Birding #3, 2020

I have a couple of cards completed, but I have not gotten around to take pictures of them yet, so decided to share some more of my birding photography with you.

These are all taken in the month of May during spring migration.

The first 5,  were taken in my backyard.

 The Cape May hung around in the yard for about 15 minutes, I just happened to look out the window and saw something fluttering, grabbed my camera and out I went.  I've never seen one in our backyard before, then again unusual times and working from home.

 The Carolina Wren pops in every now and again, hear him calling early in the morning.

The Brown Thrasher - every year we see one in our yard  in the tree tops, calling, but then takes off and never see him again. This year he was in our yard for just over 2 weeks, along with another one.  I'm pretty sure it was another male as this guy did not like the other being around in his territory! Have you ever heard one call before? If not you should go to All About Birds website and have a listen.

Another unusual sighting in our yard this year was a Veery.  These guys are very skittish, and likes to hide underneath the cedars, but would pop out with ease to check things out.  I saw him from my craft window just after dinner one evening and then he ran underneath the trees.  So out I went sat on the deck and waited for him to show himself and he did! Cute little guy!

And then we have the Baltimore Oriole.  Last week of April we get the sugar water made and out in the feeder waiting for them to come.  This spring we had 3 pairs, but they are now nesting, so will probably see them again towards the end of July. Such a beautiful bird the male is.

Out and about birding up north near Tobermory, ON - 4 hr drive each way, a long day but worth what we saw.  I have many more pictures to share from up there, just haven't had time to work on them.  Here are a few of what we saw.

I hope you enjoyed these as much as I love taking the.  I have a few thousand pictures to go through, just haven't had much time with working, house and yard duties and trying to fit in a card now and then. 

I appreciate your stopping by.  Keep well my friends!

Pauline

Birding #2, 2020

So glad you were able to stop by today.  I do not have a card to share, but I have some of my photos that were taken April & May.  

Not a lot of explaining on these, so I will leave you to take a closer look at each but clicking on the picture.

These were all taken from the car window as we traveled the country roads.

The Blue-headed Vireo (below)  just happen to land in our backyard one day during spring migration.  Now that I have been working from home, it amazes me how many variety of birds actually stop on their way through. I was just lucky enough to see this guy stop for about 10 min then gone!

I hope you enjoyed these, I will have more in the coming days to share.  Have a wonderful day!

Pauline

Birding #1, 2020

Hello everyone.  I hope you are all doing well.  Sorry I haven't posted in a while once again, I'm just having a hard time creating cards.  I started one yesterday, but just haven't finished it yet. 

I thought I would share some of my photos that I have taken so far this year.  Mind you I take tons, lots don't turn out and only some I complete.

So lets get started shall we, the first one is from March, and the rest are from April.

First up is a Ring-necked Pheasant.  As we were driving down a country road one early Saturday morning back in early March something caught my eye along the road edge of a corn field.  We turned the car around and sure enough there was this beautify guy posing for us.  We had him for about 10 min, as he would scurry around, stop, pose and continue.

Next we have an Eastern Meadowlark, again out in the county early April.  On weekends during this self isolation time, we take a drive on the weekends, to see what we can see and always take photos from our car window.

Eastern Peewee- ended up finding 2 of these guys fluttering along the dirt road along a forest edge. Beautiful!

One advantage of working from home, is my 'make-shift' office is in my craft room with a window view. I'm always on the look out as to what spring bird with stop in my yard before continuing on.  Well, this particular morning we had a Hermit Thrush,  he ended up staying for 4 days. Such a nice treat!

One of our frequent birding spots not far from home we found a Pine Warbler.  We have seen them there the last 2 years so far, so looks like they came back once again this year.  Such a pretty warbler. It amazes me  how they can stay warm, as this particular weekend, we had snow and it was below freezing.

Another backyard visitor is the White-Throated Sparrow.  Beautiful colour markings on this guy, and their song is music to my ears.  I woke up on this particular day to his song.  We ended up have between 10-12 at any given time in our backyard, and these guys stayed for just over 2 weeks! But a few have come back!

I hope you enjoyed what I shared today.  I have many more.  Birding season has been slow for the spring migration which I think is due to the winter like temperatures and strong north, northwest winds.  We need the south winds to help carry them up.  

I am on vacation this week, which is the same week Bill and I take every year for the spring migration, but things are very different this year.  No provincial parks or national parks are open, which means 2 of  the Parks we rely on for our spring birding are closed to the public. To see anything you have to rely on woodlots or any hot spots that you may know of. Good news is the provincial government has allowed the Provincial parks to be open as of tomorrow - May 15th, so rain or shine we will be heading to Rondeau Provincial Park, which is on Lake Erie, so hopefully we will see plenty of Warblers.

As always, have a wonderful day and take care,

Pauline

Winter birding

Hello everyone.  Hope your having a good Friday! It's snowing here today, feels like -12 with the wind chill, brrrrrr, just cold!

I have a few cards but haven't taken pictures yet, so thought this was a good time to share some of my bird photography.

Last Saturday, Bill and I were up and on the road at 3:30 am to drive 5 hrs to see a certain bird.  This bird normally lives in British Columbia, so he is way off track.  He has been up in Haliburton since mid Dec and is still surviving our winters, eating lots so that's good.

As we were within 1/2 hour of our destination, we are driving along, I noticed lots of marshy areas, and then I noticed something on a dead tree trunk.  Bill had already driven past by the time I said 'stop'.  He started to back up, but there were a couple of cars coming behind us, so we drove up to turn around.  Came back and noticed it was a GGO (Great Gray Owl)! Wow, so excited!!!!!

Here is my picture: (you can click on the pictures to enlarge them)
Isn't he beautiful??

After spending about 15 minutes with him, he flew into the open marsh area further in, too far for pictures. 

Which leads us to our destination.  When we first got there, there was one gentleman waiting for this bird to show himself, we just chatted a bit and about 5 min later in flew lots of Blue Jays and then the Varied Thrush.

He seemed a bit timid, but eventually he came down far enough into the center of the pine tree, in an open area for us to take some pictures.  This is a lifer for me.  Another one crossed off my list! Gorgeous colours!

That's it for today.  I do have some more pictures of back yard birds over the last month, I will share these with you at a later time.

Enjoy your weekend.  I appreciate your visit.

Pauline

Fall Warblers

Hello everyone!  Well I don't have a card to share with you today, still working at getting my mojo back, but I realized I have lots of bird photography pictures from late summer and fall that I have not shared with you yet.

I will just leave you with the pictures below to view.  Not a lot of explaining to do with these. These were taken in September 2019 about 40 min from our house.

This was taken in our backyard.  As the warblers start to migrate either in spring or fall we always manage to get a few that stop on their way through.

Hope you enjoyed these.  Have a wonderful day!

Pauline

Spring/summer birds #2

Hello! Bill and I spent  last week up north at Algonquin Provincial Park. Beautiful fall colours to be seen, yellows, oranges, reds, browns, burgundy, truly remarkable.  We have lots of pictures to go through, so when we do I will have some to share. Until then,  I thought I would share some more Spring/summer bird photos that I've been working on over the last little bit in between card making.


First up we have the Ruby Throated Hummingbird - in our backyard doing a little fluttering of his wings.

Here we have a  robin cooling off in the bird bath during a hot day in August. He/she spent almost 10 min in there splashing around, love the water spray.

Next is a Canada Warbler - I tried to photograph him last year but had no luck. 

Playing a little hide-n-seek was this Chestnut Sided Warbler.  Love him peeking out from the top of the branch.

Along the country side roads was this black swallowtail fluttering around. He stopped just long enough to capture this picture.

I'm working on more photos from the summer, it takes a while to do one as I still don't fully understand all the processing techniques, but slowly getting there. I try to do as much as I can and keep tackling them, when I get stuck at a certain point and can't figure it out I call for Bill's help!   I hope you enjoyed these, next post will be a Bella girl, stay tuned.

Pauline