Vermont- Black-throated blue

Here are some more warbler shots from vermont. The black throated blue warblers were everywhere. Just like the chesnut sided warbler he was very cooperative and moved around giving me a back shot. I dont know if i will be able to beat these pictures in the future.

I just got back from camping, got some good bunting prairie warbler and field sparrow pictures.

Bay breasted or Parula????????????

Abe from http://mybirdsblog.blogspot.com/ recently posted a picture of a northern parula. I saw it late after 16 people commented on it. To me it looks different. I went in my sibleys and really thought it looked like a female bay breasted. I could be totally wrong and thats why i am making this post below is the picture he took with my arrows on it.

ARROW 1- shows the white patches on the side of face. Seen on bay breasted warblers not parulas.

ARROW2- Shows the rufous colors below the face and there are some down the sides that most bay breasts have.

Parulas and bay breasted both have wing bars and female bay breasted have the eye ring making them hard to differ from parulas. The key feauture that stuck out was the white on the side of face. Notice abes and the two other bay breasted pictures have the white pale sides of face but the parula doesnt. Lets hope this is a bay breasted and Abe will have a new lifer bird!!

Below is a parula notice there are no pale sides of neck

Vermont birds!

Vermont was a lot of fun. I had big expectations and it turned out to be great. We ended up with 14 warbler species. Both waterthrushes seen in back yard. Black throated blue and greens were all over the place.Chesnut sided were also everywhere. There was 5 or so blackburnians throughout the different conifer grooves. We had parula this morning as we left so i never got a good picture. Of course i did not get a magnolia warbler... or canada. The habitat wasnt good for them but o well.On the bottom of road theres a field that had 5 bobolinks, and a alder flycatcher near by. 4 thrushes: hermit,wood,veery,swainsons. Magnolia warbler seems to be my nemesis bird. And big thanks to birdgirl because the R2D2 thing totally helped find me a Bobolink :)

I got good pictures of black throated green, black throated blue, blackburnian, and chesnut sided. Ill start off with the chesnut sides

He turned around on the perch giving some cool oppurtunities to get back shots.

Memorial weekend excitement

Bird-boy is ready for this upcoming weekend. I have been waiting for this for 2 months. My birding extravanganza. I am goin up to the the warbler breeding ground in vermont. My uncle owns a cabin on a huge mountain road in southern vermont. The habitat is unbeleivable. There are possibably 5 houses and millions of birds. Well I hope there is. The road has all habitats. At the base is a hgue field with nesting bobolinks. Then you wake your way up a stream wetland habitat, more fields, and dense dense conifers. My uncle is a birder and says its awesome. SOme key warblers he said nesting that I am excited for is Blackburnian,canada,magnolia,bt green, bt blue. Its a bird-boys candyshop. Wish me luck and i hope to come home with some beautiful shots.

Bird-boys anger--- Maybe I am excited because my warbler luck in New york sucks. This blue winged warbler shot i got the other day. He was singing right at me. When i took the shot a leaf must have swayed in fornt of his face urrrrrrrrrgggggg

Small birds in flight....too hard

I find it almost impossible to get a passerine in flight. They are so fast and unpredictable. Every picture I ahve of a small bird in flight is quite horrible. There is something that always can go wrong. I had a scarlet tanager as you can see below, perfectly in focus off the branch... too bad i was on the worst possible shutter speed making the red bird look black.

The parairie warbler is just bad


Swallow out of frame

Yellow warbler that can be confused with a plane.

Nesting warblers

I traveled to a local nature preserve yesterday. It was late about 5. I can not get enough of warblers so when my parents can drive me somewhere, were gone. Well we took a path through these huge powerlines. The habitat beneath them was awesome. Tons of prairie warblers called. Dont forget the blue wings. I really hope i can pull a golden winged warbler from that place this year. We were there for about a half hour and also had redstart, b and white, oriole, and scarlet tanager. This weekend i will wake up early and see if anything is different. Urggh school. I should go to tommorow but noooo, math class at 7:45 ewww

More migration

Here are some more pictures from Jamaica Bay and forest park. The coolest part of the trip was a canada warbler. Such awesome colors. Sadly the only picture of him i got was him high tailing it out of my frame :( Got some pictures of other things including Northern Water thrush, black throated blue, parula, common yellowthroat, american redstart

Spring Migration!

I really do love spring migration. I went to two birding hotspots today. We started the morning at Jamaica Bay. My favorite bird ever is the magnolia warbler. yet for some reason I have never seen one. When its left im right. When the magnolia is the south garden at Jamaica Bay im in the north. Well today i hit it perfectly. A quick 5 second glimpse made me happy. There were birds everywhere today. We also stopped at forest park where i got a lifer canada warbler..AWESOME!! Here are some pictures but not all at once.

above is btg warbler


above is b&w warbler

above and below chesnut sided warbler at forest park waterhole

Barred Owl Back On Nest

Last year, I found a Barred Owl nest. It was awesome. I called up a friend and cursed so much i was so happy. They produced two young last year. Well I got a call that they were back in the same tree this year. I went to check it out. Sure enough big mama flew out of the whole when i got close. Not great picture but my first Barred Picture! yay

Warbler Madness

I went to Jamaica Bay again this weekend. It was crazy. I spent along time training my bird songs. It was almost usless. There were so many birds calling I had no clue where to start. I had around 13 lifers. Unfortuneally it was very gloomy and almost impossible to get a picture of birds with such little light. There were tree swallows all around. I had fun taking pictures of them and the house wrens.

This one was very upset the tree swallow stole his house :(

Bird List

warblers

yellow

myrtle

parula

black and white

common yellow

nashville

chesnut sided

black throated green

black throated blue

blue winged

ruby crowned kinglet

white eyed vireo

blue headed vireo

white crowned sparrow

green winged teal

baltimore oriole

orchard oriole

rose breasted grosbreak

scarlet tanager

great crested flycatcher

tree swallow

rough winged swallow

chimney swift

barn swallow