Ten Minutes at K-Mart Creek

It didn’t take long.  We had been observing a Yellow-crowned Night Heron near our local K-mart Creek, so named of the little drainage creek that usually flows by an empty K-mart building.  I, like Lisa Rest up in Chicago, Illinois, always have my camera with me.  Check her blog to see her amazing shots from the Windy City.

We hadn’t had time to stop on the previous sightings, so we decided to make a special trip, specifically to see if we could spot that bird.  We saw it immediately as we drove on to the parking lot.  I managed to get the two pictures that are below, then as we were about to leave, Ann spotted a Green Heron in an honey mesquite tree by the water.  It was obscured partly by foliage, but I have always maintained that if you can see enough of the eyes, get them in sharp focus, you can get a nice picture.

I hope you enjoy all of the photos.  Click on any of them to see an enlargement.

Yellow-crowned Night Heron

Yellow-crowned Night Heron

Green Heron in tree

Cooper’s and Sharp-shinned Hawks

You guys all know how much I love to photograph raptors.  I have posted many images of Red-tailed Hawks several times during the history of this blog.  Today I will feature several photos of the Cooper’s Hawk and of the Sharp-shinned Hawk.  These hawks are some of favorites along side of the red-tailed.  In fact, the sign on the side of my car features a Cooper’s Hawk, as do my business cards.

The following photographs were taken over the past few years.  There is much similarity between the Cooper’s Hawk and the Sharp-shinned Hawk.  The difficulty in making the right ID has me hoping that I made the right choice in naming these.

Cooper’s Hawk

Cooper’s Hawk

Red-shouldered Hawk

On a side note, when I photographed the top image, I was at the bird blind at San Angelo State Park.  Sitting next to me, co-incidentally, was Jim Miller, a fellow blogger and photographer from San Antonio, Texas.  Somewhere in his files, he has a photo nearly identical to mine.

The following is an image that I believe to be a Sharp-shinned Hawk.  You can see and understand the difficulty in identifying these two species.  I am sure that there will be letters and controversy after I post this.  It would have been easier if I had a photo of the both of them, sitting side by side.  It would show that the Cooper’s Hawk is a good 5 inches taller than the Sharp-shinned Hawk.

Red-shouldered Hawk

I was, at first, reluctant to post the last, (above) photo.  Simply because I had clipped the tail.  But upon further consideration, I felt that it was too good an image to just discard it.

So, enjoy the photos.  Click on any of them to see enlargements.

Golden-fronted Woodpecker and more

Since we had better weather for a couple of days we have been to our local parks a couple of times.  Today, Saturday, of course, the weather has changed, getting cooler then downright cold for the next six days or so.  Anyway, I managed to get a few photos of some of the smaller birds, plus a pretty nice shot of a Great Blue Heron.  I will show them here starting with three images of a Golden-fronted Woodpecker, which I think is one the most photogenic of that species.

Golden-fronted Woodpecker

Golden-fronted Woodpecker

Golden-fronted Woodpecker

This Savannah Sparrow flew from a tree into the edge of the water.  It is one of my better shots of one of these.  It usually is difficult to get such close-ups of them.

Savannah Sparrow

The same goes for the American Goldfinches such as the one pictured below.  I was lucky with this image.  The bird was in dense brush, inside a fence line.  I think I took 30 shots, before I got one that showed nearly the whole bird in focus.

American Goldfinch

There was still a lot of water standing in the roadways and this Western Meadowlark decided that it wasn’t too cold for a bath.

Western Meadowlark – taking a bath

I have always had difficulty getting decent photos of swans.  Usually the ones around here are on open water, making getting good compositions hard to come by.  Also there is the problem of getting the exposure good because of the whiteness of the feathers.  I believe this image of the two Mute Swans is a bit more interesting with the rocks in the background.

Mute Swans

What can I say about the Great Blue Herons.  I always enjoy trying to get interesting images of them.  We ate at the ‘Golden Arches’ for breakfast early Thursday morning.  It was cold, drizzly, and a bit dark.  When we left the restaurant, Ann noticed the heron in the little arroyo adjacent to the parking lot.  Of course, I just happened to have my camera in the car, so I got it out and managed to get several images in the very low light.  I like the photo especially the way the wet weather saturated the colors.

Great Blue Heron

Click on any of these images to see enlargements.

By the way, I still have copies of my highly acclaimed book, “Birds, Beasts and Buttes”, available.  To order autographed copies, contact me at bobzeller1@aol.com.

American Kestrels – Feisty cuties

We are having rainy weather here in San Angelo.  The nasty, drizzly, dreary kind of stuff that tends to keep a person indoors.  So what does a guy do, when he has hundreds (thousands?) of photos in his files.  I decided to see what I had of interest.  There has been a lot of interest lately in the American Kestrels.  Lo and behold, I discovered that I had a bunch of images that may or not have ever been seen before with the human eye in one of my posts.  In short, I think that I have never posted some of them before.   So here for your enjoyment are a few of those that I think were photographed in early 2011, or somewhere around there.  Click on the images to see some really great enlargements.

American Kestrel

This American Kestrel, as you can see was watching me intently, and shortly he took of from that little branch.  The following two images are immediately after that.

American Kestrel in flight.

American Kestrel in flight.

In the next two, this Kestrel can’t make up his mind whether to trust me or not.  He keeps looking back at me.  I wonder if he strained his neck in the second image.

American Kestrel

American Kestrel

I think this one below is getting ready to go on a hunt.

American Kestrel

Hunt accomplished.  Looks like a good meal to me.

American Kestrel with a noon time lunch.

A successful hunt, catching a small field mouse.  I hope you enjoyed these photos.  I’ll be back another day with maybe more surprises.  It depends on how long these rainy days last.

A new day, more birds

After spend a few listless days with not many birds to show, Ann and I finally had an enjoyable morning today.  After breakfast, she, on the spur of the moment, said that we ought to make a run out by the Middle Concho Park to see if things had changed.

The morning was much cooler and I guess that made the difference as we saw a total of 29 species.  I even got a few more images to share.

juvenile Yellow-crowned Night Heron

We first saw the juvenile Yellow-crowned Night Heron across the river.  I maneuvered my Ford Edge close to the water so I could rest my big 500mm lens on my Noodle for the shot.

Next, down the little road a bit, I spotted the bright red Vermilion Flycatcher in a tree.  I started to move in with my car to a more comfortable position, but the bird moved.  So began a merry chase for about 15 minutes before I was successful in getting the shot.  I must mention that I didn’t actually “chase”, as in hassling the bird.  I guess “follow” is a better word for it.

Vermilion Flycatcher

After seeing what we could in that park, we decided to try Spring Creek Park while we were in the area.  We saw a two or three Yellow Warblers, but had no opportunity to get a photo.  Coming upon a shoal that was uncovered by the lowering water level, we saw a Spotted Sandpiper and a Green Heron.  Both gave me good photo opportunities, although they were pretty far from the bank.

I got my tripod out and set it up closer to the bank.  It was a shady area and I was confident that I wouldn’t disturb the birds as we were somewhat hidden in the low light the trees provided.  These photos are indeed a credit to my state of the art equipment.  Well, maybe I helped a little, too.  But I am proud of the images that I got after doing some tight cropping.

Spotted Sandpiper

Green Heron

Well, I hope you enjoyed these images as much as I enjoy getting them for you.  It appears that things are looking up a bit, and maybe we will get a few more migrant birds arriving in the near future.

Roadrunner and Wren

We are still in the summer doldrums when it comes to birding here.  Going to the SA State Park has slowed down to producing only a few birds for photography.  In a couple of weeks it will start changing and we will have the winter birds beginning to migrate.  I don’t know about other areas, but we have many, many more birds here in the winter than we do in the summer.

On one of our latest outing we saw only 17 different species, but luckily I managed to get a couple of pictures.  This Bewick’s Wren (Thryomanes bewickii) was in a tree outside of the bird blind.  I took the picture from the window at a distance of only about ten feet.

Bewick’s Wren

Later on, down the little lane that leads to the blind, we spotted this Greater Roadrunner (Geococcyx californianus), in a tree along the path.  The light wasn’t too great, early morning sun filtering through the branches.

Great Roadrunner on tree limb.

Enjoy the photos and click on either one to see and enlargement.

I am going to do some blatant advertising again, and direct you to the links on the right of this page, to preview and/or purchase a book or calendar.  I might add that my book is also available as an e-book for your iPad.  (at at cheaper price, too)  For signed autographed copies, contact me direct at:  bobzeller1@aol.com.

Cardinals (The Redbirds)

Well, it’s time to get serious again.  Well, maybe not too serious, but it’s time to write a post about birds, but first let me tell you this little story that I heard this morning.  It is too funny not to pass on.   Credit my friend Monty Jones, AKA the former Biscuits O’Bryan.

It seems that this eccentric guy liked to collect thrones.  Yes, that is right, you read it correct.  Thrones – like the ones that kings sit on to twiddle away the day.  He would travel all over the world to collect thrones from palaces and castles where the current kings, and queens, decided to re-decorate and get new furniture or thrones.

On top of all of that, he lived in a glass house.  (do you see where this is going?)  He stored all these thrones in that glass house.  After a time the weight of all the thrones, gradually was too much, and the glass house collapsed from all the weight.

Soooooo, a person that lives in a glass house should never stow thrones.

Okay, now that I have your attention, my subject today is the Northern Cardinal, (Cardinalis cardinalis).  I have found that if going out day after day in this heat doesn’t produce the right results, a.e. finding birds to photograph, you must go for the sure thing.  The bird blind.  There is always some kind of activity there.

San Angelo State Park has a nice little blind, with comfy seats, and  big windows with a view of feeders and a little pond.  I would much rather drive around in my air-conditioned car, over the hills and through the woods, in search of my photographs.  But the blind is my go-to place when the pickin’s  are lean and I need quick images or just want to pad my birding list. 🙂

Northern Cardinal

Northern Cardinal – female

Actually, the Northern Cardinal is one of my favorite birds.  Always vibrantly red (the male), and fun to watch.  It’s like they have a personality all of their own.  Here in west Texas they sometimes are referred to as simply the Redbirds.  So this is where I ended up going a few days ago.  I hope you enjoy the images.  Click on either one to see an image.

By the way, my book is going great, and I now have my 2013 Bird Calendars.  To preview both the calendar and the book, click on the links on the right side of this.

Yellow-crowned Night Heron at the Golden Arches

As I may have mentioned before Ann and I quite frequently breakfast at the McDonald’s restaurant a couple blocks from our house.  Ya gotta love those ©Egg McMuffins. 🙂

Behind the parking lot a little creek meanders along, a branch of the Red Arroyo system.  We always monitor the birds and such that frequent the place.  The other morning we spotted this juvenile Yellow-crowned Night Heron, (Nyctanassa violacea), along the bank.  You can see that it’s yellow crown hasn’t matured much yet.

Yellow-crowned Night Heron

I photographed the bird from the car, using my Canon EOS 7D with a 100-400mm lens attached.  It is amazing how successful you can be if you use your car as a blind.  If I would have got out, I am sure I would have spooked him, and he would have flew off.  When I absolutely have no choice, and have to get out to get a shot, I try to keep the car between me and the bird, maybe shoot over the roof, or lean over the hood, etc.  For these shots, I was only about about 40 feet away.

Yellow-crowned Night Heron

The less stress you put on your birds, the better and more natural image you can obtain.  Click on either image to see an enlargement.  Happy Shooting!!

Yearning for the Big Bend

As most of you know, the Big Bend country of west Texas is my favorite of all favorite places.  Ann and I generally make at least two trips per year to that area.  Usually once in the spring, then another during the fall months.  We try to time the journeys to coincide with the spring and fall bird migrations.

A butte in Big Bend National Park

So here we are in mid-summer.  Our fall trip isn’t scheduled until late September we have another couple of months to wait.  We have plans to visit Marathon, Texas on September 23 and stay at the old Gage Hotel.  While there we will bird at the Gage Gardens and Post Park.  A lot of good birds visit each location, so hopefully I can get some new photographs along with maybe seeing some new lifers.

Great Roadrunner

On Monday September 24 the real fun starts.  We will be staying at the Far Flung Casitas until Friday morning.  Located in Terlingua/Study Butte area these beautiful little cabins are the best places to rest between “play times”.  They are centrally located for day trips in any direction.

Rio Grande with Santa Elena Canyon in background

Big Bend National Park is just a few miles east.  Going south and west along the El Camino Del Rio, (River Road), Hwy. 170, is probably one of the top ten scenic drives in the country.  To the north lies the city of Alpine, home of Sul Ross University.  Further west of Alpine is the city of Marfa, where you can see the eerie “Marfa Lights“.  There is a road that heads south from a point just west of Marfa that takes you on a spectacular down through Pinto Canyon and around the Chinati Mountains.

Sora photographed at Rio Grande Village, Big Bend National Park.

Getting back to our personal plans, we intend to do a lot of birding in Big Bend National Park.  Rio Grande Village RV Park is one our favorite places to see a lot of birds.  There is where you can try a great nature trail that winds through a wetland with a boardwalk, then up to some high points for some great scenic views.

Bobcat photographed at Rio Grande Village, Big Bend National Park

The Sam Neil Ranch ruins provides great birding opportunities.  The old windmill still works, pumping some water through this seemingly little oasis.  Watch out for marauding Javelinas.  Similarily, a few miles away is Dugout Wells, another shaded area where birds and an occasional Bobcat hang out.

Red-tailed Hawk – Big Bend National Park

We also have plans for a guided birding trip provided by Mark Flippo, a  bird expert of the Big Bend region, and hopefully a drive to Carolyn Ohl-Johnson’s Christmas Mountains Oasis.  Click her link  to read more about her personal birding area.

So now you can understand why we are in a restless mode right now.  After reading this post, you may be inclined to join us.  Click on any photo to see an enlargement.  Some of the images may be found in my new book, which I am shamelessly promoting every chance I get.  Click this link to preview and/or purchase a copy.  Or contact me at bobzeller1@aol.com.

You Asked for Her, Now Take my Wife – Please

Okay, so Henny Youngman I am not.  For you youngsters and international readers, Henny Youngman was stand-up comedian many years ago, and one of his favorite lines was, “Take my wife, please!!

Now I have been asked recently why I have never posted a picture of Ann.  I am always writing about Ann and I doing this and that, but never showing you her picture.  Next month we will have been married 54 years.  So in honor of that mementous occasion I will show you the images of time gone by and later.

Ann back then…

Ann now…………..

Now, I don’t really see much difference between the two. 🙂

Here are a couple of more.

Bob and Ann back then……

Bob and Ann about now…

So now you know, there really can’t be much difference in pictures, as long there are no differences in the way we feel about each other.  Thank you for following us along in our journey through life.

P.S.  click the images to see delightful enlargements. 🙂