Last weekend of December

I wasn't even sure if I was going to go to the park today. But after my wife came down with a bad cold the night before, I didn't want to be around her germs. When I arrived at the park, some other bird watcher friends had already been hiking around for a while. Eventually I met up with them for some more hiking and we went around the entire perimeter –albeit in a roundabout fashion. With fresh snow it is easy to go off the trail and venture into places that aren't visited that often. But before all this, I had been watching a few little "tweety birds" as another friend of mine puts it, along the paved trail just north of 73rd Avenue. There were Cardinals, Chickadees, Finches and Juncos among the thick brush. Here I caught a snapshot of a Dark-eyed Junco eating from what appeared to be a dried up Goldenrod plant. I've been reading recently about how important it is to leave native plants standing through the winter as they provided food sources to many different species of birds insects. And this is proof of that for sure. Somewhere along our long hike today we logged dozens and dozens of Robins, many of them singing like it was springtime. I tried a number of times for a photo but they were always right above my head at the wrong angle. In this area one of our group spotted an Owl fly past but we never saw it again after some searching. The sun came and went today on a whim every 10-15 minutes or so. When it happened to be out I noticed this bright red male Cardinal going for the very last berry on this tree. A sight for sore eyes to see some color again after such a dreary month of December. Someone told me that we had just 2 days of sun in the entire month of December. But with yesterday and today that would now make 4. A stretch like that makes even seasoned Minnesotan's reevaluate why they live here! Finally when our group returned to the paved trail just north of 73rd, we stopped at the same place to watch the tweety birds. This is when I caught this House Finch snacking on a Buckthorn Berry. Yet another species in a growing list that I've seen eating Buckthorn Berries.

Saturday After Christmas

As I get older I look forward not to Christmas anymore but to it's passing. So much running around and adding unnecessary stress to our already hectic lives. Boy I sound old. But really I look at it now as something to get past and one step closer to Spring. But Spring seems like a distant memory as I hiked around the snow covered park today. Wet, sticky snow from a recent storm clung to everything it could and built up in even the smallest of twigs. It made for neat views today which was good because there were very few birds to be seen. Probably the best bird I spotted was a Red-bellied Woodpecker but from a long ways away. Other than this I saw a couple of American Robins, Mallards in the duck pond,  a small flock of American Crows, and a couple of American Tree Sparrows. I hadn't started my hike today until almost 3:00pm so there was a short time of light. As I was coming back around on the north side I liked how the setting sun was hitting the twisted Willow Trees. This was about 4:30pm and it would be dark soon so I headed back to my vehicle.

Christmas Eve Day

Today was a day off of work, December 24th with Christmas coming tomorrow. My visit to the park today was something I regretted later for reasons I don't want to share here. Lets just say that I made a choice that I disagreed with later and would have done differently. Life lesson I guess. But the visit wasn't completely wasted. I was surprised to notice a Woolly Bear Caterpillar inching it's way across the paved path! But knowing what I do now about this particular caterpillar, it's not quite as unusual as it may seem. The Woolly Bear –or Isabella Tiger Moth– caterpillar doesn't hatch until Fall and then spends the entire Minnesota winter still in caterpillar form.

It's not until the following spring that it pupates and turns into a moth. During the winter, Woolly Bear can literally freeze solid and still survive! Besides the caterpillar today, I saw a Red-bellied Woodpecker, Black-capped Chickadee and Northern Cardinal. I also noticed a bright greenish-yellow patch of moss growing on an old dead tree that seemed to be in just the right light for a photo. It was just something that appealed to me today and made for an interesting photo.

Back Out Shooting Photos

After a disappointing day of equipment failure yesterday, I found myself spending most of my morning running back and forth between different camera stores. Indeed I will be shipping my new 600mm lens back for service. The worst part about this is that I have a big bird watching trip planned for the Sax-Zim bog area on this coming Thursday! The mere thought of not having my lens with on this trip is heart-wrenching. So my next best option was to rent a lens. National Camera had just one of the very same model for my Nikon camera and today I took the rented lens to Palmer Lake Park. I was simply amazed at how well this one worked! In fact it was hard to remember when my own lens ever worked this well. Things were in focus and the vibration compensation feature was a dream. It makes me wonder if my own lens was slowly getting worse over time. Anyway, I was happy to have a working lens back this afternoon as I spotted a Pileated Woodpecker who was contently working on an Oak tree not far above me. This was on the paved trail on the north side where the majority of the Oaks are located in the park. I shot a LOT of photos of this male –note the red, not black "mustache" behind the bill– and enjoyed watching him for quite a long time. It's not often that I see them in the park and to be able to photograph the bird properly gave me such enjoyment. I was already experiencing bird photography withdrawals just knowing that I might not have as good a lens as I'd gotten used to. In fact I was having fun just pointing it at anything and seeing how sharp a shot I could get. Again it was dreary and misting today and everything was wet so the raindrops clinging to the trees were catching my eye. With most of our snow now gone from high temperatures (I believe we hit 50º today) I decided to hike out along Shingle Creek heading downstream. Here my friend had photographed a Mink earlier in the day. Indeed I did spot one running across the only thin ice that was left on the creek. But I was behind too much brush and could not get a clear shot. There was also a Doe followed by a younger Deer out in the field to my right. It was getting quite dark by this time but I had set my camera to 1250 ISO and then later to 1600 to try and compensate for the poor lighting. Earlier I also saw a large flock of Cedar Waxwings, a few Chickadees and I could hear what sounded like Tree Sparrows somewhere behind me.

7 Hours, 3 Owls and 1 Broken Lens

This Saturday I was determined to track down and photograph an elusive species of Owl. Two years ago a birder friend of mine alerted me to the presence of Long-eared Owls at the park. Back then we successfully found not just one but five of them and I even got a great photo. But since getting my new camera lens I've been wanting to find one again. I searched in an area I thought might be good and indeed I did "bump" one right away. But these particular Owls are masters at blending in. So much so that even experienced bird watchers often don't spot them until they are just mere feet away. After an epic four hour attempt at finding one perched somewhere where I could take a photo, I gave up. Never once did I see perched anywhere, though I saw it fly to different roosts numerous times. On my way out of the woods I ran into another birder friend of mine and we decided to hike around together for a bit. We intended to head towards the bridge over the creek on the north side but never quite made it there. Instead we wandered up the far north paved trail near the big Oak trees that still have rust colored leaves. Here we were hoping we might spot a Great Horned Owl but to our surprised we found a Barred Owl instead!

This is the very first Barred Owl I've seen in the park since May of 2013 –a spotting that I remember well. The Barred was perched above a drainage ditch and was very interested in something below it. To say the weather today was dreary would be an understatement. But around 4:30pm the sun made a brief and glorious appearance. And this was the same time that we stumbled across the Barred Owl. It was a picture-perfect scene with the Owl out in the open and the evening sun shining on him! I immediately put my camera on him and started taking photos but noticed that something seemed off. My camera or lens or something wasn't behaving like normal. So I looked at the 15 - 20 photos I'd just taken and they were incredibly blurry! I thought "I must have a wrong setting" and proceeded to fidget with it, trying different settings. To my horror, nothing was working. I even leaned against a tree and still got terrible shots! I was more confused than upset at the time. Of dozens and dozens of attempts, this was the only "saveable image" I could muster up. Upon arriving home and experimenting and testing, it appears that my lens' "vibration compensation" feature is no longer working. Talk about frustrating. I've only owned this new lens for roughly 5 months and now I am looking at shipping it back to the manufacturer for repair. All I can say is ugghgghhhh. On our way back to our vehicles, we did finally spot a Great Horned Owl, then a second one. By now it was mostly dark and I didn't even try for a photo. I'd spent close to 7 hours at the park today but I was able to see 3 different species of Owls which I think is a personal best for me. But man am I upset about my camera lens. It's hard to imagine now being without it as it allows me to take images that I'd never dreamed of getting years ago. I guess I will be hiking with my old 300mm lens in the near future until mine is repaired or replaced.

Fruitless Search

Today I decided to go in search of a very particular and special Owl. One that I've seen and photographed at the park before but one that I'm hesitant to even mention here on my blog. The reason is that certain species of Owls (including the one I was looking for today) are actually SO hard to find that when someone does find one, and tells someone else –well the word travels quickly. And unfortunately this knowledge can sometimes balloon into circumstances that aren't so good for the birds themselves.

Any way, I wasn't able to locate the elusive Long-eared Owl today but I DID find a spot where one has obviously been perched recently as evident by the "whitewashed" branches covered in Owl scat. Better luck next time I guess. All I saw today was an American Robin and Blue Jay.

A Warming Trend for December?

Believe it or not, 20 degrees above zero feels pretty good about now. After having an unusually cold and snowy November, we are apparently in for a steady warming up over the next couple of weeks. Highs of 40 and even 50 are predicted –but I'll believe it when it happens. Though it was still below freezing this morning when I arrived at the park the sun was out and there was no wind. I actually didn't see much for birds however for quite a while into my walk. But when I arrived at the "duck pond" on the southwest corner, I spotted an unusual one. Being that 100% of it's plumage was snow white in color, I would think it would likely be an albino, though I never quite got a good look at it's eye which should be pink in color. I remember seeing a pure white duck here in the exact same spot in the past so I wonder if it could be the same one? After the pond, I hiked up the wood chip trail and started to finally see a few birds in an area of thick Buckthorn bordering a field of cattails. I decided to hike in and realized it was an area of the park I'd never visited before. Here in one small area I saw 7 species including; Dark-eyed Junco, Downy Woodpecker, Northern Cardinal, Black-capped Chickadee, American Tree Sparrow, American Goldfinch and House Finch. So it seemed that all the birds were in one place today. Every time I'd move forward on the sun-drenched, icy snow it would creak and crack below me making it tough to get close. But I managed to grab a photo of a male House Finch which made me happy simply because I don't have many good photos of them. Later on another Woodpecker was busy up above me and posed briefly against the nice blue sky. I know for sure this one is a female as she lacks any red coloring at the back of the head. However, I thought for sure that this was a Hairy Woodpecker and not a Downy. The reason being is that the outer white tail feathers on a Hairy should appear white with NO dots –just like this photo shows. However in looking at a photo from another angle I can see dots on the underside of those white feathers! So now I'm second guessing my ID and thinking this is actually a Downy Woodpecker. It was quite small in size and also has the smaller, thinner bill of a Downy I believe. Later on the north side I decided to go up the extra paved trail just a bit. There are actually lots of Oak trees here that make very good hiding places for Great Horned Owls. I walked up and down the short stretch not seeing anything. But just as I was about to meet up with the main trail, a large dark blob caught my eye. I walked backwards a few steps, looked through my binoculars and sure enough, one was perched here facing the other way. I was quite literally behind the Owl and so I decided to hike in a ways then turn left, hoping to get a view from the front. Well I did just that and found myself almost right underneath it! It was a little closer than I wanted to be and immediately after I took this one photo, the Owl took off for a new perch. I didn't want to chase after it today –especially after bumping it once already. But it is always nice to see one at the park.