Field Guide – Linda & Robert Scarth

The male Sharp-tailed Grouse were still dancing on their leks at Namekagon Barrens in northwestern Wisconsin. When we walked to the blind on the Sunday morning it was 20° F (-6 C). The blind was snug and well designed; one of the best we have used. We were comfortable with our winter boots, snow pants and long underwear. We had awakened at 3:30 a.m. to be in the blind a few minutes after 5. There were some birds already at the lek. (When we had scouted the leks the first evening, we saw a few birds at one of the leks.)

Forty-five minutes later, as the sun peeked over the northeastern horizon, a warm glow tiptoed across the lek. There were at least 20 males visible through the blind’s port openings. More were seen occasionally jumping just over the edge of the highest area in the middle of the lek.

The birds did not tiptoe but stamped out their flamenco steps while rotating and sometimes moving quickly to one side. They spoke a language of cackles and chuk-a-luks with cooing undertones. Perfect music to accompany their performances.

Even as it became light we needed to keep high ISOs and shallow depth of fields to keep the shutter speeds up enough to stop the action as the birds danced.  One frustration was their tendency to move to spots where their heads were blocked by tufts of grass while their bodies and tails remained in sharp focus. The job of deleting such images is always a necessary chore.

After the last birds flew south across the Barrens just before 8 a.m., we walked back to our pick-up camper on a beautiful morning and headed to Virginia. While there we did programs for the Williamsburg Bird Club and the John Clayton Chapter of the Virginia Native Plant Society. The weather was warm and and the reception friendly.

Our hosts took us to Jamestown Island where we found the large patches of Jamestown Lilies that the first settlers commented on 400 years ago. They were in full bloom around the edges of wetter grassy areas. More on them next post.

Yesterday was our first group field trip of the season. Last year Spring had arrived a month and a half earlier but this year it is lagging here in the Midwest. Dave Gossman invited the Iowa Woodland Owners Association and the Iowa Native Plant Society to explore his property and learn how he manages his farm for trees, native plants and the wildlife that lives there along with raising no-till corn and soybeans in conjunction with his other enterprises.

There were a few blooms – hepatica (below), bloodroot, wood anemone, Dutchman’s britches. We also found lots of trout lily leaves and blue cohosh stems in the woods. A few shrubs and small trees had buds. The only obvious fungi were many Devil’s Urns. But mostly we enjoyed the bare bones of the canyon and upland landscapes.

Among the largest and smallest objects of the day was a giant old oak tree and the contents of an owl pellet.

From its shape and size this oak must have once been part of a savannah on the upland at the time of European settlement of eastern Iowa. It stands near the edge of one of the highest bluffs above Buck Creek. There are other oaks with wide spreading arms that let viewers know a bit about the past.

As we were photographing the owl pellet, a Barred Owl was heard calling back in the canyon. In the pellet were several tiny jaw bones, a backbone, some leg bones and even a tiny rodent skull.

Any day exploring the woods, creeks and grasslands has the promise of many opportunities to see and hear and smell the beauty of the earth – even if it not quite Spring.

In the last couple of weeks we have photographed at two Great Horned Owl nests. One is in a tree in the middle of a small town. A resident told us that parents have nested there for at least ten years. The second nest is in a cave on a cliff in a nature preserve. Owls have nested there for almost twenty years.

The youngsters at both nests appeared to be about six weeks old at the times we saw them. The one above, which we photographed a week ago, is high in a cottonwood tree. The large snag at the end of a big branch is hollow enough for a nest. If offers protection from the winter elements for the parent on the nest in January and February. We saw only one of the three youngsters.

There was natural light – sun in a hazy sky – on the nest snag at mid-afternoon and some fill flash was used. There are catchlights in the eyes, but the young owl’s bushy eyebrows shaded its eyes more than we liked. The general exposure was acceptable. Here is where converting a raw file with ACR (Adobe Camera Raw) came to the rescue. Because it was a raw file, adjustments to exposure around the eyes could be made with the adjustment brush without changing the overall exposure. Opening up the light on the eyes improved the image. Except for the eyes, the rest of the owl is well camouflaged in plain sight.

Yesterday we spent several hours observing the two youngsters (below) in their cave.  The cave is visible and at a good angle for observing from a bridge across the creek to the side of the cliff. Here the flash extender proved very useful. When we arrived, one of the twins was out on the ‘porch’ of the cave. It was a cooperative subject for full frame images while it napped, watched hikers across the creek and a insect flying around it, glared at a small child who stomped on the bridge, and sometimes looked at us. The flash and extender put a bit of light on its left eye which would have been shaded because natural light was coming from its right (left side of the image.)

When several boys in kayaks came quietly down the creek, the young owl considered them for a moment and retreated into the darkness at the back of the cave. Though in the  dark, we had seen movement from the second owl. We could see both of them moving about but could not see any details in the gloom. The overhang also obscured the scene.

We moved back along the bridge to change the angle of view and include both owls. In fact, we moved the tripod several times until the angle of view was perpendicular to the owls after they had settled into this pose. One of the youngsters dozed against the other.

The flash and extender overcame some of the darkness as the alert chick watched us with wider pupils because of the dim light. The sense of the setting would have been lost had the image been brighter  -  more flash exposure. The minus 1/3 flash exposure fill light kept the scene more natural while allowing us to capture the birds. Usually fill flash exposure is lower at minus 1 or more. By the time we made this image we were probably close to 90 feet away from the cave. Light from a flash diminishes at a distance.

As we often say, photography is always a compromise with light, camera settings, subject location and nature itself.

We are eager for Spring with the wildflowers, insects, migrating warblers and a greening world. In the mean time, to keep thinking color, composition, edges, shapes and all the elements of a good image, it is necessary to look around for other pursuits. The annual mineral and fossil show in March is a chance to wander about with cameras to see what catches our eyes.

Many of the exhibitors have geodes and crystaline chunks of various quartz and other minerals. Most exhibitors are happy to allow photography when asked. Some even offer to move a piece into better light with fewer shadows.

Light is an issue in the big halls with tungsten and fluorescent lights competing. Thank goodness for auto white ballance and raw image files.  Picking an in-camera white balance would be difficult because the variety of light sources. The ability to adjust the light balance and termperature in Photoshop or a similar program turns what a camera can do back into what our eyes and minds saw.

There will be polished agates which are mysterious and look like elevation lines on a subtley colored map with pools and cliffs.

Mineral slices backlit in an exhibit are works of abstract impressionism, just waiting to be photographed. This one caught our attention and is intriguing to contemplate. While the agate is soothing, this one is opposite. Both are good subjects to capture.

Parrots are smart and adaptable. That is part of their appeal. Several parts of the U.S. have become home to escaped psittacines who found one another and established colonies. Feral parrots are controversial topic among birders and biologists.

On our recent trip to Florida we heard parrots talking (screeching) near our camp and followed the sound. The Nanday Parakeets (Nandayus nenday) were on wires observing and discussing the happenings at the RV dump station. They are also called Black-hooded Parakeets or Nanday Conures.

The day was gray and rainy. Several pair posed for us before flying off calling to the rest of their small flock. The Parakeets appeared as dark sillouettes until we opened exposures enough to see some of their color. This made the sky pale, which many consider uninteresting. In these images the blank background is not objectionable. Further increases in exposure in Photoshop were needed to see the red feathers that fringe their legs. The greens and turquiose colors were also helped by the increase in exposure though more digital noise is present. Photography is always a compromise.

Reddish Egrets (Egretta rufescens) are among the species discussed in the current (March-April 2013) issue of Audubon magazine. They are one of Audubon’s priority species because of its special habitat needs. Reddish Egrets live in the salt marshes and tidal flats othe southern U.S. and Mexico. These coastal marshes are under threat from development ant climate change.

At Fort Desoto County Park on Mullet Key south of St. Petersburg, Florida we had the unusual opportunity to photograph two of the three color morphs on the same beach. The white morph is sometime confused with Snowy and White Egrets. The bill is the easiest identifier. There is also a gray morph that can be confused with the Little Blue Heron, though the LBH is darker and does not have the pink on its bill. It would have been wonderful to also find a gray morph.

We would have liked to spend more time with these two birds (and the other species), especially getting to photograph behaviors like the wing spread in the top image. There was a family on the beach that allowed their children to chase the terns, gulls and egrets which were resting from the wind on the beach. The parents seemed to find their children’s inappropriate behavior amusing, even while we were quietly approaching birds. We decided pointing out that the children’s behavior was harassing the birds would have resulted in a confrontation rather than a teachable moment.

Yesterday we hung an exhibit in the Show House Corridor at the Greater Des Moines Botanical Garden. The images are on both walls of the corridor. In this photo, Robert is measuring the placement of the last six small frames, which are from our book Deep Nature: Photographs from Iowa, University of Iowa Press, 2009.

Last evening there was a reception for the two new exhibits: ours and the oil paintings by Vicki Ingham from Des Moines.  Many of her paintings are of landscapes in the northern Great Plains. It was wonderful seeing old friends and meeting new people. The GDMBG is undergoing changes which will be lovely to see and experience. We are pleased to be exhibiting there and invite you to visit the two current exhibits until April 30.

In May and June 2013, an exhibit of some of our bird images will hang at the Cedar Rapids Public Library’s new west side location.

Spring was making a more than tentative appearance during our recent trip to the southeastern US. In spite of the severe dry conditions, we saw Redbuds and Flowering Dogwoods in south Georgia and Florida. The tiny green flowers and their white petal-like bracts of this Flowering Dogwood (Cornus florida) which we saw in a state park in northern Florida were in much better condition than those we saw further south.

A few strands of Spanish Moss are seen in the background. Spanish Moss is not a moss but is an air plant which is common on some hardwood trees, especially Live Oaks in this part of the U.S.

Many years ago when we lived in Georgia, the Flowering Dogwood display in the Atlanta area in April was spectacular. People sometimes said that it looked like a cotton field from the air.

Several inches of snow fell today. Every inch is welcome to recharge dry soil as we wait for Spring. We have a Pagoda Dogwood (Cornus alternifolia) outside this study window. The layered branches all the way to the pagoda-shaped crown wear white snow fur along their tops.

The Pagoda Dogwood is a northern cousin of the Flowering Dogwood with very different blossoms – flat-topped clusters of fluffy, white, tiny flowers – that appear in late Spring. Their ranges overlap so some people can enjoy their beauty in succession.

The Iowa winter eagle watch season began today with two watches along the Mississippi River. More are scheduled along Midwestern rivers over the next two months. With most of the rivers frozen over, the only open water is found below dams (both large and small) on the larger rivers. The open water below dams is usually a good fishing spot.

We will be at the Bald Eagle Watch & Expo to be held from 10-3 on Saturday February 9, 2013. The organizers invited us to have a table at the Expo with some of our images for sale. Most will be small ones of Bald Eagles on greeting cards. We have made some larger prints of a composite of a Bald Eagle in flight across the sky.

The head study above shows the sparkling golden eye of this fish eating eagle. Its beak is certainly made for slicing up fish and other food items.

After you have watched eagles at the outdoor viewing area, we would enjoy visiting with you at the Expo site: the Brown Deer Golf Club, 1900 Country Club Drive, Coralville, IA. There will be several speakers and presentations during the day. The viewing area will be at the Tailwater West Picnic Shelter, Coralville Lake. The event is sponsored by the Corps of Engineers which manages the lake/reservoir, and by a number of bird and outdoor organizations.

The Bald Eagle has made a remarkable population increase since DDT was banned. Their voices are no longer silent in winter, nor in spring.

Sable Antelopes (Hippotragus niger) were among the most sought after trophies by big game hunters in the 19th and 20th centuries. They are still hunted in some areas. Sable Antelopes have become a special sighting for visitors and photographers. We were fortunate to spend some time with a herd of females who were associating with a small group of Zebras. A half hour after leaving the females we came upon a solitary male who also tolerated our presence, probably because he was inspecting an area where the females must have bedded down.

This large, very pregnant female seemed to be the leader of the female herd. They had spotted something in the distance which we could not see. Even after the other females and the Zebras settled down to graze and rest, she kept watch for a long time. There was a second large female who also seemed close to giving birth.

Our tracker and we spotted something dark through a thicket of trees at the same time. Our driver circled the trees and came to an open area with tall grass. There we found this bull with his magnificent set of horns. Though huge, our guide said they were not as heavy as they look. The male’s horn rings were much thicker than those of even the largest female.

The bull walked around, stopping to sniff at places where the grass was flattened or disturbed. The females must have rested here within the last day. He paid close attention to places they urinated. He was busy and did not seem concerned about our presence.

He was checking for pheromones indicating that one or more of the females might be coming into estrus. We were able to make several images showing his flehmen, the act of opening his mouth and curling his lips to allow his vemeronasal sensory organ to evaluate the pheremones. We have both side views and front views of him doing this.

Flehmen is a German word. Many animals – cats, horses, sheep, antelopes – perform this action. Researchers at the National Zoo’s (U.S.) research facility have reported that female Sable Antelopes seem to use flehmen to syncronize their estrus and calving times. Abstracts of their work is findable using a search engine.

We hope this bull and the females we saw on this Botswana concession live long and prosper, including having many calves.