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Swans on ice in Vienna

Posted in Birds, Nature, Photography, Travel, wildlife, Winter, tagged Canon SX50, Cygnus olor, Donau-Auen National Park, Mute Swan, swan, Vienna Austria on December 11, 2016| 11 Comments »

Today I had some free time to wander about in the Donau-Auen National Park in Vienna, Austria.I am visiting Vienna for a few days on a business trip and decided that I did not want to fight the crowds at the numerous Christmas markets in the city.

It was cool and windy and I did not see as much wildlife as I did during a visit there last April. However I did manage to spot a family of Mute Swans (Cygnus olor). Two of them—one adult and one adolescent—landed on ice that had formed on the small lake and they struggled to walk across the slippery surface to reach open water. The adult, who was bright white in color, moved with much more confidence than the dusky-colored youngster, who moved in a cautious and tentative way. I suspect that it was the first time that the young swan had encountered ice.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Keep moving

Posted in Birds, Humor, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, birds in flight, Canon 50D, Cathartes aura, Huntley Meadows Park, Tamron 150-600mm, turkey vulture, vulture on December 9, 2016| 7 Comments »

Whenever a vulture is circling overhead, I like to make sure I move about from time to time. This Turkey Vulture (Cathartes aura) at Huntley Meadows Park didn’t seem to be paying too much attention to me, but you can never be too cautious, especially if you have not taken a shower that morning.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Seeking shelter

Posted in Birds, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Ardea herodias, Canon 50D, Great Blue Heron, Huntley Meadows Park, Tamron 150-600mm on December 8, 2016| Leave a Comment »

When it’s cold and windy, the Great Blue Herons (Ardea herodias) at Huntley Meadows Park often like to seek sheltered areas at the edge of the water. Unlike the heron, I stayed out in the open and was buffeted by the strong winds as I tried to capture this profile shot of the heron.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Telephoto landscapes

Posted in Autumn, Landscape, Nature, Photography, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, Huntley Meadows Park, landscape, Tamron 150-600mm on December 7, 2016| 2 Comments »

Some photographers like to stay in one spot and let the action come to them, but most of the time I prefer to keep on the move, opportunistically scanning for subjects to shoot. There is one place, however, at Huntley Meadows Park that I will sometimes visit and simply sit for extended periods of time. It is a beaver pond in a secluded area of the park and I feel a sense of peace surround me whenever I am there.

This past Monday I was sitting on a log at that spot and was struck by the beauty of the elements of the scene in front of me. I tried to capture some of those elements of the landscape with they 150-600mm zoom lens that was on my camera at that moment. I like the way that the telephoto lens provides an intimate landscape view, unlike the wide-angle view that I typically associate with landscapes.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Heron on dry land

Posted in Birds, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Ardea herodias, Canon 50D, Great Blue Heron, heron, Huntley Meadows Park, Tamron 150-600mm on December 6, 2016| 4 Comments »

The water levels are really low in many parts of Huntley Meadows Park and it seemed like this Great Blue Heron (Ardea herodias) was looking over mostly dry land as it surveyed the landscape this past weekend.

The banding of the colors in the background add some visual interest to the image, without being distracting. I was standing at the edge of a dried portion of the marsh and that permitted me to take this shot from a low angle, looking slightly up at the heron.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Late autumn cardinal

Posted in Autumn, Birds, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, Cardinalis cardinalis, female Northern Cardinal, Huntley Meadows Park, Northern cardinal, Tamron 150-600mm on December 4, 2016| 7 Comments »

The subdued colors of the female Northern Cardinal (Cardinalis cardinalis) seem to be perfectly suited for the late autumn, when the muted shades of the fallen leaves seem to dominate the landscape.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Kingfisher catch

Posted in Birds, Fish, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Belted Kingfisher, birds in flight, Canon 50D, female Belted Kingfisher, Huntley Meadows Park, kingfisher, Megaceryle alcyon, Tamron 150-600mm on December 3, 2016| 12 Comments »

I spent a fair amount of time yesterday at Huntley Meadows Park watching a female Belted Kingfisher (Megaceryle alcyon), one of my favorite birds. She was perched on a broken-off tree a pretty good distance away and there was no way that I could get any closer, since there was water between the boardwalk on which I was standing and that tree.

The kingfisher remained perched for quite some time, so I had plenty of time to steady myself and adjust settings until I was relatively content with some of my shots. What I really wanted to do, though, was to capture the kingfisher. I knew that eventually the kingfisher would dive into the water and I waited. Kingfishers don’t give any real warning when they are ready to dive, so I tried to remain alert and ready, even though I knew the chances of me capturing this fast-moving bird in flight were slim.

The kingfisher dove several times and I did manage to capture a few ok images of her flight toward the water. My favorite shot, however, is the final one here in which she is flying out of the water with what looks to be a small fish.

It was a nice catch for both of us.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Santa bird

Posted in Birds, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, Huntley Meadows Park, Santa, Santa bird, sparrow, Tamron 150-600mm, white-throated sparrow, Zonotrichia albicollis on December 2, 2016| 2 Comments »

I often think of this little bird as the “Santa bird,” because of its white “beard” and round belly. Technically speaking, it’s a White-throated Sparrow (Zonotrichia albicollis), but it’s often more fun to make up my own names for the creatures that I see and photograph.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Bird bath

Posted in Art, Birds, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, bathing, Cameron Run, Canon 50D, nird, silhouette, Tamron 150-600mm on December 1, 2016| 6 Comments »

Late in the afternoon I was walking along a stream when I suddenly heard some splashing at the edge of the water. Full of curiosity I peered though the bushes to see what was going on. I was looking almost directly into the sun, so all I could see was the silhouette of a bird that was bathing in the shallow water. I knew that I would not be able to capture the details of the bird, but what I really wanted to do was to capture the mood of that intimate moment.

I hesitated a little to post this image, because its flaws are evident, but somehow it speaks to me emotionally through its simple color palette, through the shadowy unidentified bird, and through the concentric ripples in the water. My usual rule of thumb is to post the images that I like, so here it is. I realize that my views of the image are really subjective and are tied to my memories of the moment—you had to be there.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Defying gravity

Posted in Autumn, Birds, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, defying gravity, Downy Woodpecker, Huntley Meadows Park, Picoides pubescens, Tamron 150-600mm, woodpecker on November 30, 2016| Leave a Comment »

This energetic little Downy woodpecker (Picoides pubescens) seemed to be defying gravity on Monday as it leaned over backwards and pecked away at a small tree growing out of the water at Huntley Meadows Park.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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The Birds

Posted in Birds, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Alfred Hitchcock, birds in flight, Canon 50D, Escher, grackle, Huntley Meadows Park, Rusty Blackbird, Tamron 150-600mm, The Birds on November 29, 2016| 8 Comments »

Yesterday the fields and forests of Huntley Meadows Park were alive with the sound of birds, lot of birds. I didn’t get a close enough look to identify the black birds, but they seem to be Rusty Blackbirds or Grackles. As they foraged, they moved from one spot to another in a great cloud of birds, all flying at the same time.

I tried to capture images of the birds with different backgrounds and especially like the first one below, which reminds me of some pf Escher’s pen-and-ink drawings of birds.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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High heron

Posted in Autumn, Birds, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Ardea herodias, Canon 50D, Great Blue Heron, heron, Huntley Meadows Park, Tamron 150-600mm on November 28, 2016| 11 Comments »

Generally when I see a Great Blue Heron (Ardea herodias) in a tree, it is roosting in a protected location and napping. Early one morning this past weekend at Huntley Meadows Park, however, I spotted this alert heron perched on an exposed dead tree, looking like it was playing the role of a sentinel.

I initially caught sight of the heron from a distance and followed a path in the treeline that let me get almost underneath the heron for some shots. The sky was overcast and there was not much light, causing the background to appear white and the images to be almost monochromatic.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Panning a heron

Posted in Art, Birds, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Ardea herodias, birds in flight, Canon 50D, Great Blue Heron, heron, Huntley Meadows Park, panning, Tamron 150-600mm on November 27, 2016| 3 Comments »

Sometimes I will intentionally use a slow shutter speed when I am panning a moving subject to blur the background and give a sense of motion, but that was not the case with these photos—I was shooting in aperture-priority mode and simply wasn’t paying attention to the shutter speed that the camera was giving me. In all three of these images, the shutter speed was 1/100 of a second, which is really too slow for handholding my 150-600mm zoom lens.

As the old saying goes, though, sometimes it is better to be lucky than good. I really like the way the background was rendered and am not at all bothered by the somewhat soft focus on parts of the moving heron.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Hoodie season

Posted in Autumn, Birds, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Cameron Run, Canon 50D, Hooded Merganser, Hooded Merganser duck, Lophodytes cucullatus, Tamron 150-600mm on November 26, 2016| 3 Comments »

It’s Hoodie season—hooded sweatshirts for me and lots of Hooded Merganser ducks (Lophodytes cucullatus) at Cameron Run in Alexandria, Virginia.

Yesterday I spotted this group of six males swimming around and hanging out together. Most of the time during the year when I see Hooded Mergansers, it is a couple or a mother with ducklings, so it was unusual for me to see such a large grouping. There were a few females too, but they seemed to ignore the males and for the most part kept to themselves.

While the single guys were burning off some energy, a couple found a quiet spot and decided to take a nap. I often see Canada Geese and Mallard ducks sleeping, but I am pretty sure that this is the first time that I have ever seen the little Hooded Mergansers doing so.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Thanksgiving Day Hawk

Posted in Birds, Nature, Photography, Thanksgiving, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Buteo lineatus, Cameron Run, Canon 50D, hawk, Red-Shouldered Hawk, Tamron 150-600mm on November 25, 2016| 4 Comments »

When I was walking yesterday along Cameron Run, a tributary of the Potomac River in Alexandria, Virginia, I was shocked to spot a hawk perched nearby in a small tree almost at eye level. I was on a paved bike trail that parallels the stream and there is a relatively steep embankment that slopes down to the water’s edge. The tree was located on that embankment.

When the hawk, which I think is a juvenile Red-shouldered Hawk (Buteo lineatus) eventually flew away and landed atop a building, it screamed out repeatedly at some circling crows. It makes me wonder if the hawk had previously been hiding from harassing crows and that is why it permitted me to get relatively close without initially taking off.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Busy

Posted in animals, Art, Autumn, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, beaver, busy, Canon 50D, Castor canadensis, gnaw, gnawing, Huntley Meadows Park, North American Beaver, Tamron 150-600mm on November 23, 2016| 8 Comments »

As I wander about in Huntley Meadows Park, I see lots of signs that winter is on its way, including this tree that I encountered in what seemed to be the middle of the woods. Clearly the beavers have been as busy as, well, beavers. I am hoping to be able to capture them in action in the upcoming months.

If you read this blog frequently, you probably noticed that this image is quite different from my “normal” wildlife close-ups. When I stumbled upon this tree on which a beaver had been gnawing, I was struck by the interplay of light and shadows. As I framed this shot, which is uncropped here, I was trying to capture the almost monochromatic look of the scene in a very simple composition. I’m pretty pleased by the different textures that I was also able to capture in the shot.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Redhead in autumn

Posted in Autumn, Birds, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, Huntley Meadows Park, Melanerpes erythrocephalus, Red-headed Woodpecker, Tamron 150-600mm, woodpecker on November 22, 2016| 3 Comments »

On a cool and blustery morning at Huntley Meadows Park, it seemed like most of the birds were in sheltered locations yesterday, protected from the biting wind. I did manage, though, to spot a Red-headed Woodpecker (Melanerpes erythrocephalus) busily at work high in the trees and was able to get shots from a number of different angles as the woodpecker moved about.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Farewell to damselflies?

Posted in Autumn, Dragonflies, Insects, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, bluet, bluet damselfly, Canon 50D, Enallagma civile, Familiar Bluet, Familiar Bluet damselfly, Huntley Meadows Park, Tamron 150-600mm on November 21, 2016| 3 Comments »

It was a pleasant surprise to see this colorful Familiar Bluet damselfly (Enallagma civile) last Friday at Huntley Meadows Park. With the arrival of frigid weather, with temperatures at near-freezing levels at night, however, I fear that it will be my last damselfly sighting of the season.

When I first spotted this damselfly, I had my Tamron 150-600mm zoom lens on my camera. I didn’t want to take my eyes off of the damselfly, for fear of losing sight of it in the underbrush, so I decided to make do with the long zoom lens. I quickly realized that I had a few obstacles to overcome. The minimum focusing distance of the lens is almost nine feet (2.7 meters), so I had to back up. At that distance the damselfly was so small that my autofocus did not want to lock onto it, so I was forced to focus manually, while handholding the lens at 600mm.

I ended up trying to do environmental portraits, rather then the close-ups that I generally prefer to take. I like the way that the seasonal coloration of the background helps the blue of the damselfly’s body really stand out, almost like it is an alien visitor in a foreign land.

Farewell, sweet damsels of the air, until we meet again in the spring.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Autumn camouflage

Posted in Autumn, Butterflies, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged Common Buckeye, Common Buckeye butterfly, Junonia coenia on November 20, 2016| 3 Comments »

If it hadn’t been moving, I am pretty sure that I would not have spotted this Common Buckeye butterfly (Junonia coenia) on Friday at Huntley Meadows Park. The butterfly was perfectly camouflaged among all of the fallen leaves and even in this cropped image you have to look hard to see it.

I am also including a copy of the original image, in which the butterfly is even harder to find. The image reminds me of some of the complicated jigsaw puzzles that my Mom used to like to do when I was a child. I remember one puzzle that was a circular one depicting a plate of spaghetti. Needless to say, my Mom had a lot of patience and persistence.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Merlin

Posted in Autumn, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, Falco columbarius, falcon, Huntley Meadows Park, Merlin, Tamron 150-600mm on November 19, 2016| 12 Comments »

Yesterday I finally saw the merlin (Falco columbarius) that has been hanging out at Huntley Meadows Park the last month or so. Merlins are really cool-looking small falcons that generally are in our area only during periods of migration.

The merlin was perched at the very top of a slender dead tree. The Cornell Lab of Ornithology website notes that merlins spend long periods perched in open areas scanning for prey and I suspect that is what this bird was doing when I spotted it.

I was able to get relatively close to the tree, thanks to an adjacent path in the woods, but shooting upwards at such a steep angle handheld was a bit of a challenge. Fortunately the lighting was pretty good so I was able to get some decent shots, though they did requite quite a bit of cropping. You may also notice that I shot from several different angles as I tried to capture some images of this small, but powerful bird.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Don’t mess with me

Posted in animals, Nature, Photography, wildlife, zoo, tagged American Bison, bison, Bison bison, buffalo, Canon 50D, National Zoo, Tamron 150-600mm, Washington D.C. on November 18, 2016| 2 Comments »

“Don’t mess with me while I am eating.” That seemed to be the message that an American Bison (Bison bison) was sending to me during a recent trip I made to the National Zoo. The bison had lifted its enormous head, twisted it violently in my direction, and looked right at me. It then returned to calmly munching on some hay.

Who knew that bisons had such flexible necks?

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Distinctive sparrow

Posted in Autumn, Birds, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, Huntley Meadows Park, sparrow, Tamron 150-600mm, white-throated sparrow, Zonotrichia albicollis on November 16, 2016| 3 Comments »

I used to think that all sparrows were simply nondescript little brown birds. Now I look more closely and can see how beautiful and distinctive they really are, like this White-throated Sparrow (Zonotrichia albicollis) that I spotted last week at Huntley Meadows Park.

I especially love the bright yellow stripe on its face (in an area technically called its “lore”) that really stands out amid the other, more subdued colors.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Dragonflies in mid-November

Posted in Autumn, Dragonflies, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged Alexandria VA, Autumn Meadowhawk, Canon 50D, dragonflies in autumn, Huntley Meadows Park, Sympetrum vicinum, Tamron 180mm on November 15, 2016| 6 Comments »

With all of this cooler weather that we have had recently, including several frosty mornings, you might think that dragonfly season has ended, but it’s not over yet. Autumn Meadowhawk dragonflies (Sympetrum vicinum) are still with us in pretty significant numbers at Huntley Meadows Park in Alexandria, Virginia. In previous years I have continued to see these dragonflies into mid-December and one of my fellow photographers has seen them in early January.

Autumn Meadowhawks are small dragonflies, a little over one inch (25 mm) in length, so you have to look hard to spot them. At any other time of the year, their red bodies would make them really stand out, but they seem to like to perch on fallen leaves, including red ones, so they are often pretty well camouflaged until they move.

Here are a few favorite shots of these red beauties from this past weekend. Enjoy the dragonflies while you may and put off thoughts of the impending winter.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Almost super moon

Posted in Landscape, Nature, Photography, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, full moon, moon, Runnymeade, super moon, Tamron 150-600mm on November 14, 2016| 11 Comments »

I think that tonight is officially the “super moon,” but the weather forecasters predict that it will be cloudy. Knowing this, I went out last night (and again this morning) to get some shots of the almost super moon.

I learned a couple of things from this experience. First, it’s not too hard to get shots of the moon in the sky. If I am going to be shooting the moon with any regularity, I need to scout out some locations so that I can get shots of the moon rising over the mountains or over the water.

Secondly, I learned that the visible features on the moon change their apparent positions over the course of a single night. If I had had any basic lessons in astronomy, I would probably have known this already, but this revelation came to me when I was comparing the shots that I took last night with those that I took this morning. I took the first shot below at 8:02 pm (20:02 hrs) last night and the second shot at 5:38 this morning. When you compare the photos, you can see that distinctive land features are in different locations.

almost super moon

Moon at 8:02 in the evening of 13 November 2016

Moon 5:38 in the morning of 14 November 2016

Moon at 5:38 in the morning of 14 November 2016

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Asian Small-clawed Otters

Posted in animals, Nature, Photography, Portraits, wildlife, zoo, tagged Aonyx cinerea, Asia Trail, Asian Small-clawed Otter, Canon 50D, National Zoo, otter, Tamron 150-600mm, Washington D.C. on November 13, 2016| Leave a Comment »

Otters are so much fun to watch. They seem to be very inquisitive and playful. One of their favorite pastimes appears to be chasing each other around.

I am familiar with the North American River Otter (Lontra canadensis) and have been lucky enough to see one in the wild at my local marshland park. These images, however, are of Asian Small-clawed Otters (Aonyx cinerea) that I observed at the National Zoo in Washington D.C. last Monday.

There is a large group of these otters in an enclosure on the Asia Trail and I spent quite a while watching their antics. They seem to be in almost constant motion in and out of the water, so it was a fun challenge trying to get some shots of them.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Colors in the clouds

Posted in abstract, Autumn, Landscape, Nature, Photography, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, cloud iridescence, clouds, colorful clouds, Huntley Meadows Park, Tamron 150-600mm on November 12, 2016| 7 Comments »

The skies over Huntley Meadows Park were amazing around 3:00 (15:00 hrs) yesterday afternoon when a cold front was blowing in. When certain clouds were illuminated by the sun they were transformed into pastel shades of the rainbow. At times there were varying shades of orange, green, aqua, and purple.

I suspected that moisture in the clouds was responsible for the colors, but I had never seen anything like it and did not know what it was called. After searching about on the internet, I learned that this diffraction phenomenon, known as cloud iridescence, is caused by small water droplets or ice crystals individually scattering light. According to Wikipedia, ” If parts of clouds have small droplets or crystals of similar size, their cumulative effect is seen as colors. The cloud must be optically thin, so that most rays encounter only a single droplet. Iridescence is therefore mostly seen at cloud edges or in semi-transparent clouds, and newly forming clouds produce the brightest and most colorful iridescence.”

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Pandas at the National Zoo

Posted in animals, Nature, Photography, wildlife, zoo, tagged Ailuropoda melanoleuca, Canon 50D, Giant Panda, National Zoo, panda, Tamron 150-600mm, Washington D.C. on November 11, 2016| 2 Comments »

Most of the times that I have visited the National Zoo the Giant Pandas (Ailuropoda melanoleuca) have been indoors, but this past Monday I was thrilled to see that they were outdoors and active. There are two levels for viewing the pandas and I was on the upper level, giving me an unobstructed view and some relief from the large crowds.

Here are a couple of my favorite shots. The first one is of the youngest panda at the zoo, Bei Bei, who is a bit over a year old, and the second image shows him with an adult panda that I assume is his mother.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Orangutan overhead

Posted in animals, Nature, Photography, wildlife, zoo, tagged Canon 24-105mm, Canon 50D, National Zoo, orangutan, Washington D.C. on November 10, 2016| 10 Comments »

It was really cool (and only slightly disconcerting) to look up and see a hairy orangutan crossing almost directly overhead on a pair of ropes while I was visiting the National Zoo on Monday.

A series of ropes and towers connects the Great Ape House with another building called the Think Tank. The orangutans can move freely back and forth between the buildings at certain times of the day. Their overhead transit system crosses one of the major roads in the zoo and there are no nets or any other obstructions between visitors and the orangutans.

As you can see from one of the images, there is some kind of system on the towers that keeps the orangutans from climbing down one of the intermediate towers. I was amazed at how effortlessly the orangutan moved and never really worried that it might lose its grip and fall into my arms.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Faces at the National Zoo

Posted in animals, Nature, Photography, Portraits, wildlife, zoo, tagged Canon 24-105mm, Canon 50D, Castor canadensis, cheetah, elephant, lion, lioness, National Zoo, North American Beaver, Tamron 150-600mm, Washington D.C. on November 9, 2016| 2 Comments »

The National Zoo in Washington D.C. is a wonderful place to explore and has the added bonus of having no admission fee. On Monday I wandered around the zoo for several hours, visiting some of my favorite animals and taking a lot of photos.

Here are some of my initial favorite images: a lioness, a cheetah, a beaver, and an elephant.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Expressing our differences

Posted in Birds, commentary, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Ardea herodias, Canon 50D, Great Blue Heron, herons, Huntley Meadows Park, Tamron 150-600mm on November 8, 2016| 5 Comments »

Why were the Great Blue Herons (Ardea herodias) prancing about on Saturday with their heads tilted upward and their wings displayed? Surely this was some kind of elaborate courting ritual.

As Tina Turner famously sang, “What’s love got to do with it?” Apparently this is how these herons defend their feeding territories. Really? According to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, one of my favorite sources of information on birds, “Great Blue Herons defend feeding territories from other herons with dramatic displays in which the birds approach intruders with their head thrown back, wings outstretched, and bill pointing skyward.”

If only we could be so dignified in expressing our differences instead of squawking loudly and aggressively at each other.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Autumn hawk

Posted in Autumn, Birds, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, autumn hawk, Buteo lineatus, Canon 50D, hawk, Huntley Meadows Park, Red-Shouldered Hawk, Tamron 150-600mm telephoto on November 7, 2016| 3 Comments »

I have been hearing the cries of Red-shouldered Hawks (Buteo lineatus) frequently at my local marshland park, but I have had a lot of trouble spotting them. At this time in the autumn there are still lots of leaves on the trees that obscure my view. Gradually some of the leaves are starting to change colors and fall from the trees, but that process takes place a bit later here in Northern Virginia than in more northern areas of the United States.

As I was walking along the boardwalk at Huntley Meadows Park on Saturday morning, I saw a brightly colored object at the top of a tree. Looking through my telephoto lens, I was thrilled to see that it was a juvenile Red-shouldered Hawk that was out on a limb, giving me an almost unobstructed line of sight for a shot. In most of my shots, the hawk was looking away, but I was thrilled to be able to get a few shots in which one of the hawk’s eyes is visible. The bright blue sky and the red leaves surrounding the hawk were a nice bonus.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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