganza.  On the way home I drove by the heron rookery along Concho River.  I observed what I think are a couple of chicks on two of the nests.  I could barely make out the tops of their heads as they are about 25 feet off of the ground.  But what I did see, was this adult Great Blue Heron (Ardea herodias), make a graceful landing.

Great Blue Heron

I missed the actual landing as I was distracted when trying to see the young ones.  The above photo was taken shortly after.  My first line of sight had that tree branch hiding the face, so I had to move a bit to get a better view.

On my Facebook page, Melba Smith, of  MJ Photography, made this beautiful comment: “Now this is what I call “Perfection”, Bob! Your work is wonderful! It’s just breath taking!”  I love to get such compliments, and I thank you very much, Melba.

In this case, I feel I need to share that compliment with the bird itself.  The herons are one of the most beautiful and graceful birds that I know.  I am glad that I was able to capture that beauty in such a way.  My part in the process was quite easy in the beginning.  I had my Canon EOS 7D and 100-400mm lens handy, and it was just a matter of getting the right exposure combination.  I was also fortunate to have such a beautiful blue sky for a background.

Another way that I was fortunate, as you can see, I almost clipped the wing, barely getting it into the frame.  After getting home I loaded the image into my computer and opened my Photoshop editing program.  I do very little when processing my images.  But I like to lighten the shadows, such as you can see under the wings.  Doing this you can see more detail.  Then I darken some highlights, which in this case, the sun was very bright on the side of the rump.  Then I add a little contrast and color saturation to make the image “pop”.

Digital photography has made photo editing so much easier than the old days of doing the same thing in the darkroom.  Now I just don’t get my hands dirty.  If you click on the photo, you will see a beautiful enlargement.  Enjoy!

Images from Pedernales Falls State Park

As I promised, here are several more bird images that I got at the blinds at Pedernales Falls State Park.  I believe that spring has sprung, given that the weather was great and the birds colorful.  I won’t bother with any senseless text here, but just let you enjoy the photographs.  But be sure to click on the images themselves, to see some beautiful enlargements.

Carolina Wren

Lesser Goldfinch – male

Lincoln’s Sparrow

Black-chinned Hummingbird

Ladder-backed Woodpecker – female

Lesser Goldfinch – female

Ladder-backed Woodpecker

Many thanks to all that enjoy my work and offer comments.  I really appreciate the notes and compliments.  To see more of my work, click the Fine Art and the Flickr logos on the right side of this page.

Western Scrub-Jays at Pedernales Falls State Park

As I mentioned in my last post, Ann and I went to Wimberley, Texas for a visit with some friends.  Initially we had planned on going to the Hornsby Bend Bird Observatory in Austin, and also visiting the Mitchell Lake Audubon Center in nearby San Antonio.  As it turned out, Hornsby Bend was closed because of a fire a few days ago, and Mitchell Lake turned out to be open only on weekends.

So what to do if you are served lemons, well as they say, you make lemonade.  We were only a few miles from the Pedernales Falls State Park.  We decided to check out the bird blinds there that I heard about from a friend.  It turned out to be two blinds, each one facing the opposite direction.  For photography, that was excellent, giving that the light was so that you could have your choice of sun direction.

We made two trips there, on consecutive days.  I came home with 860 images of several different species.  Out of those, I hope to cull out maybe a dozen or so keepers.  For this post, I have picked out a few images of  a Western Scrub-jay, (Aphelocoma.californica).

Western Scrub-jay

Western Scrub-jay

Western Scrub-jay

I hope you enjoyed the photos, as much as I enjoyed our little trip to get them.  Incidentally, if you want to visit a picturesque little village in the hill country of Central Texas, this is the place to go.  For my own taste, I still love our wide open spaces at home in San Angelo, Texas.  But Wimberley has much to offer, great scenery, certainly more trees than I am used to, great little restaurants, and is closed to the attractions of Austin and San Antonio.

Click on any image to see an enlargement.

Off to Wimberley, New birds are calling…….

Good Morning.  We are off to Wimberley, Texas today.  We will be back Friday hopefully with some new photos of some birds that are new to us.  We will visit Hornsby Bend Bird Observatory in Austin, and hopefully, Mitchell Lake Audubon Center in San Antonio.  Until then, everyone have a great week!!!

Western Bluebirds in West Texas

There are plenty of Eastern Bluebirds around west Texas.  However, there is another bluebird  that is not seen very often here, and that is the Western Bluebird, (Sialia mexicana).  Yesterday I was lucky enough to see about a half dozen of them in a small local park area.  Besides that, I was also fortunate to be able to get my vehicle close enough for these pictures.

Western Bluebird

Western Bluebird

Now compare these with the image below of an Eastern Bluebird, (Sialia sialis).  The blue covers the entire head and chin of the Western, whereas on the Eastern the blue stops just below the beak.  The Western belly is more grayish, in contrast to the bright white belly of the Eastern.

Eastern Bluebird

The Eastern is found pretty much in the entire United States west of the Rockies.  You can see the Western usually in very far West Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and the Pacific coast.  Here in San Angelo, we are about 300 miles east of their usual range.  Enjoy the images and click in any of them to see an enlargement.

First I rant, then… some Cinnamon Teal

Before I get to the images, I want to rant just a little bit.  In two weeks, the annual Stribling Art Extravaganza will be held at the barracks buildings at Fort Concho, here in San Angelo, Texas.  It is open to all artists living in the San Angelo and Tom Green County area.  It will feature all genres including photography, but most of the entrants are paint artists.  It is a show and sale benefiting the West Texas Rehab Center.  As I usually do each year, I am entering two pieces of my work, framed 12x16s.

Hawk in Tree

Great Blue Heron

The above are two framed photographs that I am entering.  I am usually lucky enough to sell one, or sometimes two images at these shows.  Anyway, my rant is about something else that happened, related to the show.

I couple of weeks ago a lady that wants to enter a painting called and asked me if she could paint one of my photos.  The subject in the photo is an old trading post that I had photographed several years ago.  She had seen other photos of that building, but she really liked the composition of mine.  Now here’s the rub, she wanted to copy it exactly.

What the heck is going on with some of these so-called “artists”.  I always felt that being an artist, is someone that is creative.  A true artist looks at a scene and paints his or her interpretation of it;  not using another’s composition and claiming it as his or her own.  Copying other person’s works is not creative in my book.  At least she was nice enough to ask, and I, of course, turned down her request.

Now on the other side of the coin are people like Syl Lobato.  She has purchased the rights to some of my bird images.  She does use them, but she creates masterpieces by incorporating the images onto rocks, using the patterns in the rocks and her fantastic painting talents  to make the beautiful backgrounds.  I do not consider her among of the people that I described above.

Now forget the rant and have a look at some new photos that I was able to get yesterday.  The Cinnamon Teal, (Anas cyanoptera) is one of the most beautiful ducks.  Until now, I hadn’t gotten any great photos of one.  Usually, they were too far away to get decent close-ups.  Yesterday, though these were in a small pond and I was able to drive up closer.  I still had to use my 500mm lens and 1.4 tele-converter on my Canon EOS 7D.

Cinnamon Teal – female and male.

Cinnamon Teal

Click on any image to see an enlargement.