First 2008 Trip to Crex Meadows

The nice weather continued on Sunday so Michelle and I made our first trek of the year up to Crex Meadows. Unfortunately most of the ducks had already moved on to the north but there was still plenty of things for us to photograph.
Yellow-rumped warblers are all over the place right now. I see them at every park that I visit and Crex was no exception.
Although not as common as the yellow-butts I have spotted quite a few eastern phoebes.
Michelle spotted this northern flicker and was quite proud of her self for identifying it.
There were a few shorebirds around, mostly greater yellowlegs. In August I am registered for a shorebird workshop out in South Dakota. I should have a good opportunity to get some nice shorebird pics then.
We did see a few ducks that were still around. Most of them were blue-winged teal but we did also spot a single northern shoveler.

The trumpeter swans have begun to build there nests. When we visit again in late June they will probably have some cygnets for us to photograph.
Most of the osprey platforms were occupied with nests. One of the nests had been taken over by eagles but the others were acting as home for osprey pairs. Unfortunately most of the platforms are pretty far out and don't have a very good view. One of the platforms on the north east side of Crex had a little better view from the road. As we stopped to check out the osprey this bird took off from the platform and came over to check us out. That allowed me to get a couple of closer pics as he flew over head.

Raptor Release

Last Saturday was The Raptor Center's annual Spring Raptor Release. I volunteered to help out answering questions in the hawk and falcon area and also said that I would take some pictures of the event for the Education Marketing and Events Manager. I was a little worried the day before when I read that the weather report was calling for rain and possibly snow until about 1pm the day of the event. I don't mind the weather but I don't like to have my equipment out when it is to wet and since the event was being held at Hyland Park in Bloomington I knew that I would have to carry my camera for the whole time. So I decided against bringing my new lens and went with my old stand by. As it turns out it did not matter because that morning the sun came out and we had a nice, albeit a bit windy, day.
When I arrived almost everything was already set up, except for the birds themselves. They stayed crated until almost 11am. Above Adam and Emma are taking out Jack, a male American kestrel, so that he can be set up on his perch.
Some of the other birds in our hawk and falcon circle were Jamaica, a female red-tail hawk,
and Casper, a Krider's red-tail hawk. We also had the new broad-wing hawk out, who just got named Kettle, but they put him away mid way through the event before I could get his pic.
The other half of our area was where we had falcons. Besides Jack from the first pic we also had Cinnamon our female American kestrel.
Taiga, a female merlin falcon, was there. Taiga is one of my favorite birds at The Raptor Center. She is very cute and sometimes lets out a small cry when she gets fed. She is also the slowest eater of all of the education birds.

Juneau rounded off the hawk falcon area. Juneau is a female peregrine falcon and my adopted bird for last year.
There was also an eagle area which consisted of two bald eagles, Maxime and Othello, and our resident turkey vulture Nero.
Maxime is our only female bald eagle and at a whopping 10 pounds she is huge compared to Othello or the rest of the boys, Othello weighs in around 7 pounds.
They did take Nero up to the stage to help in some of the educational programs that they were running through out the day. It is a good thing that Nero is used to Laura, turkey vultures vomit as a defense mechanism and from what I hear it is extremely smelly.
There was also an owl area. Squeek, the eastern screech owl pictured above, and Borius, our boreal owl, both came out for the program. We had to set up a couple of hutch type perches for them.

Whisper the barn owl was probably eaves dropping on all the little rodents conversations in the area. Barn owls have better hearing and night vision then most of the other owls.
Samantha is our largest great horned owl and during mating season she was a bit temperamental.
We released 3 birds back into the wild that afternoon. The first was a coopers hawk. The gentleman releasing the bird was picked by a random drawing at the event.
The next bird to be released was a red-tailed hawk, who was being released by a contributor.
Unfortunately the hawk baited on her before the release.

With a little help from the clinic manager the bird was righted
and released
and off it flew.
The last bird was another red-tailed hawk and it was released by retired Minnesota Viking Matt Blair.
Matt works with The Raptor Center on one of their big fundraisers, The Raptor Bowl. In appreciation for all his help Matt got to release the final bird.

The event was a huge success. The weather was great and we had a huge crowd. The next release will be in the fall I believe at Carpenter Nature Center. I am sure that I will volunteer for that one also because I have a lot of fun talking to people about the raptors.

Dragons in Love

Ecobirder started as a way to share my nature photography with others. In the past Michelle, my wife, and I have taken trips all over the US to take pictures of moose, bears, coyote, elk, whales, raptors, and other wildlife. Unfortunately jobs and expenses do not let us travel enough for me to produce a quality blog just with pictures from our travels. So I started doing more bird photography because it was a way that I could get out in my spare time with out having to travel around the country. Last summer I found a couple of other subjects that I became interested in that became an important part of the blog, butterflies and dragonflies. Unfortunately nether of these are around in Minnesota during the winter so it has been a while since I have had a good opportunity to photograph them with any variety or regularity. While I have already seen, and photographed, several types of butterflies this year I have been anxiously waiting for the dragonfly season to begin. I have seen a fair number of the larger green darner dragonflies, these are the big ones that fly south for the winter like the birds do, I even was able to photograph one hovering at the Dodge Nature Center a couple weeks ago, but most of the smaller types, that die out in the winter, are currently in their larval state.

The darners are difficult to photograph because they do not land very often.
That is why I was excited when I spotted 2 green darner dragonflies mating at the Bass Ponds last week.
In this picture the male is on the top with a blue abdomen while the female is below with a red abdomen. The reproductive organs of both sexes are located near the end of the abdomen, however the males actually have 2 sets. Sperm is produced by the reproductive organ at the back of the abdomen and then is transferred to a reproductive organ located just in front of the abdomen. The female then places her reproductive organ on the males front organ and that is where the sperm is transferred. The male then places his abdomen on top of her head which she grasps with her feet. This gives the couple stability while the mating procedure is taking place and even allows them to fly as a single unit.
I am hoping to add a lot more butterfly and dragonfly pictures soon, if the weather decides to cooperate but if you really need a dragonfly fix check out this blog that I found on Dragons and Damsels in Malaysia. It is a very good blog with a lot of great pics so I would definitely recommend checking it out.

Birding Bass Ponds

It was not all just warblers that I photographed on my trip to the Bass Ponds.
There are probably more blue-winged teal in the area right now then any other type of duck. It seems as though there are even more teal then there are mallards, which is very unusual since we have a healthy mallard population all year long.
There are still some hoodies around but they will probably all move north soon.
Herons are a bird that we see often during the spring, summer, and fall. Minnesota is the land of 10,000 lakes but we also have about twice as many ponds and each one typically has one or two great blue heron or great egret fishing in it.
I have been having some fun lately shooting female redwing black birds. Even though they are much more drab looking then the males I enjoy shooting them more. That is probably because it is more of a challenge. The females are more secretive and do not usually hang out in the open like the males do.
Another type of bird that I see a lot of but have a difficult time photographing are swallows. Usually they are darting through the air chasing bugs around. They are so fast and maneuver so quickly that the autofocus can not home in on them. Of course the AF on my 100 - 400 never really works for small birds or insects so most of the photos that I take I use manual focus. Fortunately for me this tree swallow decided to perch and let me take his pic.

Migrating Warblers

We are currently in one of the most exciting times of the year for birders here in Minnesota, the warbler migration. Unfortunately between work, volunteering at The Raptor Center, other commitments and the weather I have not been able to get out as much as I would like to.
Last Tuesday I took the couple hours that I have between jobs and instead of catching a nap as usual I headed over to the Bass Ponds to do some quick birding.
I saw most of the common birds that we get this time of the year, like Canadian geese, mallards, red-winged blackbirds and robins but the bird that I saw the most of that afternoon was the yellow-rumped warbler.
The yellow-butts were all over. They were in the reeds, trees, bushes, on the ground even in the shallow water.
I did also find a single palm warbler. This was my first palm of the year. I must have been late in spotting them because when I posted it on the list server I received an angry e-mail stating that I should not have posted it since many people had already reported palm warblers in the area. This opened up a big can of worms, on the list server, which has finally just quieted down. So I hope that you enjoy this pic.

Birding Around the Twin Cities

It was a bit cloudy and hazy on April 27th but I decided to go to some of the local birding locations to see if anything new might turn up.
One new sighting that I found, in the marshland that is a part of Fort Snelling State Park and is right across the road from Black Dog Lake, was a green heron. This was my first green heron for the year.
Another bird which I have not seen many of so far this year is the pied-billed grebe. I found this one at Wood Lake Nature Center. Last year it seemed that I saw a lot of pied-billed grebes earlier in the spring then this year. Maybe our poor weather so far this spring has something to do with it.
There was still at least one pair of wood ducks at Wood Lake. They will probably clear out soon , heading further north for the summer.
Usually all that we have left in the mid summer months are the geese, mallards, robins, crows and redwing blackbirds.

Nature Abounds at Dodge Nature Center

I did find some other wildlife, beside the green darner dragonfly which I posted yesterday, at Dodge Nature Center on April 21st.
The painted turtles were out sunning themselves on the rocks and logs in the ponds, at least until the sky clouded up.
Song sparrows were out singing, as they have been for several weeks now.
One species that has recently returned and that I have been seeing a lot of are white-throated sparrows.
The young muskrats were out with the adults that afternoon. I did not get a very good look at them. They were good at keeping hidden in the reeds. When they did have to travel across an open space they darted very quickly, they were so fast that it was impossible to catch more then a quick glance let alone get a pick. The best look that I got was what you see above. I may not have been able to see them but it was easy to tell where they were because they were very vocal, squeaking and rustling through the dried reeds.

Leuc takes a bath

After taking some pics I pulled out my video recoreder and recorded this video of Leuc.

Leuc Takes a Bath

A couple of weeks ago while I was working my shift at The Raptor Center Leuc, one of the retired bald eagles, decided to take a bath. So I grabbed my camera and took a few shots.
Leuc was hatched in 1979 and came to the Raptor Center with a badly dislocated right shoulder.
Due to the dislocation he was unable to extend his wing which made him unable to fly.
I can certainly relate to his injuries. when I was younger I had an accident on my bicycle and separated my shoulder from my collar bone. Years later I fell on some stairs and when I went to catch myself I dislocated my shoulder. The pain was extremely intense. Since that time I have dislocated it often. The last time that I dislocated it was a few weeks ago while I was sleeping. It does not hurt like it used to but it is still not a very pleasant way to wake up.
The thing that I really found cool while watching him bathe was the detail and texture of his feathers.
Tomorrow is The Raptor Center's Spring Raptor Release. It will be held at Hyland Park in Bloomington from 11am to 2pm. The weather is not supposed to be real great in the morning but it is supposed to get better as the day goes on. Even if the weather is not that great I am sure that the event will be spectacular. There will be music from Michael Monroe, kids events, our education birds will be there and the highlight will be the release of several rehabilitated raptors back to the wild. If you are going to be in the Twin Cities area tomorrow I would encourage you to stop in.

I will be one of the education volunteers at the hawk and falcon circle, so if you do stop by make sure you come over and say hi. I have also been asked to take some pictures so I will be trying to do some double duty. Hopefully the weather will not be too bad and I will be able to get some good pics.

Green darner in Flight.

On April 21st I stopped at Dodge Nature Center on my way home from work to do some birding and take some pics. I did get some bird pics, which I will share on my next post, but I was more excited to get my first dragonfly pics of the year.
I have been seeing quite a few common green darner dragonflies on my adventures as the temps have increased. Green darners are large dragonflies that are strong fliers. I typically see them flying over ponds or fields on the hunt for mosquitoes or other small flying insects. The difficulty with photographing green darners is that they often fly for a long time, and they can fly for quite a distance, so finding one that has landed can be difficult. Even though this darner did not land for me I got lucky and it decided to do some hovering. It took me a while to get it in view and get the lens focused before it moved, especially since most of the work that I do is using manual focus, but eventually I was able to get some pics of the darner in flight.

Green darners are very similar to birds in many ways. These dragons migrate south much the same way that many birds do. In fact researchers at Princeton found that they exhibit some of the same traits that birds do when they migrate, such as migrating during a cold front with favourable north west winds or skirting large bodies of water during migration. Now they have returned to their summer breeding grounds and they are hunting for food and soon they will begin mating, much the same way that migrating birds are.