Water Is for the Birds!

Northern Cardinal

The reason birds bathe in water or saturate themselves with us is to actively maintain their plumage. In order to keep feathers, functional requires constant care by birds. Birds, depending on the species use certain movements to wet i'ts feathers. They can wade, fluff the feathers to expose bare skin between their bases and rapidly flick the wings in and out of the water. They  then submerge the breast, roll the breast vigorously back and forth and with the head thrown back dousing the feathers on the back.

Northern Cardinal

Northern Cardinal

Painted Bunting

Painted Bunting

Painted Bunting

Painted Bunting

Bird's like chickadees will dart in and out of the water, immersing rolling briefly and then returned to store the flick the wings, and vibrate the feathers and then repeat the procedure. We watched a scissor tail flycatcher briefly dunk its its body into the water. Leave and then come back and return to repeat the process.

Summer Tanager

Painted Bunting

Summer Tanager

Black-crested Titmouse

Birds also use the water for drinking and maintaining their fluid level. During our visits to the blinds, because the temperature was in the 90s there was an awful lot of drinking and bathing activity going on and we got to watch many different species on how they bathed.

Common Ground Dove

Common Ground Dove

Northern Bobwhite

There were times I envied the birds, since they could get into the water and cool themselves down. I had plenty of water to drink, but none to bathe in. I did cool myself down by utilizing a sports towel, which works by evaporating water from it, and cooling you down. The time that the towel worked was when we had a breeze, since humidity was between 90 and 100%. I bought my towel on Amazon and it was deftly worth the money and it helped me maintain my cool. Frogg Togg Chilly Pad (Blue)

Remember Topaz Clean is available for 50% off until May 31 with the coupon code "mayclean" 
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Update On My Activities

Well, after many go rounds with the technicians from Microsoft the only way we could fix my computer was to do a clean install of the operating system. The good part is that all my data are on not on the C drive. My computer C drive is an SSD drive and contains mostly the operating system and program files and all my files are on a 1 Tb D drive, and my pictures are all on external drives. The only problem was now I had to reinstall my program files, Office, Lightroom, Photoshop, etc. that has been taking up all of my time. So I am up and running.

I am packing for my trip to the Columbia River Gorge with Joseph Rossback Photography.  I have always wanted to visit this area  in order to photograph the rainforest, waterfalls  and spring flowers. it will be a busy trip photographing  from sunrise to sunset .   then once I come home I have to get everything cleaned  and repacked  for a trip to the Rio Grande Valley of Texas with a friend of mine  Larry Ditto.

I read an interesting article today from the Digital Photography School entitled "Finding Gold in Your Image Archives" this article hit very close to home. Since I have been reviewing old pictures keywording and the leading out of focus pictures, but I have found pictures that I have either not post processed in the past or now have reprocessed and have gotten a better image. The article is located at:
http://digital-photography-school.com/finding-gold-image-archives/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+DigitalPhotographySchool+%28Digital+Photography+School%29

While I'm away. I will try post blogs on my Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/pages/Photo-Bee-1-Photographing-the-Natural-World-Around-Us/191608700932223, and then when I return I will also send out links. The reason for that is I do not use Outlook on my laptop and I have to find a way to import my mail list onto my email server.

Printing And a Upcoming Workshop

I spent the weekend working on photographs and printing them.  I have been printing, utilizing Lightroom and the print module.  To help me with my printing, I have utilized to different resources.  The first is Moose Peterson's Print Lab http://www.moosepeterson.com/blog/about/mooses-print-lab/, there are two excellent downloads, which will help you.  The second is a Craft And Vision e-book " Making the Print Printing Techniques For the Digital Photographer (A Masterclass) by Martin Bailey
which is available for five dollars and  if you click on Craft and Vision Excellent Photo E-Books located at the top right-hand section of my blog, it will take you to the Craft and Vision site where there are many excellent E-books.  As I had stated in a previous blog, I AM using Ilford Galerie Prestige Smooth Pearl photo paper.  I like it because of the renditions of colors and its heavyweight.  The paper dries quickly.  I also utilize an Epson stylus Pro 3880 printer and I have imported the appropriate ICC profiles, and I have Lightroom manage the colors rather than the printer  managing them.  If you like to try the Ilford paper or papers you can buy them from Hunts Photo at a 10% discount utilizing this link http://www.huntsphotoandvideo.com/store.cfm?manufacturer=ILFORD&sp=5HEVJ
also, if it doesn't work correctly add a note to the order that you should be getting a 10% off all Galerie  Ilford items per Gary.

I also booked a trip down to the Rio Grande Valley to photograph migrant and resident birds and the local butterflies with Larry Ditto, a well-known nature photographer who lives in the area.  Larry spent many years in the US Fish and Wildlife Service and now leads many workshops in Texas and elsewhere.  I met Larry when I participated in the Images for Conservation Fund, Pro-AM tournament last year, he was the coach for our team and found him to be extremely knowledgeable and an excellent photographer.  There are spaces open and here is the information.
May 9-11 (Thursday - Saturday)
Spring migrating and resident birds and butterflies, Ramirez Ranch, Roma,
Photograph the biologically diverse south Texas brush country while staying at the Ramirez Ranch guest house west of Roma, Texas.  This three day shoot will feature bird photography like you probably haven’t seen (crested caracara, Harris’s hawk, chachalacas, long-billed thrashers, green jays, golden-fronted woodpeckers, northern cardinal, pyrrhuloxia, black-crested titmouse, various orioles, doves and more).  If that’s not enough, you can walk out from the house to photograph one of the largest and finest butterfly gardens in south Texas.  South Texas has an incredible butterfly diversity and you can walk and photograph among them at your leisure.  Ranch owner Roel Ramirez, an accomplished wildlife photographer, personally designed and installed the garden using most of the native plants of the area.
Rates: $350/day/photographer includes the photo tour, blind and garden access fees, ranch lodging and meals.
Capacity: 6 photographers
A deposit of $350 is due upon registration with the balance due by April 1.  Photographers are responsible for their own transportation.

Contact me to register at: lditto@larryditto.com
I will be traveling down on the Wednesday, May 8 and stay in till the following Tuesday.  Planning on photographing some other areas in the Valley.  Anyone who would like to join me, register first with Larry and then let me know if you want to stay longer, so we can set up locations and where we would stay.

Family Cracidae

Plain Chachalaca - notice no rufous in its primaries

Because a good friend of mine is traveling shortly to Costa Rica to go birding I am dedicating this blog to him. Cracidae are a family of large, chicken like birds that occur in tropical and subtropical Central and South America. The Plain Chachalaca is present in the United States, in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas. There are 50 different species in Cracidae and I have seen four of the species and photographed three of the species. Usually, you see these birds foraging on the ground for fruit and other food items. However, these birds are a boreal in nature and spent much of their time feeding nesting in roosting in trees. My first encounter with the Plain Chachalaca was on a photo shoot in Texas, where we were doing setups to photograph passerine's and flocks of the Chachalaca's would come in, land on the perches, and because area size and weight knocked down the perches and disrupting our photography. However, in their own right, they are interesting birds to photograph. One of the Cracidae a that I did see, but was unable to photograph because everything was packed the way, as we were getting ready to leave the Lodge for our trip to the next location was a Great Curassow. In Costa Rica, I was able to photograph the Gray-headed Chachalaca and the Black Guan.

Black Guan

Close-up of a Black Guan's head

Black Guan standing in the pouring rain

Gray-headed Chachalaca

Gray-headed Chachalaca - notice the rufous in its primaries

Plain Chachalaca

Passerines and Near-Passerines in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas

Photographing in the lower Rio Grande Valley in Texas, not only are there raptors and animals to photograph.  But there are a number of passerine's and near passerine's that come into the areas around the waterhole to feed and drink.  April and to early June is a great time to photograph these birds, since migration is going on.

Scaled Quail

I added to my life list with four birds that I observed there this year.  I was able to obtain pictures of only two of the birds, The scaled quail and the lark sparrow.

Lark Sparrow

If there is enough interest, I will lead a trip down to the lower Rio Grande Valley in late May for three fun-filled days of photography.

Here is a sample of some of the birds that you can photograph.

Common Ground Dove

Curved-billed Thrasher

Golden-fronted Woodpecker

Inca Dove

Long-billed Thrasher

Northern Cardinal

Northern Mockingbird

Olive Sparrow

Pyrrhuloxia

Savannah Sparrow

White-tipped Dove

White-winged Dove

Crested Caracara (Caracara cheriway)

During my stay in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas and photographing on the Martin Refuge-The Javelina, two of the mornings, we spent at the raptor blind.  The main raptor, that we photographed, was the Crested Caracara. In my travels, I had seen the caracara once in Florida and was able to photograph it one time during a previous trip to the Rio Grande Valley, a single flight shot.  So I was looking in anticipation to see and photograph these beautiful birds.
The refuge utilizes road kill animals to place out in front of the raptor blind to attract the crested caracara's.  Caracara diet includes carrion and in the caracara's can be found feeding, along with vultures.  Other foods that caracaras eat include insects small and occasionally large vertebrates and eggs.
After setting up our equipment in the blinds, the refuge manager placed out road-kill and form all sides.  Caracara's flew in, landing on the the tree posts that were placed there and on the surrounding vegetation and also write on the ground.  At first it was hard to pick out where to photograph.  What I decided to do, is to first decide what type of photographs that I wanted and then concentrate on obtaining those images.  My basic plan was to first obtain a set of recognition photographs, both juveniles and adults, then a set of photographs of the caracara's coming in to land on the perches, some environmental type of photographs, and then photographs documenting their behavior.

Caracaras tossed their head back when calling

Feeding

Caracara And Turkey Vulture

Caracaras coming into feed on a carcass

Crested caracara are members of the falcon family.  Although they are members of the falcon family, the caracara's are not a fast flying aerial Hunter, but more sluggish in flying and as stated above scavengers eating carrion .  They are found in the southernmost parts of the United States, including Florida, where it is listed as threatened, Mexico, Central America and northern South America and Cuba.  They are found in open and semi-open country.
Immature caracara can be told from an adult because they are browner, have a buff neck and throat and a pale breast that is streaked a model with Brown, grayish-white legs and grayish adult pinkish purple facial skin.
An interesting observation that we noticed was a number of birds that were missing a portion of their foot.  Our thought about how this occurred was since the caracara are carrion eaters and farmers and ranchers put out traps to capture predators, that the caracara got caught in the trap, which amputated their foot or leg.  However, these birds seem to get around all right, and are able to hop on land on a branch, utilizing only the one leg.  They are excellent balancers.

Caracara missing left foot

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