“A wonderful bird is the Pelican.
His beak can hold more than his belly can.
He can hold in his beak
Enough food for a week!
But I’ll be darned if I know how the hellican?”
A limerick by Dixon Lanier Merritt
I remember hearing this as a child. My memory was jogged by a post on Though Open Lens
This large post includes a list of the 61 birds including 7 life birds seen on this trip; bringing my UK list up to 261 since I started the list in 1987. I saw while in London late December 2015 and first week of January 2016. Captions provide the names, locations and dates of each siting. I posted the best ones but decided to include a few not so good photos as they are all I have of certain species.
My one serious trip was to the WWT London Wildlife Refuge on 1/4/2016. The WWT (Wildlife and Wetlands Trust has 8 other refuges around Great Britain. They cater to families, provide education and the wetlands have blinds for serious birders. I may not have found some of them, like the bittern and snipe, if other birders hadn’t pointed them out to me. My one disappointment was not having more days to do this. It was really a trip to visit family. Cemeteries are the best for birding. I enjoyed St James Park which is well stocked with ducks and pelicans.; and winter birds and ducks in and Clissold Park. Walthamstow Marshes might have produced some good birds but I didn’t get the time to investigate it.
8th posting of photographs of Sydney August, 2015
The captions give the names and locations of these Australian bird photographs created August 2 to August 18, 2015.
I went for a trip with 3 of my birding friends to Bashakill Wildlife Management Area, Sullivan County, New York on the weekend of June 6th. The first day we spent by the lake. The following morning I took some lovely photographs of dawn at the lake. Later that morning we drove up Gumaer Road, alongside a stream of the same name; stopping here and there to listen, and occasionally spot, an Acadian Flycatcher, singing Dark-eyed Juncos, Veerys and a Wood Thrush. I didn’t have my Nikon 80-400 mm lens, which is being repaired, so I am sorry to say I couldn’t photograph two young ravens being fed some red meat. Lastly, we walked along the D&H Canal Linear Park. The area is lovely and bright green this time of year with many birds, turtles and other wildlife. I had a marvelous time. We saw 55 species of birds and other flora and fauna.
I experimented with black and white with added sepia tints. Each one required its own methods to get the best result in Lightroom’s “darkroom” for translating to B&W. I aimed to create a mood and accentuate certain details. Here are both color and black and white versions for comparison.
Landscapes:
Close-ups:
A week ago it was spring now it is summer. Typical New York transition from spring to summer. BANG! It is hot. I had fun working these few images. Not much came out in focus recently. I think I need to get me big zoom lens checked out. These ones are OK. Some I worked on a bit on Photoshop and some I left alone.
Migration has been slow to start and the birds are few. We had a few specials. The Mourning Warbler, White-throated Sparrows and Blue Jay are locals. One somewhat controversial one was a Prothontary Warbler which was released by released in Central Park April 27, 2015 around 3:45 pm by the great staff of the Wild Bird Fund, in the vicinity of Tanner Spring. Reported by David Speiser. The argument is can it be counted as a wild bird. I thing, yes, as long as it recovers, feeds and continues its migration. I looks like it is feeding alright.
An assortment of birds that are both here all year and just arrived this Spring. Central Park is looking good now, birders are out and so are the flowers. I took the last two photos near 30th Street along the Hudson River.
This is a project for the Infinity group at B&H Camera store’s Event Space. The assignment was supposed to be a portrait of a character from a well-known book. I am a bird watcher so I chose a book whose main character is a bird.
Photos by Sherry Felix edited in Photoshop. Inspiration: Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach.
