Category Archives: Year 4

Meet the Plovers! (Black-Bellied and American Golden)

Year 4

The rains finally ended, and the fields of Park Point were some perfect mud flats for migrating shorebirds yesterday morning. Although some pesky clouds were still hanging around, the winds out of the North brought quite a few migrating plovers into the Duluth area. I had fun watching this Black-Bellied Plover for about 1/2 hour … and it helped me out by posing with various other birds.

Black-Bellied Plover and American Golden Plover (immature)

Black-Bellied Plover and Lesser Yellowlegs

Sky Check … Watching a Bald Eagle

Two more shorebird pics … from my recent bike tour … Short Billed Dowitchers

Northern Night Lights

Year 4

Have been off the grid at my remote small Northwoods cabin. A few nights ago I walked down to the dock at midnight and took this photograph of the Milky Way over our cabin. I knew from a photography app I utilize that the core of the Milky Way would be in the proper position of the night sky. The app is named PlanIt! for Photographers which is available for only a few dollars both on Android and IOS. This app allows one to determine many important items which are helpful to photographers such as sunrise, sunset, moonrise, moonset, dark night period, dark sky regions and much, much more. I’ve included a screenshot of how I used PlanIt! for planning my Milky Way photo. Note how the app utilizes Google Maps and thus is location specific. In the Google Maps satellite view one may actually see my fishing boat!

The light in showing through the window is from two small night lights. My camera settings are ISO 3,200, Aperture 2.0 for a 25 second exposure.

Northern Night Lights … Milky Way

Screenshots from PlanIt!

Birds and Boats! (and a Lighthouse)

Year 4, ,

I was up before sunrise and drove down to Canal Park. I noticed in my semi-wakeful state around 4 am that the heavy rains had stopped. For me that meant clear skies and good birding. As the sun poked its head over the horizon Lake Superior and Canal Park shone out in her glory.

After Canal Park, I visited the Old Stella Jones Pier (reviewed with map yesterday). During the “golden hour” I found an American Golden Plover. After some significant time with my friendly plover it was off to Park Point where I hung out on the beach with the Semipalmated Sandpipers.

Oh yes … the boat pics!