Birdwatching: I
This is the first of what (I hope) will be many posts on my birdwatching adventures. This spring, I’ve been deeply enjoying my time spent photographing my local birds; it’s been a bit of a surprise to me just how many different kinds there are in just a small section of Cincinnati. Below, you’ll see a fairly extensive gallery of my favorite photographs from May and June.
As an aside, for anyone who may be interested in birdwatching themselves, I have to spend some time recommending that you use a phenomenal app to help you identify them: Merlin. It comes from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, and it’s completely free to use (requiring only your email address). With it, you get access to powerful tools including photo ID and sound ID, which identifies bird songs and calls. It keeps track of the birds you’ve seen, too, forming a “Life List” of the species you’ve recorded. Perhaps most importantly, you can also submit your sightings to eBird (also from Cornell) to help power Merlin and other scientific applications.
May
The first birds this year to inspire me to get my camera out of its bag were a family of Canada geese and their young goslings. They’ve been marching around my apartment building feasting on grass and leaving a veritable mess on the sidewalks. They block the roads as cars are trying to park, and hiss when I walk too closely with my dog – but I still find them charming in their own special way. The goslings are fully grown now, just a bit smaller than their parents.
One evening, I was walking my dog and heard a cacophony of robin calls in the trees over a small creek that runs behind my apartment building in an otherwise fairly developed area. I looked over and, to my surprise, I spotted a barred owl being harassed – mobbed – by the robins. I’d never seen an owl before, and luckily for me it stayed put long enough for me to run inside and get my camera, helping me to get this (slightly blurry, very noisy) shot before the owl was eventually driven away.
Later in May, with warmer temperatures and longer days, I started taking walks in the nearby Otto Armleder Park, which happens to be a birding hotspot. The park’s main path follows along the Little Miami River on one side and an open meadow on another. It’s a fantastic place just for some exercise, too – it’s become mine and my girlfriend’s favorite spot to walk our dog.
After a couple weeks of regularly taking photos, I was itching for a camera lens with a longer reach. The Nikon 70-300mm kit lens just wasn’t long enough to reliably get usable photos of these tiny birds. So, I purchased the Sigma 150-600mm Contemporary lens (on a good sale), and I couldn’t be happier with the purchase. It’s expensive, but in the realm of photography equipment, it’s a steal.
The photos before this point were shot with the Nikon 70-300mm lens, and the photos after this point with the Sigma 150-600mm.
June
Another bird that surprised me right at my apartment, the house finch above kept flying over my head and perching on a tree near my balcony while I was working outside one morning. I went and grabbed my camera, and in just a few minutes later got a great photograph of the red-headed finch.
Of course, I’ve continued to make trips to Otto Armleder Park, where by the end of the first week of June, I’d identified 18 different species of birds just at the park.
One evening recently, I returned to the park after eating dinner, and overheard two kayakers in the Little Miami repeatedly shouting they they’d seen a bald eagle. Fortunately, I was in the right place at the right time, and I ran down a small trail off the paved park path to a riverside overlook to spot the national bird. It marked the second time in just a few weeks I’d seen a wild bald eagle, and the first I got a photo of.
Birding has become one of my favorite hobbies now. I’ve identified a total of 24 species and counting; I’ve seen more, but didn’t get photos in time to accurately identify them. I’m curious where that number will be later in the year.