Meetup at Great Meadows National Wildlife Refuge

Civil Dawn

Today, Saturday, May 30, Mike Milica put together another great Meetup at Great Meadows National Wildlife Refuge in Concord, Massachusetts.  The main item we will going to hopefully photograph was the Marsh Wren along with the red-winged blackbirds and what else we could find to photograph.

We met at the refuge parking lot at 5 AM, so we could be ready and out photographing at first light.  On my drive up from the home, there was moderate to thick fog present up on till Parkway on Route 128 N. at the refuge there was some fog over the water and over us some of the trees.  With the color in the sky from civil dawn and sunrise.  It allowed some nice landscapes.

Sunrise

In "Don's Early Light" a marsh wren was on the cattails singing.  Photographing marsh wrens takes patience as they will pop up onto reads and cattails and then drop down into the underbrush, so you just have to wait for the wrens to reappear.  Red-winged blackbirds were flying and singing all around us and were able to photograph them as they landed on bushes.

Marsh Wren

Marsh Wren

Red-Winged Blackbird Singing

Red-winged Blackbird Flying at You

I also photographed swamp sparrows and song sparrows, as they were singing and preening.  Also around were Canada geese, and great blue herons flying by.

Song Sparrow

Swamp Sparrow

The group started breaking up around 8 o'clock to 9 o'clock.  As a group of us was leaving, one photographer had located a marsh Wren nest, partly hidden behind new cattail leaves and the nest was attached to last year's cattails.  I spent around the half-hour watching the nest and was able to get a few pictures of the marsh wren leaving and entering into the nest.  The only reason I quit was that I had a set up on the boardwalk and the number of people needing to pass by me increased and when a person pass by.  I had a move my tripod and then reset up to find the nest again.

Marsh Wren on the Cattail Leaves with the Nest. Behind It, and the Hole of the Net Visible

Finally, as I was walking out the path back to the car, I came across a white admiral butterfly, which gave gave me some good photographs.

White Admiral Picking up Minerals from the Soil

White Admiral

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Swallows and More.

Barn Swallow

Last Friday morning, three of us visited Great Meadows National Wildlife Refuge.  The first thing we observed was a Tom Turkey displaying for a hen.  We then continue down to the morning blind, where we met Shawn Carey, who was set up to photograph, hopefully, the swallows landing on some perches.  There were a number of birds flitting by and Canada geese coming in to land.  I was able to get Canada geese landing and a female red-winged blackbird in a tree singing.

Canada Goose Landing

Red-winged Blackbird Singing

However, for the time that we were there with Shawn, no swallows landed on his perches.  At a swallow box near the blind, a female Tree Swallow (Tachycineta bicolor) was bringing in material to build the nest inside the box.  It was fun watching her as she struggled to get large pieces of material through a small hole.  In the meantime, the male tree swallow sat on top of the box and watched.

Tree swallow Building a Nest

Tree swallow Building a Nest

Up above and a little further away, barn swallows (Hirundo rustica) kept landing on a bare branch and by continuing to watch and with some luck.  I captured some pictures of the barn swallows in flight taking off from the branch.

Barn Swallow in Flight

Barn Swallow in Flight

Shawn left, but we continue to stay and finally a tree swallow and barn swallows landed on his perch, giving us some decent photographs.

Tree Swallow Singing

Tree Swallow Singing

Barn Swallows

As I have said in the past nature photography needs patience, no matter how long that it may take.

Marsh Wrens and More at Great Meadows

Marsh Wren singing in the early morning light

After reading an article in Tim Grey's Pixology Number 022 titled "A "Refine Photos" Workflow", I decided to try the methodology in reviewing the pictures that I obtained yesterday at Great Meadows National Wildlife Refuge during a Meet Up sponsored by Mike Milica.  I had taken about 500 photos and after downloading them into Lightroom, first I went through and deleted all the out of focus and empty frame photos.  Then, by utilizing the command Refine Photos and following the steps that Tim Grey outlines made picking the photos for this blog extremely easy.  Pixology is published monthly and has many good articles on Lightroom and Photoshop.  You can find more information at www.timgrey.com.

Originally, the meet up was supposed to be on Saturday, but was postponed to Sunday, because of the heavy rains.  I was not going to attend the Saturday session because of bird-a-thon (which I am afraid I did not attend because of getting over a cold and the heavy rain in the morning).  With Sunday morning, being very pleasant.  I joined the group at Great Meadows at 5:15 AM, so we could be out on the dike path for sunrise.

The main subject was to be the marsh wrens, and again, the red-winged blackbirds.  Of course, if any other interesting subjects showed up, I wouldn't hesitate to take photos of them.

The first subject was a pair of Canada geese who were watching over their goslings.  One of the goslings was very aggressive and attacking other goslings.

Gosling standing by an adult

Canada geese goslings fighting

The marsh wrens were singing and also gathering material from the cattails to line the nests that they were building.  Marsh Wren males build a number of nests and then the female comes and chooses which one she likes.  In order to take photos of the marsh wrens required patience , since the wrens  would pop up and then go right back down into the deep marsh grass.  They usually would come up around same area so you just had to pick a spot and then adjust position as needed.

Marsh Wren with cattail material

Marsh Wren singing

Marsh Wren doing the split

Again, the red-winged blackbirds were out singing and the interesting part was that they had favorite perches to which they flew in rotation.  This made it easier to get photographs of the red-wing blackbirds.

Red-winged Blackbird singing in the early morning light

Female red-winged blackbird flying

Red-winged blackbird singing on a cattail

Red-wing blackbird flying

I've photographed from around 5:30 AM to 9 AM, came home and downloaded the pictures, selected the ones I wanted for today's blog and then went to sleep for a while.  Later in the day, I post processed the pictures.


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Meetup Morning at Great Meadows National Wildlife Refuge

Red-winged Blackbird Singing and Displaying

This morning I joined a Meetup group organized by Mike Milica at Great Meadows National Wildlife Refuge - Concord Unit. We met at 5:45 AM in the parking lot where Mike explained that the main object was trying to get male Red-winged Blackbirds displaying on the reeds or on the cattails, plus whatever else we could find to photograph. The plan was that we would all spread out since the dike trail is long enough to support us without being in each other's way.

As we started walking down the trail, the first bird that I observed was a female red-winged blackbird, which I photographed high-key so that I could completely blow out the background.

Female Red-winged Blackbird

Then I joined the group photographing a very cooperative Great Blue Heron who was standing in the water which was flowing in between the two impoundments. Everyone had a chance to obtain photographs of this bird.

Great Blue Heron

The rest of the morning was taken up trying to get the red-winged blackbirds singing and displaying what out being obstructed by objects in front of them by having sticks coming out of their head. It required a lot of patience and moving around to get the best angle.

Red-winged Blackbird In-Flight

Some of the other species that I photographed included a singing Common Grackle in great light showing off its beautiful iridescence. A pair of mute swans went through different display modes, then they mated and displayed again afterwards. Most of the ducks and geese were far away, however, a male Wood Duck swam close to the shore line and required careful placement of the camera and lens in order to get a clean photograph of this beautiful duck.

Common Grackle Show in Its Beautiful Iridescence As It Was Singing

Mute Swans Mating

Mute Swans Displaying after Mating

Wood Duck

Near the end of the meetup, Mike went over manual exposure and how to set exposure utilizing a grey card or an incident exposure meter. Interesting my Nikon D3s was two thirds of a stop on the the recommended reading while my Nikon D7100 was right on. When I am shooting this is something that I have to keep in mind. It was a great day and I met some new friends at hopefully we will get together shooting again in the near future.

Cooperative Great Blue Heron

Smile you are on candid camera

Sunday morning, we went to the Great Meadows National Wildlife Refuge in Concord, Massachusetts to try to see if we could photograph the Sora Rail.  Because of the heavy rains that we had recently the dike path was flooded and the birds have been running around in the water and catching food.  My son was there early in the week and got some great pictures.  Well, no Rails were to be found, however, we had a very cooperative Great Blue Heron.  Unlike down in Florida, where the birds a less skittish, usually locally the Great Blue Heron will take off at the first sign of you approaching.  On the path, we found a cooperative Great Blue Heron that allowed people to approach close to the usual, before it would fly and landed further down the path.  This allowed us to set up for some great pictures of its activities.

Liftoff

Great Blue Heron Preening

Great Blue Heron feeding on a tadpole

Squawk

Great Blue Heron Lifting Off

Photographs from Great Meadows National Wildlife Refuge, Concord Unit

Black-vapped Chickadee Fluffed up after Preening

Today's blog is just a number of interesting photographs that I took at Great Meadows National Wildlife Refuge, Concord Unit.  All the photographs were taken with my Nikon D800, and my Nikon 70-200 mm F/2.8 lens with a 2X converter.

Broken Tree Trunk

Club-tailed Dragonfly

Black-Capped Chickadee Nest in an Old Tree Stump

Blue Dasher Dragonfly

Fern

Great Blue Heron Hiding in the Reads

Great Blue Heron Getting Ready to Fly

Hornet

Water Drops on Lily Pads

Blossoms

Flowers

Marsh Wren