Merced National Wildlife Refuge

February 15, 2016

I had three days off last weekend.  A lot of people did, apparently.  I went out to Point Reyes on Sunday and it was a nightmare.  There were people everywhere.  The roads were closed in some places.  I had gone out to see the elephant seals but couldn't get to the lookout point.  I just drove home without doing anything.

Black-necked Stilt -- Merced National Wildlife Refuge, CA

I was determined to have a better experience on Monday.  Pongo and I went to Merced National Wildlife Refuge.  A place like that would never get very crowded, I figured.

Northern Shoveler & Cinnamon Teal -- Merced National Wildlife Refuge, CA

There were more people there than on a normal weekend day, but I was basically right.  We saw maybe twenty cars over the course of the auto tour.  That's probably a little more than average, but it never felt crowded.  Plus, these people were all fellow nature nerds, meaning waves and smiles and the occasional brief conversation about birds and wildlife during brief encounters.  It's a very different crowd from my other nerd clan, the record store nerds.  There, we're all convinced of our superiority to all the other nerds in terms of taste in music and collected catalog.  No smiles.  No conversation.  Just smug looks of mutual condescension.

Northern Shoveler -- Merced National Wildlife Refuge, CA

Ruddy Duck -- Merced National Wildlife Refuge, CA

Ross's Goose -- Merced National Wildlife Refuge, CA

There's not much of a narrative to this day.  It was a fairly typical trip to the refuge.  We saw a lot of squirrels and rabbits, which Pongo loves to see.  He thought about jumping out the window to give chase a couple of times but was able to stifle those urges on this trip.  We saw a couple of great horned owls.  More often than not we see owls at this refuge.  We saw sandhill cranes, but none were close to the road.

Merced National Wildlife Refuge, CA

Ross's Goose -- Merced National Wildlife Refuge, CA

Great Horned Owl -- Merced National Wildlife Refuge, CA

Merced National Wildlife Refuge

October 30, 2015

After my last post about San Luis Wildlife Refuge, Garry Hayes (Geotripper) tipped me off to to the fact that a few thousand sandhill cranes have already taken up residence at the Merced refuge about ten miles from the San Luis unit.  I decided to take a drive to see the cranes on Friday.

Sandhill Crane -- Merced National Wildlife Refuge, CA

The cranes were spread out all over the refuge.  This is not what I'm normally used to.  My experience has been that the cranes are packed tightly together in a couple of locations.  I suspect this has something to do with the fact that most of the geese and ducks have yet to arrive.  They've had the refuge mostly to themselves for the last few weeks.  That is soon going to change.

Great Horned Owl -- Merced National Wildlife Refuge, CA

I almost always spot a great horned owl or two at the Merced refuge.  I saw four on my best owl day ever there.  Yesterday I found one deep in a group of trees.  This photo does little more than confirm I actually saw an owl.  Any day I see an owl is a good day, so I'll take it.

Sandhill Crane -- Merced National Wildlife Refuge, CA

Sandhill Crane -- Merced National Wildlife Refuge, CA

Red-tailed Hawk -- Merced National Wildlife Refuge, CA

Black-necked Stilt

As I was taking pictures I passed up a number of opportunities to shoot smaller birds.  That got me thinking about my interests and whether or not I consider myself to be a birder.  The answer is obvious to me, and it's no.  I certainly do a lot of things a birder would do.  I track my sightings on eBird (some of them, anyway).  I own a copy of The Sibley Guide to Birds.  I take a lot of pictures of birds.  That's the thing, though, it's all about the photos for me.  I passed up on photos of a northern shrike and tri-colored blackbirds because I wasn't interested in them.  Granted, the photos would have been tough to pull off but I had similar situations with the owl and the red-tailed hawk and I went after those.  Even more telling, I'd have dropped everything if an opportunity to shoot an otter or even a raccoon had come along.  I like ducks and geese and birds of prey and big birds like the sandhill cranes.  I think a birder would have been more excited about the shrike.

White-faced Ibis -- Merced National Wildlife Refuge, CA

Sandhill Crane -- Merced National Wildlife Refuge, CA

Sandhill Crane -- Merced National Wildlife Refuge, CA

Sandhill Crane -- Merced National Wildlife Refuge, CA

All in all, it was a nice little afternoon trip.  Thanks for the tip, Garry!

Merced National Wildlife Refuge, CA

Martin Luther King Jr. Regional Shoreline

Odds & Ends

January, 2014

I've been stopping by Martin Luther King Jr. Regional Shoreline on my way to work off and on over the last couple of weeks.  Stockpiling photos.  Trying things out with the new camera.  I think I've got enough interesting shots to make a post.

Burrowing Owl -- Martin Luther King Jr. Regional Shoreline, CA

I finally found the burrowing owl out there.  He seems to hang out in the same spot most mornings.  From a distance he looks like a large potato that has been stuck on a stick.  Actually, he looks a lot like that in the pictures, too.

Black-necked Stilt -- Martin Luther King Jr. Regional Shoreline, CA

There's usually a small flock of stilts hanging around.  They're funny looking birds.

Turkey Vulture -- Martin Luther King Jr. Regional Shoreline, CA

Cooper's Hawk

There was a dead bird on the road this morning.  It attracted a few vultures.  I was able to get some nice shots.

A cooper's hawk was hanging around for a while.  I saw him/her a couple of times.  I'm more convinced now than I was earlier that it was a cooper's hawk and not a sharp-shinned hawk.  What a good looking bird.

One morning a scroungy looking red-tailed hawk was hanging out in the trees.  His feet were dirty and his feathers were untidy and in general he looked like the kind of bird that worked dark alleys at night.  A bad seed, if you will.I assume it was a male only because it's hard to imagine a lady hawk letting herself go like that.

Red-tailed Hawk -- Martin Luther King Jr. Regional Shoreline, CA

California Towhee -- Martin Luther King Jr. Regional Shoreline, CA

 Ring-billed Gull-- Martin Luther King Jr. Regional Shoreline, CA

Martin Luther King Jr. Regional Shoreline

The Old and the New

January 6 & 7, 2014

Black-necked Stilt

I went to the estuary Sunday morning to take some pictures.  I had both cameras with me, but since I ended up mainly shooting birds and my zoom lens hadn't arrived yet I used my old camera a lot.  My new lens arrived on Monday so I went back to the estuary to try it out.  This new camera is definitely a game changer.

Again, I've got no real complaints about my old SX40.  I captured some images that I really like on Sunday, including the snowy egret and black-necked stilt photos here at the top of the page.  The funny picture of the white-crowned sparrow was also taken with my old camera.  Such a tough guy, that sparrow.

White-crowned Sparrow -- Martin Luther King Jr. Regional Shoreline, CA

The old SX40 couldn't have captured these Cooper's Hawk images, though.  It's good with stationary objects, but was never fast enough for moving targets.  There's also a delay of about a second between when the shutter button is pressed and when the picture is actually taken.  So, if it's not the shutter speed burning you it's the delay.

Cooper's Hawk -- Martin Luther King Jr. Regional Shoreline, CA

This shot of the hawk sitting on a fence?  The SX40 would have handled it fine.  I couldn't have gotten those shots of the bird landing, though.

Cooper's Hawk -- Martin Luther King Jr. Regional Shoreline, CA

I think that's a cooper's hawk, anyway.  I can't really tell the difference between a cooper's hawk and and a sharp-shinned hawk.

American Avocets -- Martin Luther King Jr. Regional Shoreline, CA

The 250mm zoom doesn't have the reach of the SX40's zoom.  The pictures are sharper, though, so even though I'm cropping more than before I think the pictures are still crisper than what I was getting with my old camera.  I can only imagine what this thing would do with a nicer lens.

Great Blue Heron -- Martin Luther King Jr. Regional Shoreline, CA