Posted on March 9, 2016 in Birds, Documentary, Landscape, Nature, Painting Effect, Wildlife
Notes on the day. #1 – snow geese are unpredictable. #2 – pick your background first. I’ve been watching the snow goose migration at Middle Creek for years and if there is one thing that is certain, it’s that snow geese are unpredictable! One day they will be out of the park where you can’t access them to photograph and the next day they are on the lake or a few yards away feeding along the shoreline. On this particular afternoon, just before dusk, they relocated to a field adjacent to a nice brick home which made a pretty background for their late afternoon flight. Speaking of backgrounds, I try to position myself so that my photos have a darker background that will highlight the birds. This spot was right on target. I love the way the sun is illuminating the crops in the foreground. How fun it would be to have my yard be a stopover point for migrating snow geese!
Posted on March 6, 2016 in Birds, Nature, Wildlife
It was a good day at Middle Creek! The number of snow geese climbed back to 50,000+, the weather was cold, but bearable, and the geese were active! I made a mental note of #206 as I was scanning through my images during a break in the action as I thought it might be a favorite. I was right…I love this one! The depth of field could be a bit better, but given that birds are flying by quickly, I’m happy to come away with a handful of favorite images out of the 1200 or so that I shot over the course of a day. I love that you can see the water droplets beneath the bird on the left. They had just taken off from the lake and were headed to feed in a field with more of their friends.
Posted on February 29, 2016 in Birds, People, Wildlife
A sure sign that Spring is around the corner is when the snow geese return to Middle Creek Wildlife Management Area in Pennsylvania on their annual migration north. I spent some time with 80,000+ of my feathered friends over the weekend and they did not disappoint. I love the challenge of finding new and interesting ways to photograph the migration. For me, part of the fun is people watching. The number of photographers, birders, nature enthusiasts and even dogs, seems to increase every year. Everyone loves to photograph the geese … no matter what type of camera they have. I love this fun shot of a couple watching the geese return to the lake at dusk while photographing with a cell phone camera.
Posted on February 18, 2016 in Birds, Wildlife, Winter
The snow geese are starting to return to Middle Creek Wildlife Management Area in Pennsylvania. Every winter, they head north to their breeding grounds, stopping at Middle Creek along the way. Mid-February to mid-March is usually when they visit, but timing is dependent upon the amount of ice covering the water and the amount of snow on adjacent fields. The geese feed in the fields during the day and roost on the water overnight, so ice and snow cover keeps the birds away. I’m looking forward to a few visits to Middle Creek this year…it’s become an annual photography excursion for me. This image is from last year on a day when there were over 100,000 snow geese at Middle Creek!
Posted on October 27, 2015 in Birds, Nature, Wildlife
While I was out photographing Fall color over the weekend, I visited a lake that had plenty of ducks and geese. Mostly all of the ducks were Mallards, and then there was this little Merganser. I haven’t seen this species before, so I was able to add it to my “Life List”.