Category: Birds in the Wild

Hermit Thrush…I think!

Posted in Backyard Birding, Bird Photography, Birds, Birds in the Wild, Birds of North America, PhotographyTagged , , , , , , 19 Comments

Copyright ©2016 Deborah M. Zajac
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

This little bird lives in my neighbors Oleander bush, and I rarely see it. I tried photographing it last year when it flew up to the fence, but the shots were through a window, and I really wanted an image without a window between us.

Hermit Thrush I think

A few days ago while #1 Grandson was in the backyard playing and I was sitting in the middle of the lawn hoping the Chick-a-Dee would stop making such a fuss about us being out there and fly down to the feeder so I could take its picture the Hermit Thrush flew up to the top of the fence to see what all the fuss was about.

What luck! I got two frames of it before it jumped down into the safety of the Oleander.

I thought it was Fox Sparrow, but now that I have decent image to compare with the birds in my bird books I now think this little bird is a Hermit Thrush.

If I’m wrong please let me know!

Nikon D300s| Nikkor 200-500mm | Lexar Professional Digital Film| PS CC 2015

More to come…

 

Blue Heron

Posted in Birds in the Wild, Birds of North America, Blue Heron, California, National Wildlife Refuge, PhotographyTagged , , , , 10 Comments

Copyright ©2016 Deborah M. Zajac- ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

 

Blue Heron
It was pretty windy Saturday morning in Sacramento Valley while on the refuge birding. I loved the way its breast feathers/hair looked all fanned out, and don’t you just love that log/perch he chose to stand on? I did! 🙂

Nikon D300s| Nikkor 200-500mm VR:hired lens| Lexar Professional Digital Film| PS CC 2015

More to come…

Anna’s Hummingbird-Female

Posted in Anna's Hummingbird, birding, Birds in Flight, Birds in the Wild, Birds of North America, Nikon Lenses, Photography, Santa Clara County BirdingTagged , , , , , , , 30 Comments

Copyright © 2016 Deborah M. Zajac
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

I hired the Nikon AF-S 200-500mm 1:5.6E ED VR lens to try out for the week-end since my old 300mm f4 AF-S ED lens is acting weird, and I’ve always wanted more reach.

I spent all day Saturday out birding using the lens, and several hours on Sunday before having to return it. I hated to part with it! I LIKE IT A LOT!

 

Anna's Hummingbird

I used it on my Nikon D300s and found the lens very quick to focus with very little hunting even in low contrast areas, and the images have lovely colors, and contrast. The VR was quite snappy and worked very well on the few images I shot hand-held. I won’t be doing that often.

The lens weighs 4.6 pounds so,  I used this lens on a tripod with my Wimberley  Arca Sidekick Ball to Gimbal Adapter, and let my rig carry the weight, or I shot from the car window using the door frame as my base on the auto-route parts of the refuges I visited.

This little Anna’s Hummingbird feeding on this succulent plant is an image I made this morning. The sky was overcast and gray, and she was in the shade.
Camera Settings: 1/320s| ISO 1000| Manual Priority| Matrix Metering| Single AF

A challenging situation that I think came out well. So, I guess you know I want this lens!

I shot just under 1000 images this week-end and have begun culling them. I’ll be sharing more images as I go through them.

More to come…

Monochrome Madness 2 34/52 Birds

Posted in birding, Birds in the Wild, Birds of North America, Black and White Photography, Monochrome Madness2, Nature, Nature Photography, Pacific Flyway, PhotographyTagged , , , , , , , , 15 Comments

Copyright ©2015 Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

This week’s Monochrome Madness 2 I selected an image from a recent day I spent birding in the Pacific Flyway.  The Pacific Flyway is a section of CA. that is part of the Winter migration path used by birds fleeing the cold months in the Winter.

These are Black-necked Stilts, and Long billed Dowagers foraging for food.

MM2 34 of 52 Black Necked Stilts and Long Billed Dowagers

I was trying out the Tamron 150-600mm super telephoto lens this week-end for the extra reach which was nice to have, but I won’t be saying much about the lens because I wasn’t able to use it as much as I had hoped. We had rain come in which kept me indoors the following day instead of out photographing birds.  I won’t complain too much since we need all the rain we can get. 🙂

I’m really behind reading blog posts, but am catching up ever so slowly.

Too see all this week’s posts in Leanne Cole’s Monochrome Madness 2 click here

Nikon D700| Tamron 150-600mm| Hoodman Digital Film| CS6 & Silver Efex Pro

More to come…

Monochrome Madness 2 29/52 Peek-a-Boo!

Posted in birding, Birds in the Wild, Birds of North America, Black and White Photography, Monochrome Madness2, Nikon Gear, Yellow-rumped WarblerTagged , , , , , , , 18 Comments

Copyright © 2015 Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

MM2 29 of 52 Peek a Boo!

A shy Yellow-rumped Warbler that was so adorable! Taken while out birding last Saturday morning.

I think my old 300mm f4 is having auto-focus issues again. It has quit auto-focusing a few times lately, so I switched to my D700 camera to test the lens verses camera since my D300s is also long in the tooth I need to go through the process of elimination to be sure it’s the lens and not the camera. While shooting last Saturday my lens stopped auto-focusing, and suddenly my camera settings switched from f5.6 to f22! I turned the camera off and on again and all was well the rest of the morning. That’s a pretty good indication that it’s my lens. It’s pretty old now and was sent in to Nikon in January for auto-focus issues. I’m afraid it may be ready to go back for repairs again. Sadly, it’s not under warranty anymore. Sigh.  Reality check! It may be time for a new lens.

My D300s’ flash doesn’t pop up anymore either, and it’s getting near 60,000 shutter clicks. I think it’s rated for 100K.  My poor gear. I treat it really well, but use it a lot. I may have to retire my D300s too.  That makes me a little sad. They’ve been such good company, and a huge part of my life for many years. Time to start saving big time for their replacements! 🙂

To see the other images posted for this week’s Monochrome Madness2 visit Leanne Cole’s site here.

Nikon 700| AF-S Nikkor 300mm f/4| SanDisk Pro Extreme Digital Film| CS6 & Silver Efex Pro| Tripod

More to come…

Lesser Goldfinch: Female

Posted in birding, Birds in the Wild, Birds of North America, Lesser Goldfinch, Santa Clara County BirdingTagged , , , , , 20 Comments

Copyright ©2015 Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

This morning I went back to the reserve where I went a couple of weeks ago; where I saw my first Yellow Warbler hoping to see it again only closer, and longer. I was seeing lots of Sparrows, and Yellow Rumped Warblers, the pair California Towhee’s were present, and so too was the Blue Jay, and a Northern Flicker flew in, but he kept his back to me only giving me side looks. Stuck up bird! 🙂

40 minutes after I arrived a yellow blur caught my eye and there it was! I quickly swung my rig around and fired off 3 rapid bursts. Then the bird was gone.

My first shot caught him landing and was so blurry it was unusable, the middle shot the bird was there, and the 3rd frame…no bird in it at all. I wouldn’t know for sure if I had a keeper image or not until I saw it on my computer. Though it did look promising in playback.

I didn’t see the Yellow Warbler again, and I stayed in the area until well after 9AM when it began to get busy with runners, dog walkers, and Saturday morning strollers.

Yellow Warbler Male Winter

He’s a beauty. I’ll be heading back over there again soon hoping to see him, and that Northern Flickr again.

Nikon D700| AF-S Nikkor 300mm f/4| SanDisk Extreme Pro Digital Film| CS6

More to come…

Addendum: It’s  been brought to my attention that this isn’t a Yellow Warbler after all; it’s a Lesser Goldfinch Female. Thank you https://myrsbytes.wordpress.com/ !

I’ll keep trying to capture that Yellow Warbler, but I’m glad I saw and was able to make an image of this little beauty especially since she didn’t hang around long!