March 21st Report - San Angelo State Park

Good morning in the blind. I had hoped to get out and about this weekend to someplace other than the same old thing, but family obligations and a very sore wrist kept me from traveling very far. I'm scheduled for another appointment for the wrist sometime in the next couple of weeks so hopefully we'll get to the bottom of that one--it's eating into my photography time ;)

But since I was more or less stuck in San Angelo (though happily stuck, may I add), and the light looked to be perfect, I headed out to the park to see what I could see.

Light was outstanding. Maybe a little bright at first and certainly the quality of the light changed often during my time in the blind. But it was almost universally good and only my impatience and knowing I had other things to accomplish on Saturday kept me from staying longer. Start time of actual shooting was around 8:25 and I stayed exactly 2 hours. Body count of the images was just south of 270 images and most of them were very good. The only significant mistake that I made was that I went to ISO 400 early in the morning because the shutter speeds were getting below 1/80th. As things brightened I did not go back to drop the ISO back to 200. With the 30D this is not a huge issue--noise is minimal at ISO 400. But at 200 it is far better.

First image of the day was a male Northern Cardinal. Last image was a Red-winged Blackbird. In between was a good variety of the standard late winter/early spring birds. The Orange-crowned warbler made his appearance and the small covey of Northern Bobwhites made an appearance as well with at least 5 being in the blind area at once. Pyrrhuloxia were out in large numbers as well, probably outnumbering the Northern Cardinals which is a very unusual occurrence. House Sparrows are becoming more abundant, though White-crowned sparrows are still out in force. If last year is any indication, the White-crowns should be starting to make their way elsewhere over the next few weeks. No repeat performances though from the Greater Roadrunner or the Golden-fronted Woodpecker and I haven't seen the Ladderbacks in weeks.

Again, a good shooting experience in the blind--well worth being stuck in town again.

Images:
Red-winged Blackbird (Female), San Angelo State Park, ©2009 Jim Miller
Pyrrhuloxia (Male), San Angelo State Park, ©2009 Jim Miller

February 7th Blind Report - South Llano River State Park Blinds #1 (Loma) and #4 (Acorn)

I stepped completely away from taking pictures last weekend. Weather locally was too clear and I had some projects staring me directly in the face that kept me from getting in the car and traveling elsewhere. So I took the time to take care of business and put off any travel to this weekend.

So Saturday I went down to South Llano River State Park. Easy choice to make. Weather was supposed to be dicey on Sunday so I figured a road trip Saturday and then fingers crossed on a couple of hours on Sunday at San Angelo State Park. Plus, if I was going to be at South Llano River I would also make a quick scouting trip to Lost Maples SNA.

I started once again in Blind #4 (aka Acorn). Weather was considerably warmer this weekend as compared to 2 weekends ago. I was able to leave the gloves and ski-style mask in the car this time around. It was very comfortable with just a poly-pro shirt and my standard camouflage outershirt without need for a jacket. Skies however were mostly cloudy, which certainly knocked down the available light, but it diffused things nicely.

Species spread was a little smaller than last time around. No Downy Woodpecker and no Inca Dove. But pretty much everything else showed up. Goldfinches and sparrows seemed to be more numerous. Northern Cardinals were less numerous. Quite a few Pine Siskins wandering around. The Wild Turkeys which had made their visits the previous week were back again, too. All in all it was a good time.

As I started to head out of the park I decided to take advantage of the favorable sky conditions and stopped at Blind #1 (aka the Loma Blind). This blind is not nearly as cozy as Blind #4. Also, in my haste to leave the house I left my portable stool behind so it was going to be an uncomfortable photo shoot. There was a much more narrow species spread in this blind, but there were White-crowned Sparrows present here where they were not present in Blind #4. Light was good with the cloud-cover, even though it was nearly 11am.

Images:
Wild Turkey, South Llano River State Park, ©2009 Jim Miller
Bathing Female Northern Cardinal, South Llano River State Park, ©2009 Jim Miller

January 11th Blind Report - San Angelo State Park

Yes, I know this report is long in coming, but to be very honest with you I didn't even bother pulling the images out of the camera until this evening. Temps were a little warmer than last weekend, but the sky was incredibly devoid of cloud cover. As such, the light was horribly bright and horribly stark. I shot for a grand total of 25 minutes... it actually took me longer to get out to the park, get setup, and then pull things down and go home than the amount of time I spent in the blind. Experience told me that there was nothing that could be done with the light conditions.

Having opened up the images tonight, I can assure you that this is the case. The images are generally awful, which is too bad because the bird species swath was as wide as I've seen it in weeks. Cardinals, Pyrrhuloxia, Sparrows, Bobwhites, Thrasher, Woodpeckers--the whole normal crowd and in good numbers. But with the awful light I struggled to get one image to put up here.

The upside was I got that 25 minutes to play with my 322RC2 tripod head that showed up earlier in the week.

Fingers crossed for a better light this weekend. I really want to put that tripod head through it's paces...

Image: Northern Cardinal (Male), San Angelo State Park, ©2009 Jim Miller

Great Backyard Bird Count - February 13-16

The Great Backyard Bird Count is the weekend of February 13-16 (okay, so it's an extended weekend). Here's an awesome opportunity to give a little bit back to the birder community who typically has been at the heart of the facilities that we borrow for short periods of time to make images out of.

The instructions are simple and the benefits are great. Please consider taking part in this year's count.

Image: Northern Cardinal (Male), San Angelo State Park, ©2009 Jim Miller

January 4th Blind Report - San Angelo State Park

It was awfully good to get back into the blind this morning. Last weekend was ruined by a lousy experience trying to take my Graduate Review Exam (GRE) and having their network drop 2 tests into the 4 test sequence. Very frustrating. That was followed-up with a Sunday that just didn't work the way I wanted to.

This weekend was a much better set of circumstances. I was able to get back to Abilene yesterday and take my GRE with a very positive test result (no, I'm not going to share, but let's just say I'm a very happy camper). The plan was to get out to the blind today and everything worked the way it was supposed to. Only two things were not that great. First was that it was mighty cold and mighty windy and I did not dress for the occasion. Second was that I'm still shooting without a good tripod head and my hand started to fatigue very quickly. As such I only stayed in the blind for a couple of hours, but they were very productive hours.

Lots and lots of color today. Plenty of Northern Cardinals, House Finches, and assorted sparrows. Both Golden-Fronted and Ladderbacked Woodpeckers made visits into the blind, though in both cases not for very long and not in places where I could get a good shot of them. Sparrows were running very strong with House, White-crowned, and Rufous-crowned varieties being very prevalent. Mourning and White-winged doves were present in large numbers, though White-winged were far more common. No bobwhites this morning, but looking back at the last couple of visits, they didn't usually show up until later in the morning.

No laundry list this morning. The blind was out of sheets, I didn't remember to bring a new supply, and in the big picture I don't think I could have gripped my pencil well enough to make good notes anyway.

Images:
Northern Mockingbird, San Angelo State Park, ©2009 Jim Miller
Northern Cardinal (Male), San Angelo State Park, ©2009 Jim Miller