Another Chickadee on the Back Deck
Black-capped Chickadee, Kennebunk, Maine, USA. Still having fun watching birds and taking photos under the back deck feeders while we wait out the pandemic. I have ordered a pop-up photo blind and some more feeders for a photo station out under the trees in our backyard, but until they come and I get that set up, I am just being as patient and as still as I can on the back deck. The chickadees, are always cooperative. My goal with Black-capped Chickadees is to expose so that you can see the eye in the dark mask. Not always easy. Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr and Apple Photos.
Male Downy Woodpecker
Downy Woodpecker, Kennebunk, Maine, USA. This is the male Downy Woodpecker from the pair that frequent our backyard. The Downy’s are, surprisingly, even bolder than the Chickadees. They will come down from the trees even when they have seen me. I know they see me, because they sit on a branch above me and watch me, often hoping to other branches for a better view, for several moments before diving down. 🙂 That little patch of red really stands out in the sun. Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr and Apple Photos.
Eastern Bluebird
Eastern Bluebird, Kennebunk, Maine, USA. Sitting under the feeders during our pandemic isolation here in Kennebunk, the Bluebirds did eventually come in close. This is the female. I am still waiting for a photo of the male of this pair. They do not nest in our yard…though we have invited them by putting up a box…but I think I have found the box where they do next, about 2 blocks away. They come for the meal worms I put out, and they will bring their chicks when they fledge, later this summer. Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr and Apple Photos.
Downy Woodpecker
Another shot from my back deck feeder watch. A female Downy Woodpecker, attracted to my suet feeder and taking a rest after eating on one of my perches. Too close to fit the whole bird in a 600mm equivalent frame. 🙂 Sony Rx10iv. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr and Apple Photos.
White-breasted Nuthatch
White-breasted Nuthatch, Kennebunk, Maine, USA. Another bird from our back deck feeding station. We have a suet feeder in a cage to defeat the squirrels. It took the birds a while to figure it out, but they did. And it does keep the squirrels out of the suet and saves a lot more for the birds. 🙂 Both woodpeckers and White-breasted Nuthatches hang from the bottom of the feeder to get at the suet. Red-breasted Nuthatches, Chickadees, and Titmice go through the outer cage and use the suet feeder inside just as they would if it were free hanging. It is raining today, but I will still try to sit out under the feeders for a while, in all my rain gear and with camera in its rain jacket, just to continue convincing the birds that I am harmless. Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr and Apple Photos.
Chickadee in a time of pandemic
Yesterday, while we hunker down here at home waiting out the pandemic, I spent about 90 minutes sitting under the feeders on the back deck waiting for the birds to stop noticing me. Of course the Chickadees were the first to come in close. They paid me no attention at all. This one took his sunflower seed up to one of the apple branch perches I have bolted to the deck to de-shell it and worked on the seed for a good 60 seconds before flying off. I have a whole sequence of ”working the seed” shots. 🙂 Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent (from about 6 feet). Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr and Apple Photos.
Florida Scrub Jay
Today, as I pretty much “shelter in place”, we will pop back down to Florida, from January’s trip to the Space Coast Birding Festival, to pick up this shot of two Florida Scrub Jays working the sandy trail at the Helen and Allen Cruickshank Sanctuary in Rockledge. (USA). Busy, busy, Jays are always busy. Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr and Apple Photos. We are not in lock-down yet here in Maine, but I am keeping close to home. I hope to set up in the back yard today to get some shots of birds coming to the feeders. 🙂
Melting
Deep in the forest, the vernal pools are slow to melt. This one has been working on it for weeks, and there is still a ways to go. There is not much water underneath the ice so most of the melt has to happen at the surface. It does make for some interesting abstract images though. 🙂 Sony Rx10iv at 90mm equivalent. HDR mode. Processed in Polarr and Apple Photos. Wells Reserve at Laudholm Farms, Wells, Maine.
Praying Chipmunk
There is not much moving in Maine’s forests during March other than chipmunks. I did see my first Red Squirrel two days ago, but not nearly close enough for a photo. This chipper appears to be praying at a mossy alter in the March sun, at the Wells Reserve at Laudholm Farms, in Wells, Maine. And well it might be, and well we should join it in prayer in these days of spreading Covid-19. Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Polarr and Apple Photos.
Skunk Cabbage Season
It is the season when, deep in the Maple swamps of Southern Maine, the Skunk Cabbage, in all their twisted shapes and outrageous colors, emerge from the leaf litter. This is when Skunk Cabbage is at its most beautiful. This is the flower of the plant. The big green leaves will only appear later. The wikipedia article on Skunk Cabbage is full of all kinds of interesting information. Skunk Cabbage grows downward, with its stem under ground, and only the flower and leaves sticking up at the top of the stem each year. Even stranger, the Skunk Cabbage produces its own heat, 27 to 63 degrees above the ambient temperature, so that the flower can bloom in still frozen ground…in fact it can melt the ice around it. It is mildly poisonous to humans (its heat is generated by cyanide)…you would have to eat more than a little of the fresh leaves to kill you, but your mouth will burn and your throat close with even a few bites…though with the proper preparation it has been used both as food and medicine.
To me, the Skunk Cabbage is one of the first and most welcome sings of spring in southern Maine.
Wells Reserve at Laudholm Farms, Wells, Maine. Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. HDR mode. Processed in Polarr and Apple Photos…assembled in FrameMagic.