While driving home this evening after unsuccessfully looking for snow owls, the moon rose and the skies cleared for a brief period of time. I jumped out of the car and took this photo of moonrise over the Lester River Bridge (no time to set up a tripod … only a monopod). Within 3 minutes the moon hid behind a cloud bank. Fun time.
Tag Archives: MN North: Amity
Snow Squall Birds
Enjoying “red” on a day with Snow Squalls. In addition to this Cardinal, we have had regular visits from Pileated and Red-Bellied Woodpeckers … and even a Redpoll. If you maximize the image you should be able to see the streaks of snow coming down.
Two years ago, my house was pretty much the northern range limit for Cardinals, but I now know some “reds” are being seen up the shore as far as the Sucker River (12 miles distant).
Mourning Doves … they stay the winter each year … normally not found in the Boreal Forest during the “white” time of the year. They appear to like my feeders.
Birding Rejoined!
Yesterday afternoon I was granted medical clearance to drive and venture forth on my own! While my recovery still includes a long road ahead, it is obvious I am on the correct route. I wasted little time in heading out and having a delightful time. Days are short this time of year, and from a photographer’s vantage point it is the “golden hour” in terms of light all day long. The sun rarely gets to high in the sky.
My wife gave me ground rules for where she said I was allowed to go (doctor withstanding), and I quickly focused upon winter food sources. It was great to take some short hikes and be rewarded with some nice birding results. Enjoy! (I did!).
Found this Red-Tailed Hawk conducting its afternoon hunt. In the second two images I had backed off on the zoom, expecting the hawk to take-off (a correct guess which comes from watching birds habits a long time)
Ruffed Grouse in a Berry Tree (were you perhaps expecting a Partridge in a Pear Tree? Not possible here in northern Minnesota)(in a the second images, a berry is stuck on a grouse’s beak … note the slight difference between the final two images … the photos are identical except for the beak being slightly open which changes the image’s focus point.
Common Redpolls eating Tansy Seed Popsicles (while most of the redpolls I have found are females or immature males, the final two images show a male … thus the “redpoll name”)
