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Photo Forum / Photo Technique / Nature Photography / January 2006What's in YOUR backyard? (photos from the desert)
This newsgroup seems a bit dead at the moment so I thought I'd pass along this URL and maybe prod some others into posting images from their areas ... in June 2004 my wife and I got new digital cameras a couple of weeks before a trip to Alaska's Pribilof Islands, where we were planning on photographing puffins and other sea birds. Since one of the best ways to screw up a trip is to take a new camera you are unfamiliar with we decided to practice a bit on the local fauna before heading north. By becoming members of a local Botanical Garden we could get dawn access twice a week so we joined and lugged our new cameras and 500 mm lenses down there to get some practice ... by then it was pretty much the end of the nesting season and AM temps were rapidly approaching 105 F but we managed to get some decent bird images and decided to do it again in 2005, starting much earlier in the spring. By the time we were finished (when it was 110F by 8 AM and few creatures stirred) I think we actually got better images from our extended "backyard" than we did in Alaska (though no puffins :). The web site link below has some images from those early AM trips, which usually lasted from 6-8 AM ... we didn't shoot at zoos or aviaries or over feeders, just walked carefully around desert gardens and took pot-luck on whatever wild critters came along, mainly birds but also snakes and tortoises and balls of fur ... we also found another spot about 20 minutes from home, where we shot the burrowing owls frames ... so all of these images were taken a few minutes drive from home, with the exception of the 'hummingbird-in-flight' shots taken in Santa Fe, NM in July 2005 over the course of one afternoon and one morning. Hope you like these shots ... and what's in YOUR backyard that you would care to share? http://members.aol.com/bhilton665/desert/ Bill > Hope you like these shots ... and what's in YOUR backyard that you > would care to share? > > http://members.aol.com/bhilton665/desert/ Bill, GREAT images! I also really like the presentation. OK, so how far away does one consider "your back yard?" Day trip? If you can be there for sunrise? If so, here are a few links to my backyard, all within a 2-hour drive from my home in the Denver metro area: Foxes, about 15 minutes away: http://clarkvision.com/galleries/gallery.foxes/index.html Mt Evans, 1.5 hour drive: http://clarkvision.com/galleries/gallery.mtn_goat/index.html Rocky Mountain National Park, ~1.5 hours away: http://clarkvision.com/galleries/gallery.RMNP/index.html Indian Peaks Wilderness, 1.5 hours drive to trail head: http://clarkvision.com/galleries/gallery.colorado/web/indian_peaks_wildernessc07 .04.2002.L4.07c-600.html Hummingbirds on Mount Evans: http://clarkvision.com/galleries/gallery.colorado/web/humming_bird.c05.29.2003.I MG_4126.b-700.html (click next a couple of time to see more). I'm working on a set of bighorn sheep images now. Bill, although not in your back yard, I can't wait to see your Africa trip images. Happy New Year, and great Photography to all. Roger > Roger N. Clark wrote ... > >Bill, >GREAT images! Thanks Roger ... I thought I sent you this URL when you were at Bosque but come to think of it I guess I didn't after all :) >OK, so how far away does one consider "your back >yard?" Day trip? If you can be there for sunrise? No rules ... anything you can easily drive to and back on a day trip I guess? >If so, here are a few links to my backyard, all within a 2-hour >drive from my home in the Denver metro area: I like your backyard better :) Mine is great for birds for 3-4 months but then it's too hot for much of anything. >Foxes That first fox in the good light is really really good! >Mt Evans, 1.5 hour drive >Rocky Mountain National Park, ~1.5 hours away: >Indian Peaks Wilderness, 1.5 hours drive to trail head: >Hummingbirds on Mount Evans As I said, I like your backyard better :) >Bill, although not in your back yard, I can't wait to >see your Africa trip images. Hopefully we can do as well as Art and Todd and also figure out how to do a trip with the best guides on our own (ie, much cheaper) for a repeat trip next year, in which case I expect to see you and Richard in a near-by jeep and at dinner :) Just got a new lens for that trip, a 24-105 f/4 L IS ... can't wait to use it. Bill > Hopefully we can do as well as Art and Todd and also figure out how to > do a trip with the best guides on our own (ie, much cheaper) for a > repeat trip next year, It's no problem. Lots of companies do tailor-mades, so you can specify your own itinerary and travel yourself, with your wife or whoever you like. Getting he best guides can be more problematic, many factors of African life can mean that the guide you asked for may not be available on your trip: for example, one time we asked for the guide we'd had the previous year, but his wife had just died of a specific strain of meningitis which we'd been warned about and innoculated against for only 10ukp each: a sobering reminder of the difference between third world and first world realities, where a lens such as the one you name would cost at least two *years* of your guide's salary. However, it's far easier on a private trip: your guide has his eye on his tip, so he wants to please you. If you're on a general trip, it's majority rule, but if you're on a private trip, you can specify clearly what you want, you should be OK: state it (politely but firmly) in your initial written communications with your chosen company too. E.g. lots of people on 'general' tours want only to see 'big cats', so there are big circles of vehicles around lions, leopards and cheetahs. You can easily ask not to join these circles! A useful phrase to remember is 'driver and vehicle at our disposal', which means you can go out as much or as little as circumstances dictate, though you're still not able to go many miles off your planned itinerary without paying a supplement. Safari njema Liz >> a lens such as the one you name would cost at least two *years* of >> your driver/guide's salary. Sorry: I looked up the wrong lens! Make that "4-5 years salary". Slainte Liz > Hopefully we can do as well as Art and Todd and also figure out how to > do a trip with the best guides on our own (ie, much cheaper) for a > repeat trip next year, in which case I expect to see you and Richard in > a near-by jeep and at dinner :) Sounds like a great plan. Roger Great photos as always, Bill. Two questions: Where are you that you have 110F by 8 a.m.? What do you do with your great pictures other than show them like this to us less capable souls? A google search for info about you was unproductive. Also, thanks for the great advice you and Roger give so freely. You helped me prepare for a Brooks River bear watching trip a few years back. (It was great. I want to go back.) Any advice you might offer with regards to a cruise to Hawaii in February would be appreciated now. Lewie (in Austin) > This newsgroup seems a bit dead at the moment so I thought I'd pass > along this URL and maybe prod some others into posting images from [quoted text clipped - 7 lines] > > Bill > Lew wrote ... > >Great photos as always, Bill. Thanks Lew, I always enjoyed reading your 'travelogues' as well ... still envious about the polar bears ... >Two questions: Where are you that you have >110F by 8 a.m.? Phoenix ... most days in May 2005 it was pleasant enough, in the high 80's when we quit, but in June we had a record heat wave (I think 16 people died on the street in 5 days, mostly homeless people, and another 115-120 or so died in the deserts trying to cross illegally from Mexico) and because of all the asphalt we get the 'urban heat effect' where the night time temps don't drop much, unfortunately we have nights where the 'low' is 95 F ... so we had a couple of days last June and July where the early morn temps were very high ... I wouldn't swear to 110F at 8 AM but we were usually in the car by 9 AM to return home and there were a few days over 105 F on the readout in the car. This was when I was shooting the nighthawk, I probably sat there 9 hours over 4 days to get a few shots of the chicks in the open since the mother typically just sat there shading them ... if not for that rare opportunity I wouldn't have gone out those days. >What do you do with your great pictures other than show them >like this to us less capable souls? We are basically just hobbyists who got out of control ... we sell prints occasionally (big score last year was 32 prints sold to a hospital, several from the desert page linked to in this thread) and have been published in several magazines, but don't actively market stuff ... I had a full-time job once, it was a LOT of work :) Not looking for another one so we keep it low-key. A recent example (last week) was someone seeing some of our bear and wolf photos hanging at an auto dealer's office and contacting us out of the blue to buy two matted 11x14" prints and passing our names on to the editor of a magazine that publishes big game animal images. Maybe we'll get in that magazine, maybe not ... >A google search for info about you was unproductive. One of these days I'll do a formal web page but I'm basically lazy ... >Also, thanks for the great advice you and Roger give so freely. You >helped me prepare for a Brooks River bear watching trip a few years >back. I was there again in Sept 05 and when I first walked to the point where the trail meets the river a bear popped up and, believe it or not, I remembered your article where the bear walked toward you when you backed up at the same spot, and fled when you shooed him away :) Also remembered your wife not wanting to cross the bridge because you might get stuck on the platform and there's no bathroom ... well, good news ... now they finally have a toilet on the 'far side' near where the trail to the falls branches off :) > (It was great. I want to go back.) You can make reservations starting Jan 5 ... I'll be there (hopefully, if I get a campsite) in early July and maybe early Sept so if you go let me know. >Any advice you might offer with regards to a >cruise to Hawaii in February would be appreciated now. I think Roger gets to go to Hawaii with his government job fairly often so he can probably give you good advice. He probably has some good Hawaii images on his site. I've been to Kona fishing for blue marlin several times and can point you toward the best boats if you like to fish, but that's best in the summer. Thanks for the comments ... I'm sure people would enjoy it if you posted links to your photo travelogues more often too. Bill > Also, thanks for the great advice you and Roger give so freely. You helped > me prepare for a Brooks River bear watching trip a few years back. (It was > great. I want to go back.) Any advice you might offer with regards to a > cruise to Hawaii in February would be appreciated now. > > Lewie (in Austin) Lewie, Thanks. I agree with Bill on the 'travelogues.' Regarding a "cruise to Hawaii", I assume you mean a cruise between islands after you fly there, correct? While I do know the islands fairly (I lived there for 7 years). I have never done a Hawaiian cruise, but I can answer other questions about Hawaii. Roger > Regarding a "cruise to Hawaii", I assume you mean a cruise between > islands after you fly there, correct? While I do know the > islands fairly (I lived there for 7 years). I have never done > a Hawaiian cruise, but I can answer other questions about > Hawaii. I mean a Hawaii cruise that starts and ends in Los Angeles. My wife has been wanting a trip to the islands for a long time, and I said "When they build a bridge." I then found out that you can cruise from either LA or San Diego, so no bridge required! Only 5 days in the islands, one day each at five different ports. I have signed up for a glass bottom boat ride, a windowed submarine, and a snorkle trip in the various ports, and bus tours also, but I don't know what to expect. I have ordered an Aquapac camera bag that is supposed to allow underwater use of small cameras, but I worry about quality. We take pictures to just document and refresh our memories of what we see as we travel, so really good is not a requirement, but I do like clear, in-focus prints. Lewie > http://members.aol.com/bhilton665/desert/ > > Bill Beautiful images Bill. Fabulous stuff and something to inspire us all. > Hope you like these shots ... and what's in YOUR backyard that you > would care to share? > > http://members.aol.com/bhilton665/desert/ Beautiful photographs and I particularly like your innovative 'thumbnail is a crop' presentation. Looking through those makes me wish (again) that New Zealand was blessed with a more colourful and varied bird and animal life. I've been photographing a fantails nest (a very small insect eater). This is the third batch of chicks they've reared in the nest this season already and it's still high summer here. The nest is located in rafters of an old dairy shed festooned with clematis so light levels even on a bright sunny afternoon are very low. Image quality consequently isn't great (shallow DOF, high ISO, borderline shutter) but perhaps someone will find the sequence interesting all the same? http://www.pbase.com/mapleglen/image/54217914 Rob. >The nest is located in rafters of an old dairy shed festooned with >clematis so light levels even on a bright sunny afternoon are very low. [quoted text clipped - 4 lines] > >http://www.pbase.com/mapleglen/image/54217914 Very nice. A warm and intimate feeling with the light effects. Cyli r.bc: vixen. Minnow goddess. Speaker to squirrels. Often taunted by trout. Almost entirely harmless. http://www.visi.com/~cyli email: cylise@gmail.com.invalid (strip the .invalid to email) Rob as a keen photog from across the ditch, I am surprised by your statement about NZ. You have photographic riches to die for! I am trying to get the bread to be able to drop over just for your scenery alone. I am told this by some fairly knowledgeable orno's that when it comes to variety of bird life, it doesn't get any better than Oz, and I certainly wont dispute that. However, if you want scenery then your neck of the woods is pretty bloody good. regards Don Mmmm..........must be something about grass and a fence. >> Hope you like these shots ... and what's in YOUR backyard that you >> would care to share? [quoted text clipped - 21 lines] > > Rob. > Rob > [quoted text clipped - 37 lines] >> >> Rob. I'll second that Rob, and I am an Aussie. NZ is fabulous for senery and heck, it does still have some pretty good bird life even though it may not be the same as Oz and you have to really look for it. > I'll second that Rob, and I am an Aussie. NZ is fabulous for senery and > heck, it does still have some pretty good bird life even though it may not > be the same as Oz and you have to really look for it. Personally, I'm a firm believer in finding something to photograph no matter where I am, including home. When the weather is especially crappy that might mean literally *in* my house :-) I ticked off a gal in another group a while back...she lived in Iowa or somewhere in the midwest and was complaining that there was nothing to photograph there but those big field sprinklers. I told her that she quite simply wasn't looking hard enough or, for that matter, looking at all. Traveling to make photographs is always going to be a crapshoot. You have no real way of being sure of what the weather is going to do. You aren't close to familiar enough with the area to know where the really "good" spots are. You could easily plunk down a pile of money on getting there, hotels, car rental, eating out, etc. and not get a single shot that you wanted to get. You have none of these problems staying close to home, you don't have to pay for a plane ticket, rent a pillow, or worry that you'll get sick from the food. You can look out your window and decide if the light is what you want or not, and if it's not, there's always all day the next day. You can spend a weekend driving around finding new spots and you can do that the next weekend and the next and the next. You can buddy up to people who spend a lot of time on the road or in the field. My day job is pushing trucks in the oilfield. My guys let me know when they spot just about anything. I get phone calls all the time telling me, "Hey, there's a big herd of whatever X miles east of town". I have a photographer friend who's pals with a BLM ranger here, he gets a call when they do wild horse roundups. Somebody who's just passing through here, they don't have this kind of information available to them. It makes perfect sense that the best photographs you'll make are photographs taken in an area that you know like the back of your hand.  SignatureAngela M. Cable Paint Shop Pro 8, 9, X Private Beta Tester Neocognition, digital scrapbooking source: http://www.neocognition.com/ PSP Tutorial Links: http://www.psplinks.com/ 5th Street Studio, free graphics, websets and more: http://www.fortunecity.com/westwood/alaia/354/ I wrote: >>> Looking through those makes me wish (again) that New Zealand >>> was blessed with a more colourful and varied bird and animal life. >>Rob >> [quoted text clipped - 5 lines] >>that. However, if you want scenery then your neck of the woods is pretty >>bloody good. > I'll second that Rob, and I am an Aussie. NZ is fabulous for senery and > heck, it does still have some pretty good bird life even though it may not > be the same as Oz and you have to really look for it. What's this, Aussies saying nice things about NZ? Are you lot getting ready to wipe the sportsfields clean with us again or something? ;-) I do take your point (and Bill Hiltons original one) about not taking what is under your nose for granted. The scenery is okay and NZ native birds can be interesting in a drab olive sort of way - but a Tui or a Bellbird can't begin to be compared to a hummingbird! We've a few of the European finches established, but only a few. Thing is, if green grass is all you're used to you'd crawl across broken glass for a sunset in the 'red centre' or something as exotic and spectacularly different as Mr Hiltons desert fauna... I'm fairly lucky with my backyard. We've a place a little like the one 'Jer' posted about (though without the crowds and without the huge flocks of migrating birds). My mother spent about 30 years handrearing, training and free flying exotic parrots. I've scratched out some ponds with an old secondhand excavator and there are a fair few wild birds that make use of them now. Plenty of opportunities and if you frame carefully at sunrise even the neighbours farmed red deer can almost look like they're wild. If either of you do make it across the ditch and down this way (I'm at the cold, wet end) call in and say hello. Same goes for the northern hemisphere crowd too. - In case anybody thinks I'm touting for business here there's no set charge to look round the garden and we don't charge for photographs (I'm firmly in the 'nobody owns the light' camp). I do enjoy meeting people who notice and appreciate nature. http://www.mapleglen.co.nz/ Waterfowl include Oystercatchers, Plovers, Stilts, Scaup, Grey Teal, Black Swans, Paradise ducks and Blue Herons (plus the ubiquitous Mallard & Canada Goose). Parrots free: Lovebirds, Rosellas, Lorrikeets, Kings, Twenty eights (...what is with that name?), Indian ringnecks, Quarrian. Native: Tui, Bellbird, Native Pigeon, Fantail, Grey warbler, Waxeye. A crawl around the rest of my pbase galleries will reveal most of the above along with my paucity of talent... Wishing you good light, Rob. Rob wrote: > What's this, Aussies saying nice things about NZ? > Are you lot getting ready to wipe the sportsfields clean with us > again or something? ;-) Not all of us are bastards you know......except when we're losing a match ;-) > I do take your point (and Bill Hiltons original one) about not taking > what is under your nose for granted. [quoted text clipped - 45 lines] > Rob. > -- Nice garden Rob. Must be a lot of work at times! I do intend to come south to the land of the long white cloud sooner or later. Won't promise I'll be visiting though.....but appreciate the invite.....I take it you run the place as a B&B? Jasen [...] I take it you run the place as a B&B? No! There's enough trouble in feeding and watering myself... :-) Rob. Rob hope to take you up on that one day. Keep shooting. regards Don >I wrote: > [quoted text clipped - 67 lines] > > Rob. > This newsgroup seems a bit dead at the moment so I thought I'd pass > along this URL and maybe prod some others into posting images from [quoted text clipped - 32 lines] > > Bill I caught this article just this morning... Birds take to city life at sanctuary ------------------------------------ PHARR, Texas – Allen Williams loves his solitude, but he loves company, too. And he finds both on his 2 1/2-acre refuge in the middle of Pharr, in the Rio Grande Valley. The bird lover and professional landscaper created a wildlife sanctuary in his back yard. Birdwatchers travel from all over the nation to sit in Allen Williams' back yard in Pharr, Texas, and watch for migratory birds to perch in the trees and bushes. Allen planted 55 species of trees, shrubs and plants, put in waterfalls and sprinklers, plus food sources. The lower Rio Grande Valley is a major migratory flyway, but would birds stop here, just blocks from downtown, as Allen hoped? Yes! In 1992, a slate-throated redstart landed – a first for this part of the country. Cedar waxwings were spotted. In 2004, a Central American species, the black-headed nightingale thrush, came calling. It was the first ever spotted in the United States and was way north of its usual migration stop. When word of the sighting hit the Internet, Allen got calls from across the country. Soon his back yard was filled with birdwatchers. It's been a refuge for birds and humans ever since. "My wife gets a little tired of the visitors, but for the most part, they've been respectful," Allen says. Migratory warblers and robins, even hawks, are fairly common sights in the yard, while rabbits, lizards and an occasional opossum scamper along the ground. Ruth Hoyt, a renowned professional wildlife photographer, stops at Allen's yard monthly. Sometimes, she comes alone with her cameras; other times, photography students accompany her. "The habitat, amount of ground cover and canopy are conducive to attracting birds," Ruth says. She has captured many of Allen's rare species on film. The busiest months at Allen's sanctuary are October and April, but there's usually something to see year round. It's free, though he asks for a $10 donation to maintain the grounds. A rare blue mockingbird stops by on occasion, and you just never know who else you'll run into. "We have people who come here from around the world," says Allen. So migratory birds are watching migratory folks (and vice versa) in one bird lover's back yard, in the middle of a city. Signaturejer email reply - I am not a 'ten' > Jer wrote ... > >Birdwatchers travel from all over the nation to sit in Allen >Williams' back yard in Pharr, Texas ... Thanks for posting that ... we hope to visit south Texas in April to photograph at some of the Lens and Lands sites and will stop by this place if we have time and can find it :) A couple in SE Arizona did something similar a few years back, setting out feeders in their backyard for their own viewing pleasure (going thru hundreds of dollars of feed each month) and later welcoming fellow birdwatchers who stopped by to join them ... >"My wife gets a little tired of the visitors, but for the most >part, they've been respectful," Allen says. The Arizona couple said they enjoyed having 10-20 fellow enthusiasts in their backyard each morning but when a national magazine published a story about them they soon had up to 200-300 people per day trampling the grass and clogging their toilets, and soon it wasn't fun anymore ... they eventually had to close the gates and change the number on their house to discourage folks :) Hope I get to visit this one before the party is over. Bill Bill great stuff. I think we all too often overlook our back yards. Hope your trip goes well. regards Don from Down Under. > This newsgroup seems a bit dead at the moment so I thought I'd pass > along this URL and maybe prod some others into posting images from [quoted text clipped - 32 lines] > > Bill This is about 12 miles from my backyard, well it is every winter. http://www.gllangley.com/geese.htm > This newsgroup seems a bit dead at the moment so I thought I'd pass > along this URL and maybe prod some others into posting images from [quoted text clipped - 32 lines] > > Bill Wow, pretty nice! Can we park our Mini-RV in your backyard for a while. LOL Paul Wilson PhotoStockFile.com On 1/14/06 10:35 PM, in article CK-dnfJ36LqeXlTeRVn-hA@amaonline.com, "gll" > This is about 12 miles from my backyard, well it is every winter. > http://www.gllangley.com/geese.htm [quoted text clipped - 35 lines] >> >> Bill Here's a great blue heron (first I've seen up close) catching a fish about 45 minutes from home: <http://www.edgehill.net/1/?SC=go.php&DIR=California/Bay-Area/Mt-Tam/2006-01-29-m uir-woods/heron&PG=1&PIC=2> |
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