Articles

Apr 13 2019

Wild Turkeys Today – Rough conditions for ground feeders

Author: DakotaBirder • Discussion: No Comments

I had a blast birding west of Sioux Falls today. The conditions, however, were borderline dangerous in spots. The storm may be gone, but I’ve never seen so many downed powerlines, and some roads are simply impassable with the snow, ice, and mess as things start to melt. But with the harsh conditions, birds were definitely bunched up.  With plenty of open water, water birds were doing ok.  However, with ice as thick as I’ve ever seen it, other birds were struggling. I saw more Ring-necked Pheasants and Wild Turkeys out in the open than I ever have, all struggling to access food below the ice.

But…boys will be boys!  NOTHING is going to stop a Wild Turkey tom from strutting his stuff, and I had a great time shooting a small group of 3 toms that were displaying and carrying on for a nearby group of 4 female Wild Turkeys. There’s little doubt Turkey populations have exploded in the last 20 years (about the time I started birding), as I see them so much more often than I used to. They’ve also expanded the types of habitats they utilize. It used to be that I’d only run across Wild Turkeys along major riparian areas, or in the wooded state parks in the eastern part of the state. Now, I can be driving through cropland areas, and I’ll see small bands of Wild Turkeys hanging around small shelterbelts and farmsteads.

An underappreciated bird to me! So unique, and SO much fun to watch when they’re gobbling and carrying on. Here are some photos from this morning.

Wild Turkey - Meleagris gallopavo

Wild Turkey - Meleagris gallopavo

Wild Turkey - Meleagris gallopavo

Wild Turkey - Meleagris gallopavo

Wild Turkey - Meleagris gallopavo

Sep 25 2018

The Sparrow’s Nightmare – Haiku / Photo of the day

Author: DakotaBirder • Discussion: No Comments

The Sparrow’s Nightmare

Petite feathered grace,

luminosity expressed, shrouding:

The sparrow’s nightmare

American Kestrel - Falco sparverius

With fall migration in full swing, I noticed an influx of raptors today, with a number of Red-tailed Hawks perched on roadside telephone poles and fence posts. Accompanying them were American Kestrels in high numbers, a species that breeds here during the summer months, but can sometimes be found in very high densities during migration. Despite all my sightings of American Kestrels, I have few photos of the species. Along with the Belted Kingfisher, I can think of few birds more wary of my camera lens. For that reason, this photo is rather special for me…a brilliantly colored male American Kestrel, that uncharacteristically paused for a moment before flushing at my approach.  Just enough time to grab a few photos of one of my favorite species.  As for the poem, for decades they were called “Sparrow-hawks”, with the species thought to be most closely related to the Eurasian Sparrowhawk. It wasn’t until 1983 that the American Ornithological Society noted the much closer relationship with other North American falcons, and the species was renamed the American Kestrel.

Sep 22 2018

The Autumn Rebel – Photo / Haiku of the Day

Author: DakotaBirder • Discussion: No Comments

The Autumn Rebel

The flamboyant rebel

Defies autumn’s chilly hand

While verdure surrenders

Northern Cardinal - Haiku of the Day

Autumn has arrived in South Dakota, both by calendar, and by feel. A week ago I basted in heat and humidity while working outside all day. This morning I bundled up while I headed outside. The leaves are just starting to turn on most trees, yet it won’t be long before autumn’s brown replaces the summer verdure. I do LOVE the fall though, as it’s usually a pretty active birding period with migrants. While in summer, the brilliant colors of a bird are sometimes lost in the lushness of the surrounding landscape, in autumn stark contrasts are often seen. This is one of my favorite photos, “just” a Northern Cardinal on a crisp fall day, shuffling through the leaf litter looking for food. The warm, late afternoon light, the contrast between bird and surroundings, and the wonderful pose and head turn make it a scene I mentally picture when I think of the wonderful fall season.

Sep 06 2018

Photo/Haiku of the Day – Prairie Ghost

Author: DakotaBirder • Discussion: No Comments

The Prairie Ghost

Swift ghost of the prairie

shepherding harem and young

As winter’s despair beckons

Pronghorn Buck - Antilocapra americana

Custer State Park’s famed “Wildlife Loop” never disappoints, but it’s just after dawn when the magical moments occur. Pronghorn are often seen in Custer State Park, but they are typically easier to spot in the early morning hours, before most visitors start to arrive in the park. On this morning, a harem of perhaps 6 females and their young-of-the-year surprised me by cresting a nearby hill. They then slowly worked their way towards me as they grazed, unconcerned about the photographer in the parked car. Last to crest the hill was the big male, the protector of the little band. I watched for 15 minutes as the herd fed in the adjacent grasslands. As they slowly moved on down the hill, the trailing buck paused for a moment to give me a stare.  I evidently passed his judgement, and he then trotted off after his harem as they disappeared around the bend.  The grasslands were still lush from a wet and bountiful summer and forage was good, but the leaves were beginning to change, and a harsh South Dakota winter was just around the corner.

Aug 28 2018

Photo Haiku – The Literate Pheasant

Author: DakotaBirder • Discussion: No Comments
Ring-necked Pheasant - No Hunting

Probably my favorite photo of all time. This was taken near Presho, South Dakota, on a cold winter’s day. The sun was just rising, when I came over a hill and saw this male Ring-necked Pheasant on the fence. To my surprise he didn’t immediately fly, but stayed in the perfect position while I took several photos. The pose…the light…the setting…and of course, the “no hunting” sign…I couldn’t have staged a better photo set up myself. What better photo to inspire a haiku…

Aug 28 2018

Photo/Haiku of the Day – Summer’s Last Hummingbird

Author: DakotaBirder • Discussion: No Comments

Summer’s Last Hummingbird

Ruby summer splash

between the flowers they dash

till chased by Fall’s chill

Ruby-throated Hummingbird - Archilochus colubris

A male Ruby-throated Hummingbird hovering in front of flowers in our yard. It’s now been a couple of days since I’ve seen a male in our yard. They’re always the first to leave for the summer. I still have a couple of females and juveniles, but their time with us is short as well. With the constant buzz of activity in our back yard all summer long, it’s easy to take these guys for granted. Now we will wait another 8 months for their return.

Aug 24 2018

Differentiating Female (and male) Goldfinch Species

Author: DakotaBirder • Discussion: No Comments

I was on travel for work this week which mean any blogging or work on my website was delayed. When I returned, I had an email that was thanking me for my “Difficult Bird ID” page, where you can find information on differentiating between commonly confused species. There was also a request to add another page, discussing how to tell apart the three North American goldfinch species. I don’t normally think of goldfinches as a particularly difficult group to identify, but then again, here in eastern South Dakota, we only have the one species. Overall, geography is obviously a huge part of identifying goldfinches, as in the eastern half of the country, the only species of goldfinch you’ll find are American Goldfinch.  However, if you happen to find yourself in parts of the southwestern US, you have three goldfinch species you may potentially encounter, with Lesser Goldfinch and Lawrence’s Goldfinch join the party.

The woman who sent the email lived in California and specifically was trying to figure out how to easily identify female goldfinches. That does represent more of a challenge than differentiating male goldfinches, and given that my Difficult Bird ID pages are some of the most visited pages on my entire website, I thought tonight I would go ahead and create another page that talks about ID keys for the three species.

As with many “difficult” IDs, for birders I think that difficulty melts away with experience, particularly when given keys to look for.  Creating a page such as this helps me as well!  I don’t run into Lesser Goldfinch, for example, unless I travel, but I don’t know if I could have identified a female goldfinch as either Lesser or American in the areas they overlap in range, until creating this page. Now I’ll know what to look for (bill color, and undertail covert color are giveaways).

A bit of a pain to create these pages, but as I said, they are frequently visited.  Click below for the new Goldfinch ID page.

Identifying North American Goldfinch Species

Identifying Goldfinch Species (female)

Females of the three North American goldfinch species. Males in breeding plumage? Piece of cake. A little bit harder for the females (particularly American and Lesser), but not bad when you know what to look for.

Aug 18 2018

POTD – Costa’s Hummingbird with splash of pollen

Author: DakotaBirder • Discussion: No Comments

Today I worked out in the back yard. All. Day. Long.  I’m beat, but got a lot done, and it was a nice day. A bonus…it was nice seeing all the birds coming to my feeders, including a still very active hummingbird feeder.

This is my yearly, gloomy post, focusing on the fact that my hummingbirds are about to leave me for, oh…8 months. The males already are slipping away, as most of the birds I now get are females and young. I have about 4 more weeks before they all disappear.

But this year shall be different! I refuse to go 8 months without seeing a hummingbird!  We are taking a family vacation this winter to Arizona, and while it’s not exactly prime hummingbird season in either variety or number, there are still plenty of hummingbirds around at that time of year. Today’s POTD is a Costa’s Hummingbird who obviously had just fed, from Madera Canyon in Arizona in November 2011.

Costa's Hummingbird - Calypte costae

Jul 28 2018

Photo of the Day: Broad-tailed Hummingbird

Author: DakotaBirder • Discussion: No Comments

I was going to go birding today, but alas, my Sjogren’s was flaring up and I wasn’t feeling very good. I stayed home and started processing my (many thousands) of old, unprocessed photos.  I have SO many photos I’ve taken over the years, and so many photos that I have yet to publish online (even on my massive out-of-control website), that I thought I’d start a new feature on my blog…the Photo of the Day. Oh, make no mistake, there’s no way I’ll ever publish a new photo of the day, every day.  Consider it more the photo for THAT day, rather than a series of daily photos. 🙂

First up…one of my favorite photos from our recent vacation to Colorado and Utah.  We visited 12 different National Parks and National Monuments in Colorado and Utah, and as we wound our way through Colorado, we stopped for one night at Winter Park, Colorado. When on vacation, I typically get my birding fix in during the early morning hours, waking before dawn and going out while my wife and son sleep in.  From our room, we could see a trail that ran along the shores of the Fraser River, so I thought I’d give it a try.

I was a bit surprised when I got out that morning, in that the warm summer’s day started out with a chilly 38-degree morning!  I started walking the trail just as the sun came up, but it took 20 minutes or so before the sun peeked over the adjacent ridge and started to brighten the area along the trail. Birds were a bit sluggish at first, perhaps because of the cold.  As I walked along, I saw a tiny bird on the top of a bush. As I approached, I saw a stubborn Broad-tailed Hummingbird, one who decided he wasn’t moving for any reason.

A challenge when shooting hummingbirds is getting the right light for the gorget of a male to “light up”.  I took many photos of this bird, but alas, for most of the time I spent with him, he was facing away from the sun. It wasn’t until I was about to move on that he shifted position, gave me a look, and then turned his head towards the sun.  BOOM…that brilliant magenta gorget lit up in the early morning’s sun as I took photo after photo.  The close range, the detail in the plumage, the clean background, and that gorgeous bright gorget made this one of my favorite photos from the trip.

Broad-tailed Hummingbird (Selasphorus platycercus)

Male Broad-tailed Hummingbird, hanging out on a sunny perch on a cold Colorado morning.

Jul 28 2018

A visual depiction of the problem with men…

Author: DakotaBirder • Discussion: No Comments

I haven’t done much with the website or blog lately, as I’ve been quite busy with work, including some travel.  I’m back home this weekend and am having a lovely morning, going through old, unprocessed photos, of which I have many.   I came across this photo of a pair of Bufflehead drakes fighting (a photo taken so long ago I don’t even remember it), and a blog topic came to mind.  The topic…just how dangerous it is leaving us men in charge.

This photo perfectly demonstrates men.  Testosterone…conflict…trying to prove your manliness with a show of strength.  When a problem arises, THIS is how men tend to handle things.  OK, sure, it’s all well and good if it’s a couple of cute little ducks on the pond, but the same concept applies to world leaders with powerful armies and weapons at their disposal.

Cheery thoughts to start the weekend!

Buffleheads (Bucephala albeola) fighting

Boys being boys…two Bufflehead drakes fighting.

 

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