Posts in Category: Laudholm Farm
Courting Cedar Waxwings
I rode my ebike down to Laudholm Farms (Wells National Estuarine Research Reserve) yesterday to see if I could find any Jack-in-the-pulpit in bloom. I did not, not there, though they are in bloom near the headquarters buildings at Rachel Carson National Wildlife Refuge just up the road. While hiking the boardwalk loop at Laudholm I encountered my first Cedar Waxwings of the season for southern Maine…just a few, in the very tops of the trees…but as I hiked on and turned to come up through the old apple orchards…full of blossoming apple and crab-apple trees…I found more and more waxwings. I had to keep revising my estimate up, but I am convinced there were at least 100, maybe 150, Cedar Waxwings feeding in the apple blossoms. They were all around me, sometimes two dozen or more in a single tree.
I was not far into the Cedar Waxwing experience when a pair landed right in front of me on a low branch. Each had an apple blossom in its beak, and I got to watch as they apparently passed the petals back and forth for several moments. At the very least they were offering the petals to each other. I had never seen that behavior, obviously courting behavior between a pair, before, and found it fascinating. I took a lot of photos, and came home feeling totally blessed to been in the right place at the right time.
When I showed this photo to Carol, she immediately remembered seeing another like it on Facebook already within the past 24 hours. Some searching around found not one, but three other recent photos all taken…from Maine to Michigan…of Cedar Waxwings offering petals…Dogwood and Apple…to each other. A forth appeared in my stream shortly after my search. And who knows how many were posted by people I don’t know. Cleary this behavior is synchronized with the bloom of large white showy flowering trees, and evidently they are, at least this year, all in bloom at the same time across the north east quadrant of the country.
So, as it turns out, this is just my contribution to the courting, petal passing, Cedar Waxwing show. I still feel privileged to have seen it…to have been in the right place at the right time…but I now know myself to only one a small select group of people all across the country to have this experience on the same day. How special is that!
Red-breasted Mergansers courting
This is not a great photo as photo go. The birds were too far away across the Little River Marsh from the overlook on the Laird-Norton Trail at Laudholm Farms (Wells National Estuarine Research Reserve)…so far away that it took 2x Clear Image (digital) zoom to identify them. And then a heavy crop to make the birds big enough so that you can identify them in the photo. But they are Red-breasted Mergansers, and they were actively displaying and courting, and on the theory that any photo is better than none 🙂 Sony RX10iv at 1200mm equivalent (2x Clear Image Zoom). 1/1000th @ f5 @ ISO 100. Processed in Polarr.
Up tree!
Three trees obviously. Pine, Maple, and Birch. Two at Rachel Carson National Wildlife Refuge and one just down the road at Laudholm Farms. I don’t know if you can call it a “good” use of an ultra wide frame of view, but I like to try it on occasion. 🙂 Sony a5100 in-camera HDR at 18mm equivalent. Processed in Polarr and assembled in FrameMagic. The trick of course is to be really close to the tree…but then trees are not that shy.
Red-tailed Hawk, view two.
Red-tailed Hawk, Wells National Estuarine Research Reserve at Laudholm Farm, Wells Maine
If you read yesterday’s post, you know that I got more than the one shot I shared of the Red-tailed Hawk at Laudholm Farms (Wells National Estuarine Research Reserve at…). And as I mentioned, it allowed me to approach much closer than I expected. This shot is at 1200mm equivalent field of view, but still… Such a magnificent bird!
Sony RX10iii at 1200mm equivalent field of view (2x Clear Image Zoom). 1/500th @ ISO 100 @ f4. Processed in Polarr on my Android tablet.
Red-tailed Hawk, and a poem :)
Red-tailed Hawk, National Estuarine Research Reserve at Laudholm Farm, Wells Maine
There is a poem:
When I first pulled into the parking lot
at Laudholm Farms, I glanced out the
driver’s side window to see a hawk
sitting on the Bluebird House 40 yards
away. I grabbed for the camera, but
by the time I got it out and on, and
reached for the handle to roll down
the window, the Hawk was gone.Surely too big for a Cooper’s Hawk?
Still I got out and wandered over
toward the corner of the woodlot
beyond the bird house, in case it had
not gone far…and, surprise, there it
was on the ground 4 feet behind the
rough hedge along the fence between
the parking lot and field. It was away
again before I could get on it, but it
landed in the low branch of a big oak
at the edge. I got a few shots, mostly
obscured by branches and a few dried
leaves still clinging on…but then it
swooped and landed again on the
ground behind the hedge. Now there
was a big enough gap just there so I
could focus through the winter twigs,
and I took its portrait as it danced and
pounced on something small in the
frozen grasses at its feet. Up again
to perch in an old maple by the road.This time I caught the unmistakable
flash of rust red on the tail. Ah!The Red-tailed Hawk perched with its back
to me, and let me get a lot closer than I
expected, looking over its shoulder every
once in a while to see what I was doing.Magnificent! The beak and eye…the
intricate cryptology of feather detail
of one of nature’s ultimate birds of prey.In the end it had enough of my looking at it,
and flew off down the treeline another 40
yards. I let it go. Thrilled to my bones,
entirely blessed, to have been part of its day.
This is, clearly, one of the portraits behind the hedge. Sony RX10iii at 600mm equivalent field of view. Program Mode. 1/800th @ ISO 100 @ f4. Cropped for scale and composition and processed in Snapseed on my Android tablet. Wells National Estuarine Research Reserve at Laudholm Farm in Wells Maine.
Winter flag over the bog…
Grass head, The Bog at the National Estuarine Research Reserve at Laudholm Farm, Wells Maine
The subtle colors with glints of reflected light in the emerging peat bog at Laudholm Farm (Wells National Estuarine Research Reserve in Wells Maine) form and interesting backdrop for this dried grass head growing up through what looks like it might have been Meadowsweet. One corner of a wet field at Laudholm is slowly turning into a bog, or remains a bog, while the rest of the field dries out. I am not sure which way it is going. In early winter, yesterday when Carol and I visited, it is just an empty stretch of boardwalk, but this little still-life caught my eye.
Sony RX10iii in-camera HDR. 234mm equivalent field of view. Nominal exposure: 1/250th @ f4 @ ISO 100. Processed in Snapseed on my Android tablet.
Sanderlings!
Sanderlings, Laudholm Beach, Wells ME
This is a collage of two Sanderling shots, taken on Laudholm Beach at the Wells National Estuarine Research Center at Laudholm Farms in Wells Maine. I like the light and the sense of movement.
Sony RX10iii at 600mm equivalent field of view. 1/1000th @ ISO 100 @ f7.1. Processed in Lightroom and assembled in Coolage.
Red momma!
Red Squirrel, Laudholm Farms, Wells Maine
I was walking on the boardwalk through the maple swamp at the Wells National Estuarine Research Center at Laudholm Farms yesterday, and I thought, “this is just about where I saw the Red Squirrel last year.” And just like magic, there was a Red Squirrel on the boardwalk doing just exactly what the Red Squirrel was doing last year…picking up and eating the the little whirlygig seeds of the Red Maple. Once more, the squirrel allowed me to approach quite closely…I worked my way a few feet at a time to within 12 feet of it, before it turned to challenge me and then scampered off.
I knew, while taking the pictures, that there was something odd about the squirrel…or out of the ordinary anyway. Last year the squirrel had a wound on its nose below the eye on one side. This year it was an obviously nursing mother squirrel, taking a break from nest duty to enjoy the maple bounty. You can’t see the nipples in this shot, but in other they are clearly visible.
Sony RX10iii at 840mm equivalent field of view (600mm optical plus an in-camera crop to 10mp for the extra reach.) 1/250th @ ISO 125 @ f4. Processed in Lightroom. The difference in clarity and detail between this photo and the those I took with the Nikon P900 last year is obvious at anything larger than screen view 🙂 and it is pretty clear even here.
Red-eyed Vireo
Red-eyed Vireo, Laudholm Farms, Wells Maine
I am sure I must have seen a Red-eyed Vireo in Maine before last week, but I can not remember when. This specimen was active in the trees above the main path to the beach at Wells National Estuarine Research Center at Laudholm Farms in Wells Maine last week when I walked in to photograph the Least Terns at their nesting site. Just a bit too backlit to see the red in the eye 🙂
Sony RX10iii at 600mm equivalent field of view. 1/400th @ ISO 100 @ f4. Processed and cropped slightly for scale in Lightroom.
Least Terns in flight: Happy Sunday!
Three Least Terns in flight. Laudholm Beach, Wells Maine
“If your eye is generous, your whole being is full of light!” Jesus
To the generous eye, the glory of God is all around us in the natural world. Sunsets and sunrises, the drama of clouds over a sunlit landscape, the energy of a storm, the quite beauty of flowers…God’s glory is all around us. And no where, as I see it, more clearly than in birds in flight. Grace and power, intense purpose accomplished with such ease it looks to us like play…our spirits soar just watching, and it takes a hard heart indeed, or one terribly distracted, not to be driven to praise.
There is only one place where the glory of God is more clearly revealed…and that is, as Paul says, in the unveiled faces of God’s children. May your eye be generous to see the glory of God today, and may your unveiled face reveal that glory to all who see you. Happy Sunday!