Christmas Morning Snowfall
It is still dark here in northern Utah but I can tell there is some fresh snow on the ground so I guess that makes this a white Christmas even if the white stuff melts before the sun comes up over the mountains.
It is still dark here in northern Utah but I can tell there is some fresh snow on the ground so I guess that makes this a white Christmas even if the white stuff melts before the sun comes up over the mountains.
Two mornings ago a small flock of Mountain Chickadees came in to forage on the seeds in some Douglas Fir trees and I had fun trying to keep up with the small dynamos.
As it turns out this flycatcher gave me a wonderful behavioral clue that made identifying it a little easier for me because I watched it wag its tail slowly up and down repeatedly while perched which Gray Flycatchers are known to do.
It seems that I have spent a lot of time photographing Willow Flycatchers this year and I am happy that I have because I enjoying taking photos of these flycatchers.
My persistence and knowledge of a Willow Flycatcher's territory paid off again yesterday morning when the flycatcher flew in close and landed on a willow branch not far from where I sat in my Jeep.
Because of a two part call, FITZ-bew, I had no trouble identifying a flycatcher that I saw, photographed and heard yesterday morning in the Wasatch Mountains as a Willow Flycatcher.
The last time I wrote about American Tree Sparrows I said that they would be migrating soon and that I hoped I could take a few more photos of them before they migrated and I had that opportunity two days ago.
Snow and clouds are in the forecast for today and I have decided that today is the day for me to migrate On The Wing Photography over to the new server that I mentioned a while back.
Yesterday morning I was delighted to find two House Wrens foraging in a brush pile in the Wasatch Mountains not long after sunrise. This time of the year the wrens aren't singing like they do in the spring so I have to rely more on my eyes and not on a combination of my eyes and ears to locate them.
There are times I enjoy finding hidden faces in clouds, rocks, trees or other natural features and I saw one in this House Wren photo.
Even though this adult Cedar Waxwing is small in the frame because I photographed it from quite a distance it is one of my favorite images taken in the Wasatch Mountains four days ago.
I love seeing the Aspen eyes of the forest upon me and I find myself happy to photograph them whenever I can.
I spent some time up in the canyons of the Wasatch Mountains yesterday photographing the birds I found including this handsome Green-tailed Towhee perched on a blooming Utah Serviceberry.
A few days ago I photographed a Yellow-rumped Warbler at a pond close to home that was tossing its prey around before it consumed it.
I was looking through my archives from last year and came across some images I had taken last June in Morgan County, Utah that I hadn't processed yet and I came across these Cedar Waxwing photos.
I went looking for a mammal species yesterday and dipped on them but hit the jackpot by getting a lifer bird, a Northern Pygmy-Owl and it had prey!
Yesterday I had my first opportunity to photograph a nearby female Belted Kingfisher in Salt Lake County, Utah and I had fun getting to know her.
I was in far northern Utah yesterday and saw the hawks I expected to see but finding this Great Horned Owl was a bit of a surprise since I wasn't looking for Great Horned Owls.
A month ago I photographed a pair of Williamson's Sapsuckers excavating a nesting cavity in Idaho and this past week I spent several days photographing them again.
But for me the "Snow Birds" I have grown to love here in Utah are Rough-legged Hawks who only visit in the winter and spend the rest of their lives breeding in high subarctic and Arctic regions.
There was a bit of sun yesterday between snow falls and we headed out to Antelope Island hoping there would be light and birds. There was light and a few birds, this Black-billed Magpie was one of them.
Rough-legged Hawks breed in the Arctic so we don't see them around here in northern Utah during the summer.
Merlins are winter visitors in the Salt Lake Valley so I have just a few more weeks to attempt photographing them. Merlins are used to be called "pigeon hawks" because their shape and flight patterns are similar to pigeons.
While I observed them one of the Western Kingbirds was actively hawking insects, swooping towards a bug then perching until it saw the next insect.
I can take advantage of the sucker holes by photographing birds close to home when the sun breaks through the clouds.