Posts in Category: Rio Grande
Head-on White-patched Skipper
I really enjoy the National Butterfly Center’s gardens! Really! Enjoy! In the fall of the year there is nowhere better to photograph and study free-flying butterflies. The location, within spitting distance of the Rio Grande River and the Mexican boarder, is ideal for tropical species that are seen nowhere else in the US, and you can easily find 50 species on an average day. And the carefully selected and well tended plantings mean there are many individuals of the most common species, and generally a few rare species. In fact every time I have visited, at least one rare butterfly was on the premises, and generally more than one. A Zebra Cross-streak was seen the day before I got there, and I posed a photo yesterday of the Great Purple Hairstreak…not as rare as the Zebra, but not a commonly seen bug.
This is a White-patched Skipper…one of the spread-winged Skippers. I don’t think it is particularly rare, but it is an attractive bug anyway. This is not a good ID shot, but I like it because to me it captures more of the character of the bug. 🙂
Canon SX50HS in Program with -1/3rd EV exposure compensation and iContrast. 1800mm equivalent field of view from about 5 feet. Processed in Snapseed on the Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 2014.
Great Purple Hairstreak. Happy Sunday!
I was not scheduled to lead a field trip yesterday, and it was really my only chance to get to the National Butterfly Center and it’s butterfly gardens on this trip. The trade show at Rio Grande Birding Festival does not open until noon, so I had a few hours in the morning…three if I left the hotel at 7am to be at the NBC by the time it opens at 8am, and left there in time to be back to open the ZEISS booth. Seemed like a reasonable thing to do. 🙂
I had heard a rumor that there had been a rare butterfly sighting on Friday, and a sign in the Visitor Center confirmed a 3rd US record sighting of the Zebra Cross-wing in the gardens. I did not see the Zebra, and not for want of looking (as far as I know no one saw it on Saturday) but I did see many other beautiful bugs. This is the Great Purple Hairstreak, certainly colorful enough for anyone, and interesting in how the color is carried. It was found by a group of more avid butterflyers who decended on the garden just as I was leaving.
Canon SX50HS in Program with -1/3rd EV exposure compensation and iContrast. 1200mm equivalent field of view. Processed in Snapseed on the Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 2014.
And for the Sunday Thought: when I arrived at the NBC at 8am on the day following a rare sighting, the staff, and the other early commers, assumed that I was chasing the Zebra Cross-wing. In fact I was not. As I told those who asked, I was just there to see what I could see and photograph. If the Zebra showed up, I would certainly enjoy it…but I was not about to make seeing or not seeing that one butterfly the test of the quality of my day. And as it turned out, that was a good thing, as I did not see the Zebra. But I had a spectacular day watching and photographing the rest of the bugs, and not a few birds, in and around the gardens.
While I was there someone received a call that a Amazon Kingfisher had been sighted about 12 miles south of Harlingen. The Amazon had only ever been recorded for the US once before. I did not even consider leaving the gardens to go look for it. Even when I got back to the Auditorium (home to the Festival), and saw other’s pictures of the Amazon, I was not seriously tempted to chase it. Rich Moncrief, my associate at the festival, eventually convinced me to go down and look…but the bird was absent while I was looking. It returned about 10 minutes after I left to go back to my duties at the booth.
And I am not at all disappointed. I might take a look tomorrow afternoon, after my morning field trip, if it is still being reported, but I might not too.
Again, I do not like to make one bird, or one bug, the measure of my day. If I had allowed myself to be disappointed, even a little, at not seeing the Amazon (or the Zebra) it would have been an insult to the Red-boardered Pixie and the Great Purple Hairstreak, and even the much more common Queens and Peacocks and skippers I photographed, to the hovering White-tailed Kite and the common Green Jays whose images I caught, and to all the other lovely bugs and birds of the morning. It would have diminished the wonder of everything I did see. And that would simply not be right.
And it would, definitely, be an insult to the giver of all these gifts! Or that’s what I think anyway.
Mexican Screech Owl
We were just finished photographing the resident Common Paraque at Estero Llano Grande World Birding Center when a Ranger and two tourists walked up and asked if we would like to see a Screech Owl.
Well yes!
This is apparently the Mexican variety, common in the Rio Grande Valley, and under study for separate species status. To give a sense of proportion take a look at the normal sized screw head upper left. This is a small owl. And you are seeing it’s whole body. Close study will show its little toes and talons at the bottom of the nest hole. Small.
Canon SX50HS in Program with iContrast and – 1/3rd EV exposure compensation. 1800mm equivalent field of view. Processed in Snapseed on the Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 2014.
Variegated Meadowhawk, Estero Llano Grande TX
The Variegated Meadowhawk is a widely distributed dragonfly across much of North America. It breeds in a wide variety of habitats, and it flies both early in the season and late, so it is very likely that you have seen it somewhere before. According to the books it is a bit shy of people, but where I see them in numbers, they are relatively easy to approach.
This is a tel-macro, taken at full zoom plus 2x Digital Tel-Converter function (2400mm equivalent field of view) from just about the closest focus distance (4.5 feet) on the Canon SX50HS. I especially like the bright weathered wood of the boardwalk contrasted with the water, which is thrown completely black by the bright foreground.
f6.5 @ 1/1000th @ ISO 125. Processed in Lightroom for intensity, clarity, and sharpness.
Million $$ Junk Bird!
I have said this before…and it is still true…I have never seen a more spectacular junk bird than the Green Jay. Junk birds are birds that are so common that birders do not look twice. House Sparrow. Juncos in winter. Mallards on a pond. Etc. Now, I can (and should) say that to a real birder, there are no junk birds…but the fact is that even the best, most conscientious, most righteous birder pays little attention to the most common birds most of the time.
And there is no doubt that if you live in South Texas, especially in the Rio Grande Valley, Green Jays are junk birds. They are that common. Put out a feeder, they come. Don’t put out a feeder, they still come. They are everywhere, all the time. And their habits in your yard, like the habits of most Jays, are, shall we say, not endearing? The very definition of junk birds.
However, if you don’t live in South Texas, the bird that you are most likely to be impressed by on your first visit, is the Green Jay. I mean, it is in-your-eye vivid, and so striking, so over-the-top exotic, that you will never forget your first encounter. “What was that?!?!?!”
And, being a junk bird, it is easy to see. If you only make one or two trips to the Rio Grande Valley per year, you will never get tired of seeing Green Jays. I know I have not!
I have not got tired of photographing them either. I have enough Green Jay shots from my Texas trips to make a calendar…most likely a 5 year calendar. (Not yet a Mayan Calendar…but I am working on it.) 🙂
These shots are from the National Butterfly Center gardens in Mission Texas.
Canon SX50HS. Program with auto iContrast and Shadow Fill. –1/3 EV Exposure Compensation. 1200mm equivalent field of view. f6.5 @ 1/100th and 1/125th @ ISO 800. Processed in Lightroom for intensity, clarity, and sharpness.
Odd Couple: Estero Llano Grande
On my last day in the Rio Grande Valley of South Texas, despite slightly dodgy weather, I drove out to Estero Llano Grande State Park World Birding Center for one last bit of birding and photography, Texas style. I sat on a bench at Grebe Marsh and watched this pair feed around each other for 30 minutes. The White Ibis and the Tricolored Heron conscientiously ignored each other. They shared one small corner of the pond, and were actually feeding in each other’s wake (looking for what was stirred up as the other bird passed), but neither was admitting the other’s existence. It looked odd, but it is, of course, common behavior when mixed species feed together.
Canon SX50HS. Program with auto iContrast and Shadow Fill. 465mm equivalent field of view. f5.6 @ 1/1000th @ ISO 500. Processed in Lightroom for intensity, clarity, and sharpness.
Giant Swallowtail: National Butterfly Center
The National Butterfly Center has one of the best Butterfly Gardens in the nation, but I am coming, the more often I visit, to appreciate the much less managed trails through native vegetation that extend out from the garden proper. On this last trip I managed to capture several bugs there, with one very rare, that had not seen in the gardens. This is a Giant Swallowtail, not an uncommon butterfly in Texas or else ware, but a real treat wherever it is seen. I found it in native vines along the dyke-top trail east of the gardens.
Canon SX50HS. Program with auto iContrast and Shadow Fill. 1800mm equivalent field of view. f6.5 @ 1/1000th @ ISO 320. Processed in Lightroom for intensity, clarity, and sharpness.
Clay-colored Thrush (aka cc Robin)
I have spent many hours, over the years I have been going to the Rio Grande Valley Birding Festival, stalking the Clay-colored Robin…down trails at Bensten Rio Grande State Park (now the Bensten SP World Birding Center), through the picnic grounds at Anzalduas Park, and all around other rumored haunts of the illusive valley specialty.
So imagine my surprise when processing my images from the National Butterfly Center, to discover that what I had taken for a immature American Robin in the 30 second glimpse I got when it hopped up on to a branch about 15 feet from me and I got off a single burst of shots, was, in fact, an adult Clay-colored Robin. I have never seen one this close, and I have never seen one in a tree. I did not even have time to back off on the zoom to get the whole bird in! (I had the camera set for Butterflies at 6 feet…not Clay-colored Robins at 15!) That is just the way it is in birding.
And imagine further my surprise when I looked up the range of the bird and discovered that they have changed the common name to Clay-colored Thrush while I was not paying attention! The Clay-colored Thrush is common all through Central America and is the national bird of Costa Rica, but is only reliably found in the US right along the Rio Grande River in south Texas (though its range is, apparently, expanding north).
Canon SX50HS. Program with auto iContrast and Shadow Fill. 1800mm equivalent field of view. f6.5 @ 1/640th @ ISO 800. Processed in Lightroom for intensity, clarity, and sharpness.
Emperor Butterfly: National Butterfly Center
There are several Emperor Butterflies in the Rio Grande Valley. I believe this is the Tawny Emperor. It was taken at the National Butterfly Center gardens in Mission Texas. I like the way the light is catching in the wings and the revealing half open pose…not to mention those bright yellow tips on the antennae. Tawny Emperors in particular are attracted to rotting fruit, and there are several “feeders” at the National Butterfly Center…hanging baskets full of garbage…and generally covered with butterflies. A study in contrast.
Canon SX50HS. Program with auto iContrast and Shadow Fill. 1800mm equivalent field of view. f6.5 @ 1/500th @ ISO 800. Processed in Lightroom for intensity, clarity, and sharpness.
Well hello there! Orange Crowned Warbler
On my visit to the National Butterfly Center in Mission Texas, I was standing watching Green Jays and House Sparrows (now there is a contrast) at the feeders set up in one corner of the Butterfly Garden, when this little yellow bird landed on a branch 20 feet from my head. I swung around and grabbed a record shot at whatever the camera was set at…which turned out to be about 200mm equivalent…then, when the bird just sat there and looked at me, zoomed in to the the full 1200mm equivalent for a few more intimate shots. I could not quite figure out what kind of bird it was…and I was too busy shooting to worry about it right then. The light was dim enough so the camera was having difficulty fining focus…and I could see the motion blur in many of the shots as the bird fidgeted on its branch…but I was persistent…and got off a dozen or more shots that might include a few keepers.
I got three keepers in fact…three frame filling portraits of what turned out to be a Yellow-crowned Warbler.
Canon SX50HS. Program with auto iContrast and Shadow Fill. – 1/3 EV Exposure Compensation. 1200mm equivalent field of view. f6.5 @ 1/60th @ ISO 800. Processed in Lightroom for intensity, clarity, and sharpness. This is a exceptional image in many ways. 1/60th of a second is nearly impossible for an active bird, hand-held at 1200mm equivalent…and a testimony to the effectiveness of the Canon’s Image Stabilization. And, at ISO 800, the image quality is really quite good for a small sensor camera. Way to go Canon!