Harbingers of Spring

Tags

american robin, canada geese, colonial lake, diamondback terrapin, Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, great egret, photography, postaday, snowy egret

American Robins don’t migrate during the winter, merely keeping out of sight most of the time. They reappear with the coming of spring, when the ground is no longer too hard for them to try to pull out worms.

American Robin, 2019 spring.

Flocks of Canada Geese flying overhead is another sign that the seasons are changing. However, I can’t figure out what they are doing since they seem to be flying in all directions.

Canada Geese flying East.

Just a minute after the above shot, those Canada Geese reversed direction and flew over me again.

Canada Geese flying West.

I thought that was the last of that flock and started walking toward the woods. Then they flew North and passed overhead once more.

Canada Geese flying North.

Another sure sign of spring is the return of Great Egrets and Snowy Egrets. They appeared two weeks ago, then went away when the weather turned cold. Now they are back.

Great Egret and Snowy Egrets at Edwin B Forsythe NWR.

Great Egret.

Finally the turtles are out sunning themselves. I think they are Diamondback Terrapins, but am not positive. They all jumped into the water as I tried to come closer to them to get a better look.

Seven turtles at Colonial Lake.

2018 Unpublished Photos

Tags

american robin, blue jay, cosmos, great egret, mallard, montezuma national wildlife refuge, northern cardinal, photography, postaday

In 2018, some of my photos did not appear on this blog, normally because I didn’t want to have too many in any post. Now at year end, looking at them, some actually deserve to be shown, and here they are.

Northern Cardinal in January 2018.

Mallard mother and ducklings, May 2018.

Great Egret at Montezuma NWR, September 2018.

American Robin, November 2018.

Blue Jay, November 2018.

Cosmos brought inside, October 2018.

Monochrome Monday

Tags

cormorant, Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, great blue heron, great egret, photography, postaday

These are some shots I have taken earlier this year, rendered in monochrome.

Great Blue Heron.

Cormorant.

Great Egret.

Birds in Flight

Tags

Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, great blue heron, great egret, photography, postaday

You won’t believe how many times I have missed capturing, or badly captured, birds in flight. Two days ago, at the refuge, I finally was able to get several good shots of a Great Blue Heron as it took off from the marsh.

Great Blue Heron in flight.

Great Blue Heron in flight.

Great Blue Heron in flight.

On the same day, a Great Egret also put on a good show.

Great Egret in flight.

Great Blue Heron in flight.

Great Blue Heron in flight.

2018 Year of the Bird

Tags

bald eagle, barn swallow, barnegat lighthouse, Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, great egret, Long-billed Dowitcher, mourning dove, photography, postaday, ring-billed gull, sanderling, year of the bird

2018 is the Year of the Bird, as declared by the National Audubon Society, National Geographic, BirdLife International, and the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. I didn’t know about that until now, but here are seven photos I took recently of birds around New Jersey.

Two Barn Swallows in Newton, NJ.

Mourning Dove on beach at Barnegat Light.

Great Egret at Edwin B Forsythe NWR.

Sanderling at Barnegat Light.

Young Bald Eagle at Edwin B Forsythe NWR.

Long-billed Dowitcher at Edwin B Forsythe NWR.

Juvenile Ring-billed Gull at Barnegat Light.

Montezuma National Wildlife Refuge

Tags

bald eagle, great blue heron, great egret, montezuma national wildlife refuge, photography, postaday, ring-billed gull

Montezuma National Wildlife Refuge is at the Northern end of Cayuga Lake, one of the 11 finger lakes in New York state. It is less than a quarter of the size of Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge in New Jersey, but has much of the same wildlife, with the addition of Sandhill Cranes and Black Terns that are not usually seen in New Jersey.

We drove on Wildlife Drive through Montezuma NWR, stopping occasionally to take pictures.

Marsh Mallows were vibrant and plentiful at Montezuma NWR.

Marsh Mallows at Montezuma NWR.

A young Bald Eagle surprised me by swooping overhead and diving toward the marshes. It was too fast and moved around too much for me to get good pictures, but the following will give you an idea of the drama evolving in the sky.

Bald Eagle at Montezuma NWR.

Bald Eagle at Montezuma NWR.

Bald Eagle at Montezuma NWR.

Bald Eagle at Montezuma NWR.

Bald Eagle at Montezuma NWR.

However, the young Bald Eagle failed to catch any fish.

There were several Great Blue Herons and Great Egrets that landed near Wildlife Drive then stood or walked in the water.

Great Blue Heron at Montezuma NWR.

Great Blue Heron and Great Egret at Montezuma NWR.

Great Egret preening at Montezuma NWR.

Great Egret at Montezuma NWR.

Great Egret at Montezuma NWR.

There were many Ring-billed Gulls and Canada Geese at Montezuma NWR. One gull was hovering over the marshes and crisscrossing the sky, asking to be photographed.

Ring-billed Gull at Montezuma NWR.

Windy and Cold

Tags

Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, great egret, hooded merganser, mute swan, photography, postaday, snowy egret

Temperatures went as high as 84°F (29°C) yesterday, but today they are back down to 40°F (4°C), and it is very windy and cold. Even though I took the following photos last month and last week, they illustrate well this challenging weather we are having.

Mute Swan.

Great Egret and Snowy Egret.

Great Egret looking for fish.

Great Egret catching fish.

Great Egret and fish.

Hooded Merganser windblown.

Flock of Egrets

Tags

aigrette, Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, great egret, photography, postaday

Hundreds of Great Egrets were still sleeping or waking up and preening at a pond at the refuge. It was a bit nippy and there was some fog and frost on the brown reeds. I had never seen that many Great Egrets in one place, but could not capture the entire flock in one photo.

Great Egrets waking up. Note the Great Blue Heron on the left with eyes still closed.

All the birds were in their best breeding plumage and colors, with long white aigrettes that ladies at the beginning of the last century would have paid dearly to adorn their headdresses with.

Closer look at Great Egrets.

Great Egret.

Great Egret

Tags

Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, great egret, photography, postaday

This was the first Great Egret I saw at the refuge this Spring. It was still cold and quite windy so it did not stay too long.

Great Egret.

Great Egret starting its flight.

Great Egret airborne.

Monday Monochrome

Tags

Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, fog, great egret, photography, postaday, snowy egret, spider web

A few weeks ago, the heavy morning fog led to some unusual monochrome shots.

Great Egret.

Snowy Egret.

Snowy Egret.

Spider Web.

Sunrise Sunset

Tags

Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, great egret, photography, postaday, snowy egret, sunrise, sunset

Like many of us, whenever I see a colorful sunrise or sunset I try to take a picture of it, if possible. Since the refuge is where I go most often to shoot pictures, in the past several years I did manage to have some sunrise and sunset shots from that place.

The following photo was taken 14 minutes after the shot of the pinkish sunrise I posted here a few days ago at https://neihtn.wordpress.com/2017/11/05/fall-at-the-refuge

Sunrise September 15, 2013.

Snowy and Great Egrets at sunrise September 15, 2013.

In the shot below, the sun hid behind thick clouds, but as it plunged below the horizon it produced magnificent colors ranging from blue and purple to red and yellow.

Sunset January 5, 2015.

Fall Egrets

Tags

Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, great egret, john heinz national wildlife refuge, photography, postaday, snowy egret

Egrets stayed around at the refuge later this year because the weather has been warmer than usual. Not today though as Artic air has brought temperatures to lows unheard of since the 1930’s. Anyway, last week I saw a Snowy Egret by Wildlife Drive at the refuge and stopped my car not more than 20 ft (6 m) from it.

Snowy Egret.

Snowy Egret.

Other cars then began stopping behind me, and the Snowy Egret decided it had enough and flew away.

Snowy Egret.

Snowy Egret.

Looking through my files, I saw the following photo taken in November 2014 at the John Heinz National Wildlife Refuge. I did not post it before, perhaps because at first glance it appeared too dark. But lighting was falling on the egret and not on the marshy background. So here it is.

Great Egret.

New and Familiar

Tags

cormorant, Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, european starling, great egret, photography, postaday

Last week, at the Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, I saw for the first time an American Avocet standing among other familiar birds. In fact I did not know what it was until I got home, saw a strange bird in the photo and looked it up.

American Avocet, on the right, and Mallards.

Great Egret.

The following photo is unusually wide so that all the Cormorants in that one spot can be seen.

Cormorants drying their feathers.

Finally, many smaller birds were flying around: Grackles, European Starlings, and Red-winged Blackbirds. I did not get a good shot of the Red-winged Blackbirds, although they appeared to be leading packs of small birds around the marshes.

Grackles.

European Starling.

Great Egret.

Have a Nice Weekend

Tags

great egret, photography, postaday

Great Egret: “Have a Nice Weekend!”

Did They Smile?

Tags

great egret, photography, postaday

Unlike Great Blue Herons which prefer large fish, Great Egrets stick with smaller ones. The following Great Egrets each caught a small fish as I was photographing them. Looking closer at their photos, did they actually smile at the prospect of more food filling up their stomach?

Great Egret with fish it had just caught.

Great Egret with fish: was the egret smiling?

Great Egret with fish it had just caught.

Flying Birds – Continued

Tags

great blue heron, great egret, photography, postaday

There must have been at least a hundred Egrets and several Great Blue Herons at the refuge yesterday. They were very active fishing and flying from spot to spot, a golden opportunity for me to capture more BIF photos.

Great Egret.

Great Egret.

Here’s a sequence of a Great Blue Heron taking off.

Great Blue Heron.

Great Blue Heron.

Great Blue Heron..

Flying Birds

Tags

BIF, great egret, hummingbird, photography, postaday, saegull

Most of us are fascinated by photos of birds in flight (BIF), probably one of the hardest kinds of photography. Ever since I started to become serious in photography five years ago, I have occasionally attempted to shoot BIF pictures, most of the time with disappointing results. I still have a long way to go, but over the past few months I have kept the following photos to post.

Great Egret.

Great Egret.

Seagull.

Seagull.

The birds shown above are relatively large and easy to photograph. The hardest one, for me anyway, is the tiny but very fast Hummingbird.

Hummingbird.

Pas De Deux

Tags

Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, great egret, photography, postaday

These two Great Egrets looked like they were dancing a pas de deux. Actually they were being chased away from a fishing spot by a fierce Great Egret that was overzealous in guarding its feeding station.

Great Egrets.

Worming and Fishing

Tags

american robin, Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, great egret, photography, postaday

Two different kinds of birds, an American Robin and a Great Egret, with two different ways of finding food.

Male American Robin looking for worm.

He dove toward one.

Maybe not this time.

Great Egret diving after fish.

Caught one!

Wordless Wednesday

Tags

great egret, photography, postaday, snowy egret, wordless wednesday

Great Egret and Snowy Egret.

Red, White, and Blue

Tags

blue jay, cardinal, great egret, photography, postaday

July 4, 2016 is a good day for Red, White, and Blue birds!

Cardinal.

Great Egrets.

Blue Jay.

Here are red, white, and blue, all in one photo, the banner image: East Point Lighthouse at the southern tip of New Jersey.

Hatchlings

Tags

Black-crowned Night Heron, glossy ibis, great egret, hatchling, Ocean City Welcome Center, photography, postaday, yellow-crowned night heron

As predicted, the eggs in the Night Heron nests have begun to hatch. I went to the Ocean City Welcome Center today to look at them, and saw little balls of fur moving while the parents were busy preening or redecorating their nests.

Yellow-crowned Night Herons with new hatchlings in nest.

Yellow-crowned Night Herons planning redecoration.

At another nest, the male heron brought a twig back.

Female heron: “What took you so long?” Note that one egg still had not hatched.

Male heron passing twig to female.

While he flew away to look for other twigs, she tidied up their nest.

At yet another nest, no eggs had hatched.

All the eggs were still whole.

There were many other birds around the herons. I only managed to get shots of Ibises and Great Egret.

Great Egret throwing up food.

Several Glossy Ibises were flying around. Maybe they also had nests in the rookery.

Black-crowned Night Heron. They also had nests but those were well hidden in the rookery trees.

Yellow-crowned Night Heron on the hunt.

Wordless Wednesday: Flight

Tags

Bomaby Hook National Wildlife Refuge, canada geese, common tern, Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, great egret, photography, postaday, snowy egret

Northern Shovelers at Edwin B Sorsythe National Wildlife Refuge.

Canada Geese at Bombay Hook National Wildlife Refuge.

Common Tern at Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge.

Snowy Egrets at Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge.

Great Egret at Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge.

Egrets Fishing

Tags

Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, great egret, photography, postaday, snowy egret

Snowy Egrets are probably among the best egrets at catching fish. Here’s a series of photos I took at the Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge last week when there were many of them, together with Great Egrets, flying around and fishing.

Snowy Egret landing.

Snowy Egret jabbing at water.

Caught one!

Great Egret landing.

The Great Egrets were not so successful at finding fish. At least I did not see any of them catching anything while the Snowy Egrets were plucking fish now and then out of the same pond.

Great Egret Fishing

Tags

Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, great egret, photography, postaday

Around this time of the year, breeding season makes the Great Egret grow long feathers called aigrettes. Those were much in demand by women more than a hundred years ago, leading to the extermination of 95% of the Great Egret population by the end of the 19th century. Today, they are no longer an endangered species and can often be seen in wetlands in North and South America. The one pictured below was standing by itself, occasionally straightening his neck to look for fish.

Great Egret waiting for fish. Note the long plumes and the green around the eye, signs that it is prepared for the breeding season.

Great Egret moving along shore as he saw fish swimming nearby.

With his long yellow bill, he suddenly jabbed violently at the water several times.

“*##**#, missed!”

Tossed Fish

Tags

edwin b forstythe national wildlife refuge, great blue heron, great egret, photography, postaday

Two days ago, a Great Blue Heron was stalking fish at the Edwin B. Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge.

Great Blue Heron stalking fish.

I saw it repeatedly stab at something in the water, but never saw it catch anything, unless it swallowed its prey even before coming up for air.

Great Blue Heron jabbing at something, but came up empty.

Meanwhile, a nearby Great Egret had better luck and seemed to enjoy its tossed fish.

Great Egret: caught one!

Great Egret smiling and tossing fish before swallowing it whole.

Great Egret and Goslings

Tags

canada goose, edwin b forstythe national wildlife refuge, gosling, great egret, photography, postaday

Monday was a cloudy and rainy day. At the Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge a Great Egret was standing by himself, very dainty and haughty in full breeding plumage.

Great Egret

A family of Cannada Geese with nine goslings loved the weather and went in for a swim.

Great Egret: “I tell you, this is why we need birth control!”

Of course, the goslings thoroughly enjoyed the water.

Second gosling from the right: “Who cares what he says!”

Breeding Plumage

Tags

black-bellied plover, breeding, great egret, photography, postaday, willet

Spring means mating season for many birds, and to be at their best their feathers change to more vivid colors, their breeding plumage in other words. Here are a few photos of this phenomenon taken at the Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge within the past two weeks.

As its name implies, the Black-bellied Plover displays a black belly in breeding colors. Normally its belly is white.

Black-bellied Plover in breeding plumage.

The Willet is of a gray dull color when it is not breeding, otherwise it is mottled brown and much more noticeable.

Willet in breeding plumage.

Incidentally, in the 19th century people used to eat Willet eggs and meat for food, just like chickens. That brought this bird almost to extinction until the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918 stopped that practice. Now it is abundant again and very striking when it flies with blank and white stripes on its wings.

Willet preparing to fly.

Willet flying.

The Great Egret is always white, but during breeding season it shows some green color on its face and it sports long plumes of feathers. Those airgrettes used to adorn ladies’ hats in the 19th century. That fashion craze led to a serious decline in egret population until the fad was eventually banned.

Great Egret with a successful jab at a fish. Note the green breeding color on its face, and the feather plumes.

Egrets

Tags

Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, great egret, photography, postaday, snowy egret

In a pond at EBF National Wildlife Refuge, a Snowy Egret looking for food passed by a preening Great Egret. I don’t often see Snowy Egrets preening like their bigger colleagues do.

Snowy Egret and Great Egret.

Great Egrets

Tags

Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, great egret, photography, postaday

Yesterday at the Edwin B Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, several egrets were standing enjoying the rising sun. They were wearing their breeding plumage with long airy feathers (see https://janthinaimages.wordpress.com/2015/04/01/she-sits-in-her-beauty-upon-her-nest/).

Great Egrets enjoying the sunrise.

One was playing pickaboo as it preened itself.

Great Egret peekaboo.

Great Egret: I see you!