Puzzling Absence Of Double-crested Cormorants This Winter At My Local Ponds
Every winter since I moved to northern Utah in 2009 I have found a few Double-crested Cormorants overwintering at my local ponds but this winter has been very different.
Every winter since I moved to northern Utah in 2009 I have found a few Double-crested Cormorants overwintering at my local ponds but this winter has been very different.
Yesterday I shared a photo of a Bald Eagle resting on the icy marsh at Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge and this morning I am sharing a Canada Goose doing exactly the same thing.
I spent some time yesterday morning focused on photographing an immature Black-crowned Night Heron at the dawn of the day in the marsh at Farmington Bay WMA.
On the first of February when I found and photographed an unusual and distinctive Bald Eagle with leucism I also photographed two more immature eagles in the same area.
Yesterday morning I spent some time up in the Wasatch Mountains and I am so glad that I did because I found a second winter Bald Eagle with leucism.
There were plenty of Great Blue Herons to photograph yesterday morning at Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge and I was more than happy to take photos of them.
Yesterday morning I spent time focusing on photographing Great Blue Herons on the frozen marshes of Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge.
Because of the low light and snowy conditions on the first day of the year I did not take many photos of the birds that I saw but I did get a few mallard images that I liked.
Why were the mallards sticking close to this Redhead? That was because she was diving down into the pond and bringing up aquatic vegetation to feed on and the mallards were stealing bits of it from her.
I photograph birds all the time and there are a few that simply take my breath away and totally mesmerize me, this dark morph Ferruginous Hawk is one of those birds.
I'm really glad I looked at these ducks in the fog and decided to take photos of them even though I was looking towards the sun instead of away from it like I typically do when photographing birds.
I couldn't have asked for a better birdy subject yesterday morning than this relaxed and cooperative immature Cooper's Hawk and I loved the setting it was in too.
I don't have many decent photos of immature Turkey Vultures so when I spotted several of them 11 days ago in northern Utah I was excited but my hopes for good light on the hatch year birds were dashed by clouds.
The Brown Pelican didn't do much while I had it in my viewfinder and I probably took way too many photos of it but I don't care, it was unique to see here in land-locked Utah and the setting of the Bear River was definitely different than the many times I have photographed this species back East.
I spent 26 minutes yesterday photographing juvenile Red-tailed Hawk siblings and had a blast watching them preen, lift off, flying, scratching, resting and landing.
The Great Blue Heron had flown in and landed near the shoreline on the other side of the pond where the bank was covered with snow and the heron rested there for a bit.
These two Black-necked Stilt photos were taken 9 days ago at Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge and I thought they could easily show the difference between the female and male of this species.
The best bird I spotted that I could photograph was a male Red-tailed Hawk resting on a cliff face and what I loved about this photo was all the grasses, lichen, wildflowers and the sage high up on the cliff.
So as of right now I am not sure whether I will be spending time on the island after the biting gnats come out which means if I am going to photograph Sage Thrashers displaying I need to find the thrashers some place else.
So far this year the only photo I've taken of the nest building magpies that I have liked is this close up of a resting Black-billed Magpie who was taking a break from looking for nesting materials.
I photographed this White-tailed Antelope Squirrel in 2016 near Torrey in Wayne County, Utah, the squirrel was resting on a boulder a couple hundred yards away from where I was camping.
I really can't pin down why I like this mallard photo and honestly I don't feel a need to figure out why I do. I simply do.
The only image I liked of the few I took yesterday afternoon was of this resting, feral domestic Mallard that appeared to be keeping an eye on me while it floated next to the shoreline of the pond.
It might seem a little late in the year to see immature Mourning Doves but it probably isn't because Mourning Doves can have as many as six broods per year.
I have often written that bird photography isn't easy and that it can be frustrating, wildlife photography can be much the same and my two recent sightings of Moose in the Wasatch Mountains can prove my point easily.
I was photographing birds when I spotted a hairstreak butterfly land right in front of me and took some images of it, I didn't know at the time it was a Colorado Hairstreak butterfly, I found that out later after I got home.
While photographing some waxwings a flash of movement caught my eye and I spotted an immature American Robin reaching for a berry in a Utah Serviceberry shrub, I couldn't help myself, I had to photograph this young bird too.
Last year I found plenty of Monarch Butterflies on the Rocky Mountain Bee Plants on Antelope Island and they were a delight to photograph as they fluttered around going from flower to flower sipping nectar from the delicate blossoms.
Yesterday in a Wasatch Mountain canyon I found a cooperative female American Robin resting on a perch on a hillside covered with sagebrush.
Every year in August Antelope Island has a SpiderFest where there are walks and talks about the spiders of that live on the island, I love photographing them and they really aren't so creepy as they seem to be.