Brown Thrasher Photos

Photography by Terry Sohl

My Favorite: Brown Thrashers are a species that often make their presence known, through their voice. But they're also skulkers, denizens of brush and thickets, often seen foraging but then darting into cover when approached. Thus, while they're a pretty common bird here in the summer, I don't have a huge number of photos. My favorite photo is the one below, from May 2020 at Newton Hills State Park.

It's also a photo where I give full credit to modern technology! I normally don't put a lot of stock into the role of the equipment, in terms of getting a good bird photo. The biggest challenge typically isn't the photography itself...it's getting close enough to the bird. But in this, technology gets a big assist! This was a VERY gloomy, drippy, early morning. The light was so poor, that even with the camera I had prior to my Canon 90D and 100-400mm IS lens, I don't think I would have bothered trying this shot. There simply wouldn't have been enough light, to get enough shutter speed. The photos would have been blurry, without a doubt. But here, the Canon 90D's performance in low light is quite good, with the ability to dial up the ISO to a pretty high level, and still get a very good quality photo without grain. This was taken at ISO 4000, which on my old camera, would have resulted in an extremely grainy photo. The lens certainly helped to, as the IS (Image Stabilization) greatly improves your chances of getting a sharp shot, despite low light and a quite low shutter speed. Thank you modern technology for my favorite Brown Thrasher photo!

Brown Thrasher - Toxostoma rufum


Brown Thrasher 1	Brown Thrasher 2	Brown Thrasher 3	Brown Thrasher 4
May 19th, 2006	June 12th, 2006	May 20th, 2008	July 5th, 2010
Big Sioux Recreation Area, South Dakota	Beaver Creek Nature Area, South Dakota	Big Sioux Recreation Area, South Dakota	LaCreek National Wildlife Refuge, South Dakota
Brown Thrasher singing at the top of a locust tree	Single bird posing on dead tree branch	Thrasher with freshly caught beetle breakfast	Juvenile bird hiding in cattail marsh

Brown Thrasher 5	Brown Thrasher 6	Brown Thrasher 7	Brown Thrasher 8
May 13th, 2014	May 13th, 2014	May 13th, 2014	May 16th, 2020
Brandon, South Dakota	Brandon, South Dakota	Brandon, South Dakota	Newton Hills State Park, South Dakota
Grumpy thrasher posing in a crabapple tree	Spring foliage and Brown Thrasher	Brown Thrasher at bird feeder	Profile of bird foraging on edge of a hiking path

Brown Thrasher 9	Brown Thrasher 10	Brown Thrasher 11	Brown Thrasher 12
May 16th, 2020	July 12th, 2020	July 12th, 2020	July 5th, 2020
Newton Hills State Park, South Dakota	Minnehaha County, South Dakota	Minnehaha County, South Dakota	Hughes County, South Dakota
Thrasher posing on dead tree branch	Bird on wooden fence post with freshly caught breakfast	Thrasher with earthworm breakfast	Brown Thrasher posing on a barbed wire fence