The Day After

Late September storms are not uncommon on the Atlantic coast but they often just get blowy and rainy and they're gone. This was no exception, a storm blew through for a day but left behind a bright slightly windy day afterwards. What it did also leave was lots of nice waves to hammer the Maine coastline. We sat on nice sunshine warmed rocks had some food and just watched the waves.

Wave on Schoodic Point

Blue Jay

Here's a very old picture of a Blue Jay. Theres whole packs of them in the yard. This is a young one as the feathers are really blue, the older ones tend to be more washed out a little.

Blue Jay

Maine Sunset

As we are planning another vacation in Maine I thought I'd look at some of my old pictures. This sunset was from the cottage we rented in 2012, right on the bay looking West. How many months is it til September?

Maine Sunset

Orchids

Longwood Gardens, in SE PA usually has an awesome exhibition of Orchids around this time of year. These are from a few years ago.

Anhinga

Friday March 20th was the Equinox, one of the two days of the year when the daylight hours are equal to nighttime hours so from now on the days are longer and the nights are shorter. What has this to do with an Anhinga you might ask, absolutely bugger all. Except maybe that the Anhinga is a warm weather bird and as it snowed again on Friday and I wanted a bird to remind me that the warmer weather is coming.

Anhinga

My God, it's full of stars geese!

I couldn't resist revising the old 2001 Space Odyssey quote, sorry! It's true though,  the fields and skies were full of the Snow Geese. Wonderful spectacle. It did attract some very shifty men in black characters though.

We went out to Middle Creek Wildlife Management Area for a few hours which is an annual occurrence for us this time of year to see the thousands of Geese as they migrate North through this part of Pennsylvania.

Snow Geese

Snow Geese

Lots of Snow Geese

Very efficient Air Traffic Control

Frozen Middle Creek

Amish Ornithological Society Spring Outing

Tundra Swans

Sight and Sound

This time of year the fields around home are host to thousands of Snow Geese and Tundra Swans. Currently the estimate at Middle Creek is 110,000 Snow Geese and 3000+ Tundra Swans.  They  feed on the remnants of last years corn and other juicy stuff. The sounds they make even late into the night are a wonderful noise. Last night around 7pm as the sun was setting I could see 100's flying around at the top end of the yard. I can't see the fields at back due to the top of the yard being the highest point and the fields fall away to the South. When I crept through the trees the fields were full of both the Swans and the Geese. Wonderful spectacle.

Snow Geese, can you see the Ross's Goose?

Geese flying in

Swans and Geese in a snow melt pool.

Geese spooked by a deer.

Mainly Tundra Swans

Rascal

It's a bit chilly outside, above freezing but windy so as it's a lazy Sunday afternoon my photographic model for the afternoon is Rascal. We keep telling her she's going to get thrown out on the coldest night of the year if she doesn't behave. She doesn't listen. The single black whisker is the sign of the Ninja Cats so beware.

Rascal

A Tale of Two Squirrels

In my yard I've only ever seen Grey Squirrels and would love to see a Red Squirrel but don't think thats going to happen. Apparently we have Flying Squirrels though I've never seen one as they are nocturnal. Instead I'll have to make do with the hordes of Grey Squirrels that eat all my bird seed. Destructive little bastards, they are too. They love eating the bird feeders to get at more food. They have been evicted from the roof on two occasions where they gained access by chewing through the siding.  Quite a costly ethnic cleansing was required to totally evict them.

As you can see from the picture they eat anything, including blossoms.

Grey Squirrel in evening sunlight

The Red Squirrel was a resident in the yard of the cottage we rented on the Maine coast. I used a nice bit of technology to get this shot. I used a device called a Triggertrap. I connected the trigger trap cable between my iPhone and the camera which was mounted on a tripod prefocussed on the spot where the squirrel used to feed. I then linked my iPhone and iPad wirelessly and went and sat inside overlooking the yard. Simple. Squirrel came out I triggered the shutter release from iPad which told the iPhone to tell the camera to take a picture. I love it when a plan comes together.

Red Squirrel

Roosevelt Arch, Gardiner Montana

I'm people and I benefited and enjoyed it. This is the Roosevelt Arch just outside Gardiner, Montana at the North West Entrance to Yellowstone National Park. We stopped and had lunch in this cowboy themed restaurant, very authentic  except the staff were all Russian! I've been playing with a bit of black and white as you can see.

Roosevelt Arch, Gardiner, Montana

Wikipedia

View from a Picnic Bench

You must have seen them, the picnic benches in parks, state forests and suchlike. This is one of my all time favorites. It's at a place called Seawall on Mt Desert Island in Maine and was just after a storm had rolled through.

Seawall, Maine

Bald Eagle

A morning visit just up the lane to check out the Larks, Buntings and Longspurs turned up an adult Bald Eagle sitting there just warming itself in the sunshine.

Bald Eagle

Moonlit BackYard

Moonlight 

I woke up coughing at around 3AM due to the Upper Respiratory Thing thats been going around. Decided a cup of tea would be nice but on my way to the kitchen I noticed how bright the yard was in the moonlight. Having recently just had an email exchange with Colin, an old birding friend of mine in the UK about seeing things differently and breaking out of conventional photography I thought I'd try something different. While my English Breakfast Supreme was brewing I got the tripod, camera and a nice 50mm Zeiss lens I don't use enough and headed into Kelly's sewing room which commands a nice view over the backyard. It took me a while to slide the frosted window open without waking her but I managed it. When I say I managed it I mean I got the window open. If I did wake her I'll get it in the neck in the morning. So with the window open and the 11f air coming into the room I needed to be quick or I'd have frostbite in my nether regions which would not be good. The above photograph is a pretty damn good representation of the backyard at 3:30am EST.


Now a plug for Colin while I'm at it. Take a look his pictures and buy a few, you never know, he'll be even more famous/notorious one day. http://photo-hub.co.uk/artists/colin-towe

Guess what boys and girls .......

it's snowing .......... again.

It's not that cold out so I can have a window open and take photos without freezing my goolies off. The wind is blowing from a NE direction so thats good too. Heres a couple so far. I like to give them plenty of time to feed without me disturbing them.

Cardinal

Dark-eyed Junco

Snow Bunting

About a quarter of a mile down the lane there were 12 of these little beauties yesterday along with a few Lapland Buntings. I would love to get Snow Bunting on my Yard Bird List. I'll spread some seed in the field opposite and see if I can entice some down here. It still counts if I can see a bird from the yard; it's my list, my rules.

A long time ago in a galaxy far far away I used to go skiing in the Cairngorm Mountains in Scotland. In March or April while the skiing was still good I used to see the Snow Buntings in their breeding plumage around the mountain tops or even lower down in the car park. I wish I had taken some photographs back then.

Snow Bunting

Snow Bunting

Little Green Heron Bad Hair Day

This juvenile Little Green Heron was having a bad hair day. I was working in York (York Pennsylvania before anyone gets excited) and beside the car park there was an overgrown retension pond where the Little Green Heron family was raised. I saw at least 3 young heronlets or whatever young herons are called.  One afternoon when I was leaving one of the juveniles was learning to hunt on his own and I just wound the window down and snapped away. The second picture was taken in June 2012 when I was down in Florida on a week long conference. Florida in June is just plain nasty. The heat and humidity is awful. I had to go out and buy more shirts as I was changing them 3 or 4 times a day when I got the opportunity to go out photographing.

Little Green Heron Juvenile

Little Green Heron

I think this is a juvenile too,  probably a few months older