BirdingGirl

Ding Ding Ding- We have a winner! I am confident to say this mystery duck that I saw at Four Ponds Conservation Area in Pocasset, MA is a female ring-necked duck. Source: Lloyd Spitalnik's Wildlife Galleries http://www.lloydspitalnikphotos.com/ Leah at BlueBirdFriendliness gave me a good tip about Scoters and Eiders, and I was fairly confident that it was a Female Common Scoter in 2nd year breeding plumage , but the ring on the bill was lacking in the pictures I found. As my friend Dave always tells me, if there is a key characteristic missing then it probably isn't a match and keep looking. I should have known better but didn't think I could get any closer. Thanks to Andy at Andyslens.com for helping me solve this mystery! I better study up and spend more time outdoors so I can get a little sharper.

Thanks to Leah at Bluebird of Friendliness for the tip on the Mystery Duck ID (shown above). I looked at some pictures of Ruddy Ducks, Eiders and Scoters. I found a great picture of a female Common Scoter in 2nd year breeding plummage that looks like a close match. Source: Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust http://www.wwt.org.uk Source: Surfbirds.com

I was out in the yard again on Saturday practicing with my tripod. It's very tricky how I need take the camera off the mount to flip it around so I can either aim up or aim down. It's still pretty cool though and I'm excited about the stable pictures that I'm able to get now. Since our back lawn has tree-lined borders on either side, that is naturally where the birds like to hang out. Unfortunately it looks like I like to spy on my neighbors with binoculars and tripod-mounted camera! Tufted Titmouse: White-throated Sparrow: Dark-eyed Junco: Carolina Wren: Ok- so the Carolina Wren and White-throated Sparrow aren't the greatest, but those birds are fast! They're so tricky to photograph. Practice makes perfect :) Can't wait to get out there again.

Armed with my new Dynex tripod I made a special trip to Four Ponds over Thanksgiving to try and get some decent Bufflehead pictures once and for all. My mom and Steve joined me. We left poor Marsy (our black lab) at home since we didn't want her to scare the birds away. Even with all of these things in my favor--tripod, no dog, known Buffleheads on a small pond-- I still cannot get a decent picture. We went directly to the pond that borders County Rd. since we saw the ducks there on our way to the Barlow's Landing Rd. parking lot. I quietly moved ahead and crouched down to set up my tripod. I went with the 60" lightweight one since I thought it would be best for carrying while birding. I figured I could easily kneel down and still aim the camera up whatever bird I was trying to get. Well, that's easier said than done when you're trying to shoot ducks in a pond surrounded by bushes. That, and the fact that they're easily spooked. Wonder why.... I was able to fin...

It's been raining all day but that hasn't stopped the birds! They were a little slow to rise, but sure enough around 11:00 they were swarming the feeders. I couldn't believe how active they were even when the rain was at its heaviest. It's been just the usual suspects so far, but I did see an interesting sparrow. Since I've been watching from the safety of my covered porch I wasn't able to get close enough to get a good shot, and had to rely on the strength of my Canon PowerShot's zoom. Fortunately I had the steadiness of my new tripod in my favor. It's not very tall, but I can set it up on the table in the porch. It works out pretty well. The rain has added an interesting element to my shooting today. Some of the pictures make the birds look like they have white specs on them. Dark-eyed Junco and Tufted Titmouse: Male Northern Cardinal: Blue Jay and Squirrel: I know squirrels are a nuisance but I don't see very many of them (this is maybe the seco...

I just completed my second count for Cornell Lab of Ornithology's Project FeederWatch. I happen to have today off so I was able to spend more time than usual watching the feeders in my backyard. It was a light week, compared to last week: Black-capped Chickadee- 4 Blue Jay- 1 Dark-eyed Junco- 2 Tufted Titmouse- 1 White-breasted Nuthatch- 1 Northern Cardinal- 2 Song Sparrow- 1 The Song Sparrow was the only one that threw me off because I'm not used to seeing them when they start to bulk up for winter. Here are some additional pictures of my second feeder, hung on a fallen scrub pine tree. It doesn't look too nice laying on our back lawn, but I haven't had the heart to cut it up because the birds love it. Considering the open landscape of our back lawn, it's nice to give them someplace to hide from raptors while they're visiting the feeder. Here is a Black-capped Chickadee at the feeder. They especially love this feeder because I only fill it with the black oil s...

Today is the official start to Project Feederwatch, operated by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. This is my first year participating and I'm excited because it will make me much more disciplined about birdwatching. I've never done counts before, so I think it will be helpful in getting into the habit of doing that. Although today is the official start date, I won't be starting my counting until Tuesday. I've decided to count on Tuesdays and Wednesdays since the odds of me being around are much higher than the weekends. Plus, it will be good motivation to get up early to watch the feeder before work (and start my day earlier on Tuesdays and Wednesdays). With the time change, it's actually daylight when I get up now so it shouldn't be too hard. This morning I went out back for a practice run. I knew there would be a lot of birds since I had been hearing them outside starting around 7am. The feeders were in rough shape (the smaller one was empty, and the long tube ...