Posts in Category: Magee Marsh
Biggest Week in American Birding! Eastern Screech Owl
Eastern Screech Owl: Magee Marsh Wildlife Area, Oak Harbor, Ohio, USA, May 2023 — On my first walk around the boardwalk at Magee, someone pointed out this tiny Eastern Screech Owl perched in a hole in a dead snag right beside the boardwalk. This is one of a pair that is often along that section of the boardwalk where there is a nest box for their use. It was somewhere along there every day I was there, though it moved its day perch to a leafy tree just down the boardwalk where it was much harder to see. Here you see it doing what it does best…blending into its environment well enough to be all but invisible, while it keeps a sleep watch on what is happening around it. This is a small owl: as small as 6 inches or as large as 10, and weighing between 4 and 9 ounces. Not much bigger, really, than a robin…just rounder. OM System OM-1 with 100-400mm zoom at 1600mm equivalent (using the built in digital teleconverter). Program mode with my evolving bird modifications. Processed in Pixelmator Pro. ISO 200 @ f7.1 @ 1/1000th. Minus .7EV.
The Biggest Week in American Birding! Female Yellow Warbler
Female Yellow Warbler: Magee Marsh Wildlife Area, Oak Harbor, Ohio, USA, May 2023 — Though the male Yellow Warblers are very visible at Magee this spring and every spring…singing from, it sometimes seems, every branch tip, the females are there and busy too. This one has been gathering spider web or plant fuzz for her nest. The rim-light effect of the pose and the lovely background of out of focus leaves makes this look a little like a studio portrait. 🙂 OM System OM-1 and 100-400mm zoom at 800mm equivalent. Program mode with my evolving bird modifications. Processed in Pixelmator Pro. ISO 320 @ f6.3 @ 1/640th. Minus .7EV exposure compensation.
Biggest Week in American Birding! Canada!
Canada Warbler: Magee Marsh Wildlife Area, Oak Harbor, Ohio, USA, May 2023 — Canada Warblers are one of the “less seen” warblers at Magee Marsh in May. They certainly come through and certainly in numbers, but they can be very hard to find, and very uncooperative when found. They tend to sulk deep in foliage, and they are very active, never posing nicely for a good look or a photograph. This nice bright male keep a crowd of birders along the boardwalk entertained literally all morning. It was there and being seen when I got to the boardwalk at 7:30am, and it was still there at least after 1PM when I left. I have no reason to believe it did not stay through the afternoon. Getting this photo was a three step process. First you had to insert yourself into the scrum of birders and photographers on the boardwalk that extended many yards on either side of the brush where the warbler was feeding, then you had be in the right place at the right time when someone gave up their place at the rail facing the warbler, and then you had to wait for the warbler to appear in the open for long enough to achieve focus, and then you had to be ready to shoot. (So that is actually four steps!) Fortunately the Olympus OM-1 with the 100-400mm zoom is a very capable camera, with about as fast and accurate bird’s eye focus as you can get, and I managed 3 good shots in about 10 minutes before I surrendered my place at the rail to another. OM-1 at 700mm equivalent. Program mode with my evolving bird modifications. Processed in Pixelmator Pro. ISO 500 @ f6.3 @ 1/640th.
Biggest Week in American Birding! Scarlet Tanager, for Carol
Scarlet Tanager: Magee Marsh Wildlife Area, Oak Harbor, Ohio, USA, May 2023 — Carol once told me that the Scarlet Tanager was her favorite bird. We don’t see them often in southern Maine. They are there every summer, nesting, but they stay high in the canopy. We hear them sing, but they stay mostly out of sight. Seeing one at eye-level, as you occasionally do from the Magee Marsh boardwalk is a real treat. This might be a first year adult as it still has some yellow in the feathers. Olympus OM-1 with the 100-400mm zoom at 770mm equivalent. Program mode with my evolving birds modifications. Processed in Pixelmator Pro. ISO 250 @ f6.3 @ 1/640th. Plus .3EV.
Biggest Week in American Birding! Prothonotary Warbler
Prothonotary Warbler: Magee Marsh Wildlife Area, Oak Harbor, Ohio, USA, May 2023 — The other yellow warbler! and one of my favorite warblers of Magee Marsh. The Prothonotary Warbler nests at Magee, and is one of the most fearless warblers…or at least has the least fear of man. This one repeatedly crossed the boardwalk between the legs of admiring birders and photographers while feeding on tiny spiders on either side. You have to have been at Magee to appreciate the situation. There were at least 30 people packed between the side-rails of a 5 foot wide boardwalk on either side of where the warbler was working, all trying to position for a clear view or more often a clear shot. It was close enough so that people were photographing it with cell phones. This is an uncropped shot at 800mm equivalent. Olympus OM-1 with 100-400mm zoom. Program mode with my evolving birds modifications. Processed in Pixelmator Pro. ISO 200 @ f4 @ 1/800th. Minus .3EV.
Biggest Week in American Birding! Yellow Warbler close
Yellow Warbler: Magee Marsh Wildlife Area, Oak Harbor Ohio, USA, May 2023 — How close do the birds get on the Magee Marsh boardwalk? I had to zoom back to 488mm equivalent to fit this Yellow Warbler in the frame. This is not cropped at all. That close. At least sometimes. At least once in a while 🙂 Olympus OM-1 with 100-400mm zoom. Program mode with my evolving birds modifications. Processed in Pixelmator Pro and Apple Photos. ISO 200 @ f6.3 @ 1/500th.
Biggest Week in American Birding! Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Ruby-crowned Kinglet: Magee Marsh Wildlife Area, Oak Harbor, Ohio, USA, May 2023 — A couple of things. When I should have been doing my Pic for today post this morning, I was on a plane from Portland to Detroit on my way to the Biggest Week in American Birding for a few days. I am doing a couple of Point and Shoot for Warbler workshops and one on the 7 Fold Path to Better Birding. So my posting schedule may be a bit off over the next days. Magee Marsh on the shore of Lake Erie is THE place to put a new camera to the test. Photographing warblers feeding in dense brush and foliage is one of the greatest challenges for any camera, or any photographer. A good place to see whether my new Olympus OM-1 and the 100-400 zoom is up to the task. This morning I encountered this Ruby-crowned Kinglet out on the boardwalk at Magee, and anyone who has tried will be happy to tell you that if there is one bird harder to photograph than a warbler, it is a kinglet. Kinglets do not sit still for more than 10 seconds (or so it seems). I was very happy with the few shots I got with the OM-1. Both of these are at 800mm equivalent, using my evolving bird modifications to Program Mode. I did some experimenting with focus modes as the day went on, but already I am thinking the OM-1 is definitely up to the task. ISO 400 @ f6.3 @ 1/640th. Minus .7EV.
Mourning Warbler
Mourning Warbler: Magee Marsh Boardwalk, Oak Harbor, Ohio, USA, May 2022 — The Mourning Warbler is a hard bird to see, let alone photograph, at least at Magee, where they tend to say low in the vegetation, mostly under the ground cover. And there is a LOT of ground cover at Magee this year, due to the massive blow-down of the mature cottonwoods that used to provide shade for the forest floor. This one hopped up on a twig two inches above ground for a brief look-around, just as I came up on a group of birders who had been tracking it by the movement of the undergrowth for twenty minutes already. 🙂 Right place, right time, and ready! That is my wildlife photography recipe in a nutshell. Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Pixomator Photo and Apple Photos. ISO 250 @ f4 @ 1/500th.
Cedar Waxwing among the Apple Blossoms
Cedar Waxwing: Magee Marsh Boardwalk, Oak Harbor, Ohio, USA, May 2022 — There is almost always a crowd of photographers under the apple tree that blooms in May along the Magee Marsh Boardwalk. There are often birds among the blossoms, and it makes a very attractive setting. I have photographed a dozen species of warblers there, as well as Baltimore Oriole and, of course, Cedar Waxwing. The Cedar Waxwings eat the apple flowers, and there can be many in the tree at once when they come through. Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Pixelmator Photo and Apple Photos. ISO 100 @ f5.6 @ 1/1000th, minus .7 EV. Difficult lighting.
Prothonotary: I spy a spider!
Prothonotary Warbler: Magee Marsh Boardwalk, Oak Harbor, Ohio, USA, May 2022 — All the warblers at Magee during the Biggest Week in American Birding are busy hunting and gleaning, but none more obviously than the Prothonotary. I caught this one picking spiders out of webs right by the boardwalk, paying no attention to me only a few feet away. Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Pixelmator Photo and Apple Photos. ISO 100 @ f4 @ 1/640th.