Caught this northern harrier backlit by the rising sun while hunting on Fir Island.
Caught this northern harrier backlit by the rising sun while hunting on Fir Island.
Some pics and a video tour from my four-day winter camping photo shoot in Olympic National Park photographing in the Hoh River rain forest, the Queets River rainforest and Ruby Beach.
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For landscapes:
For wildlife:
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I had a fine day watching and photographing short-eared owls on Fir Island, Washington. I found this owl in the Skagit Bay Wildlife Area.
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Short-eared owls hunt for voles and other small rodents during daylight hours, typically in early morning and late afternoon. This diurnal behavior makes them one of the easier owl species to locate and photograph.
The tips below are from my experience photographing short-eared owls in the winter in Washington State’s Puget Sound.
Here is the equipment I use for photographing short-eared owls. While a 600mm f/4 lens would be the ideal, the system below is lighter weight and far less expensive, making it useful on wildlife photography trips into the remote back-country. This smaller setup is also far easier to hold when shooting without a tripod. (affiliate links)
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Are you a bird watching lover? Bring these little avian marvels into your home with my new songbird print collection. These prints feature colorful photographic portraits of some of your favorite feathered friends.
Available as ready-to-hang canvas wraps, metal prints or framed prints. Order them now through my Pixels.com page.
Three small 8X8 or 10X10 inch square-format prints look great lined up vertically on a small wall, or horizontally above a desk or wall table. When ordering a set of canvas wrap prints, I suggest the “black sides” option (as shown below) to harmonize the prints.
These photographic prints are available in several sizes up to 30X30 inches. Every purchase comes with a 30-day money-back guarantee.
Select from 17 different songbird images in spring, summer and autumn settings. Bird selection includes chickadee, towhee, junco, steller’s jay and the miniature bushtit.
More images will be added to the songbird print collection over the coming months. So, subscribe to not miss out.
All birds in these photographs are wild, and were treated in compliance with National Audubon Society’s guidelines (PDF).
Successful Backyard Songbird Photography: A How-To Guide [Video]
November 13, 2020
More Backyard Songbird Photography [Video]
March 30, 2020
Backyard songbird photography can be a very satisfying way to enjoy outdoor photography while getting close to your neighborhood feathery friends.
In this article, I collect and share my approach to backyard songbird photography. But first, please join me for a photo shoot from my backyard photo blind by watching the following video:
Songbirds specialize in perching. They have three toes pointing forward and one toe directed back. This so called “anisodactyl” toe configuration, along with a tendon arrangement in their legs that causes the toes to curl and maintain grip “by default” (i.e. without engaging muscles), make these passerines expert perchers.
This article will focus on photographing perching songbirds using a bird feeder to attract them, and a photo blind to get in close to these miniature flying marvels.
Songbirds can generally benefit from the photography experience when done in an ethical way.
First, we need to follow some basic rules about attracting birds to your backyard with feeders. I encourage you to read the National Audubon Society’s Guide to Bird Feeding (PDF).
Here are a few measures I take in consideration of these guidelines:
Here are the factors I consider key for successful songbird photography in the backyard, which we will cover more detail in this article.
Many songbirds, and other types of birds, are easy to attract with feeders. I suggest that you go to your local home and garden store and ask about the best types of bird feed and bird feeders for your region. They also may offer advice on how to deal with squirrels or other animals in your locale that may cause a problem at your feeder.
(more…)The Boulder River Trail offers easy hiking into the Boulder River Wilderness, with scenic views of waterfalls cascading down cliffs and right into the Boulder River.
Join me for a photo shoot of the Boulder River waterfalls in the pouring rain. First, we shoot Feature Show Falls, wading out into the flooding river to anchor the scene with big mossy boulders in the foreground. Next, we shoot an un-named falls pouring over a cliff another 1/4 mile up the trail.
This is wet and wild Boulder River Wilderness at its autumn best.
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Feature Show Falls, Boulder River Wilderness, Washington
Feature Show Falls pours into Boulder River, Boulder River Wilderness, Washington
Un-named creek pouring into Boulder River, Boulder River Wilderness, Washington
Fog shrouded forest, Boulder River Wilderness, Washington
On an autumn hike up into the subalpine meadows of Mount Rainier National Park, I found these adorable American Pika (Ochotona princeps) busy topping off their hay piles before winter sets in.
American pika (Ochotona princeps), autumn color in background, Mount Rainier National Park, Washington
American pika (Ochotona princeps), Mount Rainier National Park, Washington
American pika (Ochotona princeps) sitting on boulder, Mount Rainier National Park, Washington
American Pika inhabit mountain side boulder and talus fields, where they live and store hay among the rocks. Pika don’t hibernate. Instead, they survive the frigid winters by remaining active in their rock piles under the snow.
In fact, it is summer’s heat that threatens the pika more than winter’s cold. Like rabbits, to whom they are related, pika have limited thermoregulation capabilities. They overheat and die when exposed to temperatures as low as 78 °F (25.5 °C) for more than several hours. While global warming pushes them to higher and higher elevations, they can become trapped on their mountainside “rock islands”. This limits their ability to migrate to cooler climes.
Pika now serve as an indicator species for climate change. In fact, Pika have already disappeared from more than one-third of their habitat in Oregon and Nevada.
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Join me on a 5-day family backpacking trip on the South Coast Trail in Olympic National Park to photograph seascapes along this wild stretch of Washington Coast. We start at Third Beach and make camps at Scotts Bluff and Strawberry Point. Along the way, we found towering sea stacks, coastal sitka spruce forests, tide-pools, seals, sea otter, great blue heron and bald eagles. A pack of coyote howl 100 feet from our tent. Weather ranges from light rain to coastal fog to clear skies full of stars.
Sea stack on Washington Coast in coastal fog, near Toleak Point
Moonlit sea stack on Washington Coast under starry sky, near Toleak Point
Great blue heron (Ardea herodias) wading along shoreline below sea stacks, near Strawberry Point
Tents camping on beach below sea stack on Washington Coast, Scotts Bluff
Classic coastal sitka spruce forest, Scotts Bluff
Sea stack called “Giants Graveyard” on Washington Coast at sunset
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Join me on a quick backpacking trip up to Spray Park in the northwest corner of Mount Rainier National Park to photograph Mount Rainier reflected in tranquil ponds. The wildflower meadows were in peak bloom, and so were the mosquitoes!
The mosquitoes are atrocious, but calm weather and warm evening light made for perfect reflections of Mount Rainer in subalpine ponds at 6100 feet elevation. White heather, pink mountain laurel, and Mount Rainier lousewort (which is endemic to Mount Rainier) were in full bloom.
Mount Rainier reflected in small pond in Spray Park meadows, Mount Rainier National Park
If you like the images, consider purchasing a print for yourself or a loved one.
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