{"id":47247,"date":"2017-06-11T05:19:42","date_gmt":"2017-06-11T11:19:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/?p=47247"},"modified":"2024-05-21T04:41:46","modified_gmt":"2024-05-21T09:41:46","slug":"male-cassins-finches-foraging-in-beaverhead-county-montana","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/2017\/06\/11\/male-cassins-finches-foraging-in-beaverhead-county-montana\/","title":{"rendered":"Male Cassin’s Finches Foraging in Beaverhead County, Montana"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"CuriousCurious male Cassin’s Finch – Nikon D810, f6.3, 1\/1600, ISO 640, Nikkor 500mm VR with 1.4x TC, natural light
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

Two years ago today I was in Beaverhead County, Montana photographing Cassin’s Finches foraging on the seeds of dandelions on a morning that had sunshine and plenty of fog. I was fortunate that when I had the finches in my viewfinder that I had beautiful light because just a mile or two further east and the heavy fog obscured my view of many of the birds I saw.<\/p>\n

Cassin’s Finch males look like their heads and shoulders have been dipped in raspberry juice and that always makes me smile because one of my favorite things to eat as a small child and farmer’s daughter was “berries & cream”, home canned raspberries and fresh cream skimmed right off the top of the milk in the milk tin. Only I pronounced “berries” as “burries”.\u00a0 I liked that for dessert more than ice cream as I recall.<\/p>\n

\"MaleMale Cassin’s Finch plucking seeds from Dandelions – Nikon D810, f6.3, 1\/1000, ISO 640, Nikkor 500mm VR with 1.4x TC, natural light<\/span><\/p>\n

It was great to photograph the Cassin’s Finches but it was also interesting to watch them stretch out to grab the dandelion seeds from the barbed wire fence. Normally I would delete this image because I can’t see the eye of the finch but I kept it because of the bird’s pose as it reached for a seed.<\/p>\n

\"MaleMale Cassin’s Finch foraging for Dandelion seeds – Nikon D810, f6.3, 1\/1250, ISO 640, Nikkor 500mm VR with 1.4x TC, natural light<\/span><\/p>\n

There weren’t many seeds left after the small flock of Cassin’s Finches finished foraging on the dandelions near the fence. The finches took off very quickly but I sure enjoyed them while I had them in my sight two years ago in Montana.<\/p>\n

Life is<\/em> good.<\/p>\n

Mia<\/p>\n

Click here<\/span><\/a> to see more of my Cassin’s Finch photos plus facts and information about this species.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Two years ago today I was in Beaverhead County, Montana photographing Cassin’s Finches foraging on the seeds of dandelions on a morning that had sunshine and plenty of fog.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":128874,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1513,27,2220,223,12],"tags":[4004,4430,3503,6010,3818,4286,3830,3504,3495,4247,5504,4136,2221,1149,4104,10589,7554,2135,2315,5434],"class_list":["post-47247","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-beaverhead-county-montana","category-avian","category-cassins-finches","category-centennial-valley","category-montana","tag-adult","tag-barbed-wire","tag-cassins-finch","tag-curious","tag-dandelion","tag-eating","tag-fence","tag-finch","tag-finches","tag-flock","tag-fluff","tag-foraging","tag-haemorhous-cassinii","tag-males","tag-perched","tag-plucking","tag-seed","tag-seeds","tag-summer-3","tag-valley"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/cassins-finch-dandelions-mia-mcpherson-0126.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p11Mom-ci3","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":25452,"url":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/2015\/06\/12\/cassins-finches-of-the-centennial-valley-of-montana\/","url_meta":{"origin":47247,"position":0},"title":"Cassin’s 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2016","format":false,"excerpt":"At times the male Cassin's Finch looked like he was on alert but I can't be sure why, it might have been because of the other finches nearby or that he was keeping an eye out for predators in the sky.","rel":"","context":"In "Birds"","block_context":{"text":"Birds","link":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/category\/avian\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Alert male Cassin's Finch on a conifer, Targhee National Forest, Clark County, Idaho","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/cassins-finch-male-mia-mcpherson-8307.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/cassins-finch-male-mia-mcpherson-8307.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/cassins-finch-male-mia-mcpherson-8307.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, 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