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limpingcrab

Trad climber
the middle of CA
Dec 19, 2017 - 05:49pm PT
At the risk of looking stupid, I have to ask, is the blinking light thing a joke or does that actually attract birds.

We get more birds here in the valley in winter than we do in the summer when they all head up the mountains.


Edit: ^^^^ sword-billed hummingbird
Tony

Trad climber
Pt. Richmond, CA
Dec 19, 2017 - 07:35pm PT
One thing that is good at attracting birds is some sort of water feature. It is especially good if you can arrange a slow drip. Be sure to change, clean the water frequently, though to prevent disease.
WyoRockMan

climber
Grizzlyville, WY
Dec 19, 2017 - 07:42pm PT
Came upon this Buteo lagopus (Rough Legged Hawk) today on the way home from working. He had probably been hit by a vehicle as he had a broken wing. We helped move him off the road (Pro-Tip: Don't grab them like a chicken) and waited for F&G to take him to the vet.

Tony

Trad climber
Pt. Richmond, CA
Dec 19, 2017 - 07:47pm PT
Reilly,

I can attest that the Sword-billed HB was NOT photo-shopped. Here's a photo I took at Guango Lodge near Papallacta Pass in Ecuador. There was an unbelievable diversity of hummingbird species visiting their feeders.

Here's another improbable one - Long-tailed Sylth
Delhi Dog

climber
Good Question...
Dec 19, 2017 - 10:51pm PT
That is a wild looking HB! I wouldn't thought it would be growing donkey ears as well Reilly:-)
Darwin

Trad climber
Seattle, WA
Dec 24, 2017 - 09:15am PT
Tony, are we going to see any photos from your travels soon? No pressure. ;-)

I went over to Pt Townsend yesterday. The ferry ride is my version of a pelagic trip.

Ferry docking in Edmonds in the winter pretty much always has good Surf Scoter views.


And DC Cormorants and Pelagic Cormorants.

Gratuituous cuteness.

and 'cause it's a climbing forum, Mt Baker
BrassNuts

Trad climber
Save your a_s, reach for the brass...
Dec 24, 2017 - 03:52pm PT
Happy Holiday Boids!


Hope everyone has a nice holiday season and a great 2018!
Reilly

Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
Dec 27, 2017 - 10:28am PT
Thanks, BN!

And from the Glass Half Full Dept I can report that the Lord/AOU giveth and taketh, not necessarily in that order. In their infinite wisdom they have taketh my Thayers gull but giveth me an Iceland. I guess we should be thankful for small favors, eh?
Tony

Trad climber
Pt. Richmond, CA
Dec 27, 2017 - 08:22pm PT
Well Reilly, I had both Iceland and Thayer’s Gulls on my list, so I lost one. Hen and Northern Harriers were split, so no net loss.

We recently returned from an amazing trip to the New Zealand (+ 1 Australian) Subantarctic Islands. In contrast to the low number of land bird species with a high extinction rate on the main islands, this is the seabird capital of the world. We managed to see about 13 species of albatross and 8 species of penguins, among others. There are numerous endemic species and subspecies on the various islands. I am just making some headway in going through my 5,000+ photos, but here a re some samples to start.
Before meeting the ship, we spent a couple of days around Dunedin and Invercargill. The Orokonui sanctuary has much native vegetation and birds enclosed in a predator-proof enclosure. We were lucky to have a Takahē show up.

We were surprised to see it nab a Mallard duckling that was straying from the mom. I could find only one report of such an observation, in that case a Paradise Shelduck duckling. Fortunately the group of kids had left shortly before.

There were plenty of Kakas along with Bellbirds, Tuis and Tomtits in the sanctuary.

After another day around Invercargill, we boarded the ship to begin the cruise. Here is our planned route.

The first stop was the Snares. No landing allowed here so we went on a Zodiac cruise around the island.

At sea we observed a great variety of seabirds

Next were the Auckland Islands. We hiked around Enderby Island, which has undergone significant restoration after eradication of invasive mammals, with increased breeding of several species and flourishing vegetation including wild megaherbs that look almost tropical.

Since I haven’t gotten to the photos, I’m skipping over Macquarie, Campbell Islands plus a dramatic helicopter medical evacuation of one of the crew.

We did another Zodiac cruise around the Antipodes.

After a brief visit to Bounty Islands, we spent a couple of days at the Chatham Islands. On the way there, we got good looks at the “rarest seabird in the world”, the Chatham Island Taiko (aka Magenta Petrel).

There are several other endemics on these islands.

As we left for Dunedin, we passed “The Pyramid”. This is the site of the entire breeding population of Chatham Albatross. Exciting, but a bit scary.

Clouds of Chatham Albatrosses around,and they were perched all over the rock.

We had very smooth sailing on the last leg. Good for spotting cetaceans.
This group of Sothern Bottlenose Whales included a calf with its mother.


That’s it for now, if that wasn’t enough. I'll upload more here as I go through the photos:
New Zealand Subantarctic Islands

Reilly

Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
Dec 27, 2017 - 09:05pm PT
Incredible trip! Deathly envious! How many days to do that cruise? And how does one book it?
john hansen

climber
Dec 27, 2017 - 09:19pm PT
Yes ,really cool, very unique birds from that part of the globe.

That is not on the beaten path.

Thanks for the report and the pictures.

The Albatross photos are very good. I mean wow! What were your settings on those shots to get such great photos? Must be 2000 of a second or so.

I am sure you have some good optic's..

Great stuff.
Tony

Trad climber
Pt. Richmond, CA
Dec 27, 2017 - 11:41pm PT
Reilly,

We went with Heritage Expeditions on their Birding Down Under trip. We spent 18 days on the ship. They have pioneered this venue, and I don't know that any other outfit covers it. It's not cheap, but well worth it. They have shorter trips that don't go to all of the islands, but each island group has a special appeal. We booked through Wildwings for some reason that I don't remember. It may have had to do with paying in GBP which worked out well at the time. My photos only scratch the surface of seabird and landbird diversity. We had very mild conditions after the first half which was good for making all of our landings. However, that isn't best for getting tubenoses flying so we didn't see so many on our last leg back to the mainland.

John,
My shutter speeds were usually at least 1/1000, usually faster. I was usually using a Canon 100-400 mm on a 7D Mark 2. There are a lot of stinkers that I deleted. One trick I learned from one of leaders was to use manual exposure to set shutter speed and f/stop, then use use Auto ISO for "film speed". This was very helpful in the very low light that we had for some of the early AM shooting. The ISO was sometimes way higher than I would have been brave enough to use. Noise reduction in Lightroom took care of the noise pretty well. I'm talking ISO 6400 in some cases!. A far cry from film days. It's always a challenge keeping the birds in the focus points, especially in a Zodiac, so I was shooting at high speed continuous and deleting most of the shots. Still ended up with too many!
BrassNuts

Trad climber
Save your a_s, reach for the brass...
Dec 28, 2017 - 09:18am PT
Cool trip Tony! Thanks for sharing, great pics!
Happy Cowboy

Social climber
Boz MT
Dec 28, 2017 - 09:34am PT
Outstanding photos Tony and others. Thanks for sharing
Reilly

Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
Dec 28, 2017 - 12:39pm PT
Tony, thanks for the beta. Don't think I can convince The Wife that an
18 day boid cruise is necessary to my mental health. I'll have to look
into the shorter trips.

I am tending to use Auto ISO less as I find it tends to run it too high.
Maybe your Canon doesn't run it up like my brand X. ;-)
I'm going more with Aperture priority and picking a lower ISO for less noise.
Of course, that requires better long lens technique but I'm getting better
results in spite of my lack of technique.


Got off my death bed for the first time in a month today.
Don't get me started on 'elective' surgery. :-/

unlocked gait

Gym climber
the range
Jan 1, 2018 - 12:11pm PT
[Click to View YouTube Video]
Darwin

Trad climber
Seattle, WA
Jan 1, 2018 - 02:55pm PT
FOY for me was a Bewick's Wren out the kitchen window. The following two are from Montlake Fill on the 27th. Trumpeters, but I'm willing to be corrected.


link to better image: http://bigstupid.org/postings/2017-12-24/swans534.jpg



link to better image: http://bigstupid.org/postings/2017-12-24/swans537.jpg
Reilly

Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
Jan 1, 2018 - 10:00pm PT

And don’t you think he doesn’t mean it!
Reilly

Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
Jan 4, 2018 - 08:14pm PT


Not quite sure what this dude was doing at the Guadalupe Dunes Nature Preserve. He was miles from the farm he left.
little Z

Trad climber
un cafetal en Naranjo
Jan 5, 2018 - 06:27am PT
hope everyone is surviving the winter weather. It's even been cold down here in Costa Rica although we haven't seen much evidence of more migrants than usual being pushed south, at least yet. It was a huge fall for Bay-breasted Warblers here, and there's some indication that it may be a good year for Yellow-rumped Warblers as well, but so far hardly any sapsuckers, no credible waxwing reports yet, and really low numbers and diversity of migrant ducks. At least the elevational migrants that live in Costa Rica are coming down out of the mountains as per usual. We can now hear the mournful whistles of the Golden-browed Chlorophonias as the feed on fruiting figs in our neighborhood Higueron tree.

Golden-browed Chlorophonia, male

thanks Tony for that great photo TR of your trip through the southern islands of NZ. That would be a dream trip for me. That Light-mantled Sooty-Albatross might be at the top of my wish list. Who was the leader/guide for your trip? Some of those seabirds are hanging on by a thread. It would be so exhilarating to have a chance to view them in their element, but massively depressing at the same time considering their chances
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