Good news, I’m over my little bout of creative frustration. I visited Reifel twice in recent days, just because, and it was a lovely experience. The light was somewhat less than ideal, but that gave me the push to experiment with focal length and aperture. Pulling back on the zoom gives me both a bit more depth of field and a bigger aperture, ie: more light coming in. Which is exactly what you want in this kind of environment. Thinking about it more, maybe I want to go back to S or maybe even A modes, instead of spending most of my time in M. Definitely food for thought.
In the end, I was very happy with the pictures I took on both days! There was quite a bit of ice and snow around, which you don’t see much in these parts. And capturing how the birds interacted with all this snow was a pretty new experience as well!
Reifel Bird Sanctuary, February 6
Like this. I don’t think I ever snapped a photo of a bird with snow on its beak!
I happened to see this cutie by the western dyke. I’ve never seen them there before, which may or may not be related to the weather.
More snow on beak, along with seeds and stuff. So I guess they don’t feel the snow? I mean, they have the instinct to clean their beaks regularly, but that might be because otherwise they’d just let stuff accumulate there, which could lead to parasites and infections.
Understandably, there were very few herons around! This one was standing right on the trail, huddled up and glaring at the world. Well, I guess they’re always glaring but this one seemed especially offended. And because it was very likely hungry, I took the other way. No need to make it fly away and spend precious energy.
And this little guy, going to town on these seed clusters (or whatever they are). It must be nice to be a tiny birb eating seeds or fruit, there’s pretty much always something around no matter the season. Fish eaters are out of luck.
This guy seemed so proud of its berry! And rightly so. Like many birds, robins shift to fruit in wintertime, since worms and most other bugs are harder to come by.
And this guy, somewhat fluffed out but adding a nice pop of colour!
Of course you can’t beat kinglets for pops of colour! I chased several golden-crowns around the sanctuary, but they kept zipping around and hiding in bushes and under logs and whatnot. Only this one deigned to stay in the open long enough for me to snap a decent picture.
I really don’t know what was going on with this gal. I hope she’s okay and her tongue isn’t frozen that way or something.
Oh but here’s one last surprise! I see these birbs so rarely I forgot what I was looking at at first. No, it’s not a Song Sparrow, nor a juvenile white-crown, especially with all these little dark streaks. It’s a Lincoln’s Sparrow! I’ve seen them a few times in this area, and they’re mostly winter migrants, so this one probably isn’t being pushed around by extreme weather.
Fun fact: they’re a cousin species to Song Sparrows, and like them have fairly complex songs. That may not be purely genetic though, because their other close cousins, the Swamp Sparrows, apparently have very simple songs. I’ve never seen or heard Swamp Sparrows though, they don’t normally show up west of the Rockies.
Reifel Bird Sanctuary, February 8
I planned to visit with my usual partner in birb but he wasn’t feeling well so I flew solo. The weather was still cold, the ponds were still mostly icy. No kinglets though, booo.
I thought this gal’s white tufts were some kind of snowy patches but no, it’s… what? Extra thick winter fluff? I don’t quite know. Still, she matches nicely with the snowy fence, so that’s something.
Of course these little guys show up everywhere with or without snow, but I couldn’t help posting at least one photo.
And just as before, there were tons of golden-crowns!
And a bunch of Jesus ducks
Just as I was about to leave, the snow came down hard, in heavy wet clumps. I stayed to take some photos, and the one below is my absolute favourite.
Now, on both days I could hear Snow Geese raising a racket, but couldn’t see them out in the marshes. Turns out, they were in the fields south of the sanctuary. I captured this view just after leaving, and then hurriedly parking my car by the side of the road.
Epilogue: the Northern Hawk-Owl
On my first day, I saw a big gang of Very Serious Birders pointing their Very Serious Gear at a clump of trees on River Road just opposite the Westham Island Bridge. I didn’t stop, but later that day I learned they were scoping out a Northern Hawk-Owl — a raptor that ranges across North America and Eurasia at pretty high latitudes, and is apparently pretty rare around here? Or maybe it’s the novelty of seeing an owl in broad daylight that attracts a certain kind of obsessive birder.
I stopped on the 8th, got a few terrible photos, and went on my way. The owl was not making things easy for photographers, and I respect that. I wonder how long the other people stayed for, especially after the snow came down.
It’s a bit hard for me to judge, because I’ve been known to chase rarities too… but glomming onto a daytime owl for (presumably) hours and hours over (presumably) multiple days in the hopes that it’ll do something photogenic seems excessive to me. But hey, as long as they’re not harassing the owl, you do you!