Posts in Category: Magee Marsh
Scarlet Tanager!
I was hoping for a Scarlet Tanager before the Biggest Week in American Birding was over…and on the very last day, there were two pair working around the boardwalk for several hours…never as close as I might have liked, but still! The contrast of deep deep red and jet black is, I think, one of the most striking in the birdosphere. And yes, that lower left bird is indeed suspended in mid-air, in mid-swoop from one perch to another. It was a dark day, and these understory shots test the limits of any camera. I could really have used a flash! Note the ISO setting below.
Olympus OM-D E-M10 with 75-300mm zoom. 600mm equivalent. Shutter preferred. 1/640th @ ISO 6400 @ f6.7. Processed in Snapseed on my tablet.
Well Hello Prothonatory!
The light was the only real challenge yesterday on the boardwalk at Magee Marsh on the final day of this year’s Biggest Week in American Birding. It rained all morning and the clouds never did lift in the afternoon. The birds along the boardwalk, however, were amazing. The wind kept them down low and temperature kept them avidly feeding. They were often within arm’s reach of the boardwalk. I was photographing this Prothonatory Warbler in the undergrowth when it flew up and landed right in front of my face. And then it sat there and sang. Miraculous!
Olympus OM-D E-M10 with 75-300mm zoom. 600mm equivalent. Shutter preferred. 1/640th @ ISO 1600 @ f6.7. Processed in Snapseed on my tablet.
Pole Dancer.
It is not, as I have pointed out before, all Warblers all the time at Magee Marsh. This Blue-gray Natcatcher entertained another photographer and I for a good 10 minutes, flicking through a tangle of vines and brush close to the boardwalk. It kept returning to this vertical section of vine…never perching there for more than a second and never in exactly the same pose. It was fun trying to catch it!
Olympus OM-D E-M10 with 75-300mm zoom. 600mm equivalent. Shutter preferred. 1/640th @ ISO 5000 @ F7.1. Processed in Snapseed on my tablet. Assembled in Pixlr Express.
Eastern Screech Owl at Full Alert
There are several Eastern Screech Owls in the Biggest Week in American Birding area. One along the boardwalk at Magee Marsh, one right around the Black Swamp Bird Observatory building itself, one at Ottawa NWR, and one along the boardwalk at Maumee Bay State Park. And those are just the ones I know about!
This bird is the BSBO Owl. After 3 says of sitting hunched almost invisible and apparently asleep against the trunk of a tall evergreen (near the top of course) we found it in the trees immediately behind the building as it is in this image…at full alert…and with a clear line of sight. A treat indeed.
Olympus OM-D E-M10 with 75-300mm zoom. 1200mm equivalent field of view (2x digital extender). Shutter preferred. 1/640th @ISO 2000 @ f6.7. Processed in Snapseed on my tablet.
American Redstart in a Bush
Another under-rated Warbler from Magee Marsh and the Biggest Week in American Birding: the American Redstart is common but still a beautiful little bird. This specimen is a bit bedraggled for some reason but that did not keep him from singing his heart out…to no good end, as it happens, since the wave of female Redstarts, which always trails the males, did not hit Magee until two days later 🙂 I guess he could chalk it up to practice.
Olympus OM-D E-M10 with 75-300mm zoom. 600mm equivalent. Shutter preferred. 1/640th @ ISO 4000 @ f7.1. Processed in Snapseed on my tablet. Assembled in Pixlr Express.
Prothonatory Prayer: Happy Sunday!
We did not get out to the Boardwalk at Magee Marsh until 5:30 last evening, but the two hours we spent there were the equal of my best times at Magee. Magical! The birds were avidly feeding, down low at eye-level and below, and just amazingly close. New species were in yesterday, so I had my first sightings of Wilson’s Warbler, Canada, and Northern Parula. And the female American Redstarts had arrived. The first half hour on the boardwalk I got close shots of all of the above, and then turned to my friend Paul, who is here helping me man the ZEISS booth at the Biggest Week in American Birding festival, and said, jokingly, “Now I just want a Prothonatory that close!”
Prothonatory’s are nesting warblers at Magee, and as such, arrive a bit later than some of the others, but once they come their amazing color and loud song can dominate the marsh. I knew there were a few already present because I had seen the photos others were getting. I simply wanted my turn. You can not see a Prothonatory without wanting a photo! Such a bright bird! And the contrast between the slate blue wings and the yellow yellow body only makes the bird seem brighter. Wonderful!
Of course, it was not 30 minutes and a hundred yards down the boardwalk before we saw the Prothonatory. It was not close at first, but it was actively feeding and eventually got to within a few feet of the boardwalk…and it seemed to be posing much of the time with its audience in mind. Showing off. No, of course it wasn’t, but it sure looked that way! I took way too many exposures (I came back from our 2 hour walk with almost 1000 images on my card! How did that happen?)
These 4 shots are just a sample, but it was one of those wonderful encounters that will live in my memory just as strongly as it does in the photos. (Paul said I was all lit up and glowing while shooting this bird…and I don’t doubt him.)
Olympus OM-D E-M10 with 75-300mm zoom. 600mm equivalent. Shutter preferred. 1/640th @ ISO 3200-4000 @ f6.7. Processed in Snapseed on my tablet. Assembled in Pixlr Express.
And for the Sunday Thought. Oddly enough Paul and I had been discussing the nature of spirituality, faith, and religion (not, by the way, at all the same things in either of our minds)…and gratitude and prayer as well. Paul said something along the lines of “I express my thankfulness, but I never ask for anything.” So, after our Prothonatory encounter, and especially after I had indeed asked for it, I turned to him and said, “See, you can ask for things!” The Prothonatory encounter would have been totally amazing whether I asked for it or not…but having asked, even jokingly, and then having been given the very thing I asked for in such a spectacular way…well, to me that elevates the experience from the level of wonder to the level of worship. It turns the encounter into an act of love…love totally undeserved on my part…totally amazing love on God’s part. I am as humbled as I am delighted. Such a God!
To spin it out here, Paul, 30 times that day already, had told me that he was more into big birds, and, really, bigger wildlife than these little warblers. Warblers he implied, were fine for birdy types and feather freaks, but give him a wolf or a bear any day any time! Well, we had come not 20 yards past the Prothonatory when someone pointed out a Raccoon in a tree right over the boardwalk. Paul was in his glory…and yes, he lit up and glowed! Now he would not probably think of his day-long background grumble (good natured as it was) as a prayer…but what can you say then when it is answered…when you are gifted a cooperative Racoon where you did not expect one. I know he is genuinely thankful…that was obvious in his whole manner…but I suspect he does not realize that, in fact, he asked for it! His prayer was answered just as surely as mine was. And isn’t that fun!
Happy Sunday!
Chestnut-sided Warbler. Magee Marsh
Yesterday was the heaviest migration day at Magee Marsh in recent memory, though I missed most of it (the job you know). I did get out early and late and enjoyed the show. This Chestnut-sided is among our most colorful spring warblers, though it is so abundant at Magee that it does not get the attention it deserves.
Olympus OM-D E-M10 with 75-300mm zoom. 600mm equivalent. Shutter preferred. 1/800th @ ISO 1250 @ f6.7. (And there you see the challenge of shooting in the heavy cover of Magee). Processed in Snapseed on my tablet. Cropped slightly for scale and composition.
Magnolia Warbler
I was pretty much tethered to my table at the Optics Alley at Black Swamp Bird Observatory yesterday (it is after all my job), but when my shutter finger got irresistibly twitchy, I did manage to sneak across the road to the little stand of swampy woods there, and found a few Warblers to shoot. In one willow, just twice my hight, there were Cape May, Nashville, Townsends, and this lovely Magnolia…all foraging at eye-level or just above. There is nowhere in the world like this stretch of the Erie Shore in May!
Olympus OM-D E-M10 with 75-300mm zoom. 600mm equivalent. Shutter preferred. 1/800th @ ISO 640 @ f6.7. Processed in Snapseed on my tablet. Cropped for scale.
Magee Marsh First Fruits
I got to The Biggest Week in American Birding, along the Erie Shore in Northern Ohio, a day late due to other commitments, so the first order of business was getting ZEISS set up. We are the lead sponsor this year so we have more at stake 🙂 I didn’t out to the Magee Marsh boardwalk sometime after 5pm, and spent a good, if quiet, two hours there. There were birds but they were not overly cooperative and there were not the great numbers you get on the best days…but I am not complaining. Two hours on the Magee boardwalk in May is always good!
This Yellow Warbler makes the most of the late day sun. Olympus OM-D E-M10 with 75-300mm zoom. 600mm equivalent. Shutter preferred. 1/800th @ ISO 200 @ f8. Processed in Snapseed on my tablet. Cropped slightly for composition.
Unconventional Black and White (Warbler)
Working the Magee Marsh Boardwalk in fall is far different than working it in spring. There are fewer birds…not in total species…but in total individuals; the birds are, in general, higher in the trees; the trees are fully leafed out so the birds are much harder to see; and there are way fewer birders…which translates to easier movement on the boardwalk, but also to far fewer eyes looking…which means you can’t, most of the time, just sidle up to the bird-jams and ask the massed birders what they are looking at.
Still, you do find rapidly moving mixed feeding flocks of warblers, chickadees, nuthatches, and titmice. Warblers, of course, of several different species, and occasionally they are working low enough for some good photography.
This Black and White Warbler, caught in an odd pose (but hardly atypical, if you know B&Ws at all) was along the east end of the walk not far above eye-level, feeding with Blackpoles, Mornings, and a few Magnolias, along with the usual Chickadees and Titmice.
Canon SX50HS. Program with iContrast and -1/3EV exposure compensation. 1200mm equivalent field of view. f6.5 @ 1/1000th @ ISO 640. Processed in Snapseed on the Nexus 7.