Black Skimmer’s Landing Gear
This black skimmer was doing a fly-by and actually skimming at Bolivar flats, which is a somewhat rare event in that location. From my experience over the past several years, they usually just fly around looking for a place to land so this was a very nice change of pace. Especially since this was during a guide trip that I was leading with three great guys from New Zealand, Canada and Indiana.
It’s always a challenge to capture these birds in flight while using a ground pod since your range of motion is limited while laying on the ground. Added bonus was he briefly turned directly towards me. Also like that his feet were hanging like landing gear coming down.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 500mm F4 IS II with 1.4X III teleconverter mounted on Skimmer ground pod with Wimberley II gimbal head.
1/1250 sec @ F10, ISO 800, evaluative metering, +1 exposure compensation
All Puffed Up
This white morph reddish egret was all puffed up while strutting around Bolivar Flats. There has been a record crop of white morph’s around this neck of the woods lately, which is very cool.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 500mm F4 IS II with 1.4X III teleconverter mounted on Skimmer ground pod with Wimberley II gimbal head
1/2000 sec @ F8, ISO 400, evaluative metering, no exposure compensation
Reddish Egret Stalking
This reddish egret was stalking its prey just after sunrise. He had his head on the down low while running towards the fish. His legs lined up perfectly that it looks like he only has one leg with two feet attached to it.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 500mm F4 IS II with 1.4X III teleconverter mounted on Skimmer ground pod with Wimberley II gimbal head
1/125 sec @ F10, ISO 1600, evaluative metering, +1 1/3 exposure compensation
You Lookin at Me??
You lookin at me? Better not be. My boys behind me will come after you.
Made another trip to Bolivar Flats over the Memorial Day weekend while guiding three clients for two days. They were at the end of a 3 week trip across south Texas with the Galveston area their last stop. Thanks again to Kent, Bill and Ian for allowing me to show you around this part of Texas. Had a great time and got to see lots of birds.
Made two stops to Bolivar Flats and found some avocets, reddish egrets and lots of snowy egrets. Had several opportunities for some interaction shots which are always fun. One was a little weird with an avocet trying to mate with an inanimate object. More on that later.
While focusing on a avocet, saw two snowy egrets walking behind him. Switched my attention to the background and visualized this shot coming as they crossed behind him. The avocet cooperated by staring at me while getting some scratching action in. Made for a cool shot.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 500mm F4 IS II with 1.4x III teleconverter mounted on a Skimmer ground pod with Wimberley II gimbal head
1/1250 sec @ F10, ISO 800, evaluative metering, +1 exposure compensation
Spoonbill Wingspan
Drove down to the Rockport, TX area at the end of April to participate in a workshop with Hector Astorga. We spent two mornings visiting the Aransas NWR rookery by boat. We experienced very high winds and high surf but boat captain Kevin Sims did an excellent job as always. It was quite the roller coaster ride getting to the rookery with three foot waves bouncing the small flat-bottomed boat around in the dark before sunrise.
Once we arrived at the rookery, the waves reduced but the anchor wasn’t successful at keeping the boat still so Kevin put on his waders, jumped into the water and held onto the boat to keep it from moving around. He would then push the boat around manually when we needed to switch positions around the island. He definitely went above and beyond the call of duty on this trip
The rookery was filled with great blue herons and spoonbills, along with a few snowy egrets, reddish egrets, black crowned night herons, oystercatchers and terns. Most of the chicks were fairly large but were still actively being fed by their parents.
Caught this spoonbill coming in for a landing with his wings outstretched while positioned at the upper deck of the boat. With the wind/waves, it was challenging to keep the camera steady on my tripod. Took way too many photos but liked how this one turned out. Very minimal cropping on the right side. Had to crank up the ISO to 3200 to get a decent shutter speed.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 500mm F4 IS II mounted on tripod with Wimberley II gimbal head
Aperture priority, 1/1000 sec @ F5.6, ISO 3200, evaluative metering, 500mm
Pelican Stealing White Morph’s Fish
Here are some photos of the brown pelican scaring the white morph reddish egret in order to steal his fish. He surprised me as well and they were too close at 700mm and ended up clipping the pelican’s wings in the first shot. You can see the fish drop in the second photo with the pelican getting ready to enjoy his spoils in the last shot.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 500MM F4 IS II with 1.4X III teleconverter mounted on Skimmer ground pod with Wimberley II gimbal head
1/1600 sec @ F11, ISO 800, evaluative metering, +1/3 exposure compensation
1/1600 sec @ F11, ISO 800, evaluative metering, +1/3 exposure compensation
1/1600 sec @ F11, ISO 800, evaluative metering, +1/3 exposure compensation
Flying Fish – White Morph Style
As a continuation from my last post, both white morph reddish egrets that we saw caught some very large fish. A lazy or very smart brown pelican then started to chase the white morphs to scare them into dropping the fish so that he could reap the benefits of the great fishing skills of the egrets.
This white morph apparently fled the scene and kept the fish in tow while flying, which was a first for me to see, let alone photograph. Luckily he landed fairly close to us with a very nice wing spread.
Got some photos of the pelican getting one of the white morphs to drop his fish later in the morning. I’ll post those next time.
This was one of my most successful guiding trips to Bolivar Flats. This was a very rare event to witness/photograph so I’m very pleased that my client got to see this behavior and get some great photos.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 500mm F4 IS II with 1.4X III teleconverter mounted on Skimmer ground pod with Wimberley II gimbal head.
Aperture priority, 1/2500 sec @ F11, ISO 800, evaluative metering, +1/3 exposure compensation
Aperture priority, 1/1600 sec @ F11, ISO 800, evaluative metering, +1/3 exposure compensation
Aperture priority, 1/1600 sec @ F11, ISO 800, evaluative metering, +1/3 exposure compensation
White Morph Reddish Egret
On this recent trip to Bolivar Flats in Texas, the reddish egrets were out in force, including two white morph’s. I was guiding Bruno from San Diego, who hadn’t seen a white morph before so it was great timing. They danced around right in front of us and both ended up catching some very large fish and had a close encounter with a brown pelican. More photos to come.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 500mm F4 IS II with 1.4X III teleconverter mounted on Skimmer ground pod with Wimberley II gimbal head
1/1600 sec @ F10, ISO 800, evaluative metering, +1/3 exposure compensation
1/2000 sec @ F11, ISO 800, evaluative metering, +1/3 exposure compensation
Brown Pelicans in Missing Man Formation
These brown pelicans were flying in formation in a line when three of them broke off in what looks like the missing man formation. Taken during my second trip to Galveston’s FeatherFest.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 500MM F4 IS II mounted on Skimmer ground pod with Wimberley II gimbal head
1/1600 sec @ F5, ISO 400, evaluative metering, +1/3 exposure compensation
Ground Level Bird Photography Field Trip #1 – Galveston FeatherFest 2017
Last Thursday through Sunday was a very busy time for me at Galveston’s Texas FeatherFest. I led three classroom workshops and three field trips. This was my 5th year being one of the photography leaders and it was a blast, as always.
My field trip on Saturday started off by catching the 6:00 a.m. Bolivar Ferry. I met up with my group once we got off of the ferry and they followed me to Bolivar Flats. It was going to be a sunny morning with low tide so I was hoping that the birds were going to be out. Reports from the previous day indicated that the tide was abnormally low along the jetty without many birds in that area. Upon pulling up to the parking area on the beach, I could see that there were some exposed sandbars and what looked like a flock of avocets, which was a major relief. After we geared up, I gave everyone a quick lesson on how to try to try to keep their hands clean when lying down and getting up and we headed out.
There were two other photographers lying on the beach shooting the avocets so I decided to take my group out on the sandbar so that we weren’t looking into the sun all morning. We walked through the water to the sandbar without incident, which wasn’t the case on Sunday. More on that on my next post.
Ended up having the group lay down on the sandbar in a long row so that we wouldn’t be in each others line of fire for photography. We had 8 participants along with myself and my liaison, who helps me keep track of everyone and gets us back to the headquarters on time. I had the first person lay down near the water line at the north edge of the sandbar since the tide was supposed to be receding. Well that theory didn’t work too well as the water level came up later and the first couple of people started getting wet so we had to shift the line to the right, which would have been an interesting video.
The flock of avocets kept walking back and forth across the area between the sandbars, which provided some decent photo op’s. It’s always a challenge of trying to get one of the birds isolated from the flock. Decided to get a little closer after a while so we practiced crawling on the sand while pushing our ground pods along.
After the action died down, I had the group rotate 180 deg. so that we could get some photos of willets that were in the water behind us. Also, I had noticed several groups of avocets and brown pelicans flying by our sandbar and it finally hit me that we should turn around and get photos of them flying towards us. That turned out to be a great decision as they birds kept coming our way for the rest of the field trip.
Thanks to Richard Howard for being my liaison and to everyone who came out to play in the wet sand with me. I’m hoping that you had as much fun as I did and got some great photos from a different perspective that what you normally see.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 500mm F4 IS II with 1.4X III teleconverter mounted on Skimmer ground pod with Wimberley II gimbal head.
This photo is of the flock of avocets that kept walking back and forth in front of us.
Aperture priority, 1/1250 sec @ F10, ISO 1600, evaluative metering, +2/3 exposure compensation, 700mm
Caught these two avocets that were isolated from the rest of the group. I’m always looking for how two birds will interact of make an interesting photo together, such as their beaks crossing when coming close to each other, etc. These two made a cool mirror image of each other.
Aperture priority, 1/1600 sec @ F10, ISO 1600, evaluative metering, -1/3 exposure compensation, 700mm
After we turned around, several groups of avocets flew close to us. This group was clustered together when I first spotted them and they then spread out as they got closer to us. The ones on my far right were doing some very cool synchronized flying with common wing positions.
Aperture priority, 1/1600 sec @ F10, ISO 800, evaluative metering, +1/3 exposure compensation, 700mm
This is the same group 1 second later as they got a little closer.
Aperture priority, 1/1600 sec @ F10, ISO 800, evaluative metering, +1/3 exposure compensation
Here are the group photos so that I have evidence that yes, they actually laid down in the wet sand and…
Aperture priority, 1/1250 sec @ F9, ISO 800, evaluative metering, +1 exposure compensation, 700mm
…that they got wet and dirty. Mission accomplished.
Aperture priority, 1/1250 sec @ F9, ISO 800, evaluative metering, +1 exposure compensation, 700mm
Willet Wars
On my last trip to Bolivar Flats, the willets were in fighting mode with breeding season in full swing. While taking photos of avocets, the willets were squawking away and chasing each other around. These two started going at it and were circling around after one grabbed the others neck. He then lifted off trying to get away but the other one held on for a while. He finally broke free and left the area.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 500mm F4 IS II with 1.4X III teleconverter mounted on Skimmer ground pod with Wimberley II gimbal head.
Aperture priority, 1/1000 sec @F 7.1, ISO 1600, evaluative metering, + 1 1/3 exposure compensation
Avocet Silhouette
About 3 minuets after the brown pelican sunrise photo per my last post, caught this group of American Avocets passing under the sunrise. Made for a cool silhouette shot.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 500MM F4 IS II with 1.4X III teleconverter mounted on Skimmer ground pod with Wimberley II gimbal head
Aperture priority, 1/8000 sec @ F5.6, ISO 1600, evaluative metering, -1/3 exposure compensation
Pelican in Rising Sun
In preparation for my two field trips that I’m leading to Bolivar Flats during Galveston’s FeatherFest, made a scouting trip to the coast last Sunday. My original goal was to scout out the area but will have to try that one again as I didn’t get past the parking area due to a flock of Avocets being right there before the sun came up.
Caught this brown pelican doing a fly-by as he passed near the sun. Was able to see him coming as I’ve learned to shoot with both eyes open, which is one of the tips in one of my classroom workshops that weekend.
Very little cropping on this shot, which made it a little more challenging than normal for a flight shot off of a ground pod with the limited range of motion from side to side.
Here is a link to the FeatherFest website. We have several great photography leaders with both classroom workshops and field trips. This will be my 5th year leading my events. As of a week ago, there were a few spots left on my trips so check them out if interested.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 500mm F4 IS II with 1.4X III teleconverter mounted on Skimmer ground pod with Wimberley II gimbal head.
Aperture priority, 1/1600 sec @ F7.1, ISO 1600, evaluative metering, +1 exposure compensation
Whooping Cranes
Made my first trip to the Rockport, TX area to see the Whooping Cranes a few weeks ago. It’s been on my bucket list forever since I’ve lived in Texas but never made it there until now. Thanks Scott for the invitation.
We took a boat tour with Kevin Sims and he got us very close to the cranes at the Aransas NWR. He has a small flat-bottomed boat that he beaches on the shore to help keep it stable to shoot from with a tripod. With the upper and lower decks, there are plenty of different perspectives to get.
http://texasbirdingphotos.net/
We went out for two mornings in a row but it was cloudy most of the time. I’ll definitely be going back again next year.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 500MM F4 IS II mounted on tripod with Wimberley gimbal head
1/2500 sec @ F11, ISO 800, evaluative metering, -2/3 exposure compensation
1/1250 sec @ F10, ISO 400, evaluative metering
Get Off My Head!!
These lazy, or smart, laughing gulls were standing on the brown pelican heads when they came up from catching fish. They would then reach down and grab a fish. Gutsy little critters.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 500mm F4 IS II with 1.4 X III teleconverter, handheld out my car window
Aperture priority, 1/2000 sec @ F8, ISO 1600, evaluative metering, +1/3 exposure compensation, 700mm
Brown Pelican as a Fishbowl
Found this Brown Pelican fishing off of the Texas City dike. It’s fun to watch them dive into the water and then to see what they come up with. He was getting harassed by a laughing gull that would stand on his head waiting for him to come up with fish to steal.
Got this shot after the gull flew off with a fish. The back-lighting helps with showing off the veins in his beak. This little fish didn’t have a chance but popped up to get his picture taken.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 500mm F4 IS II lens with 1.4X III teleconverter, handheld out my car window
Aperture priority, 1/2000 sec @ F8, ISO 1600, evaluative metering, +1/3 exposure compensation, 700mm
My Favorite Photos from 2016
As 2016 comes to an end, it’s time to reflect on this year. From a work/personal perspective, it was a very busy year with less time for photography than normal for me. From a photography perspective, there were fewer local trips but more trips outside of the Houston area including California, Lubbock TX and the Valley area in SW Texas. Galveston’s FeatherFest in April was a blast as always.
My goals for 2017 are to continue to expand my photography reach beyond Texas and to also try to get back to my roots more often around the Gulf coast area.
Thanks to everyone that checked out my blog and special thanks to those who commented on my photos.
Hope that everyone has a fun and safe new year’s celebration.
Here are some of my favorite posted photos from 2016.
Juvenile Caracara in Flight
Hope that everyone had a great Christmas yesterday. Didn’t feel like that time of year in the Houston area with mid 70’s deg F temperatures and very humid. Looking forward to some cold weather in January.
Here are some more Caracara shots from my last trip to Santa Clara ranch. They were taken at the raptor blind as the birds were coming in to perch.
Taken with Canon 1DX with Canon 500mm F4 IS II mounted on trip with Wimberley II gimbal head
Aperture priority, 1/3200 sec @ F8, ISO 1600, evaluative metering, +1 exposure compensation, 500mm
Aperture priority, 1/3200 sec @ F8, ISO 1600, evaluative metering, +1 exposure compensation, 500mm
Aperture priority, 1/3200 sec @ F8, ISO 1600, evaluative metering, +1 exposure compensation, 500mm 
Caracara Head Tilt
It’s always very cool to see how far Caracaras can bend their head back. There are times that it’s a challenge to move my head side to side, let alone try this one. Very flexible raptor.
Used negative exposure compensation to keep from blowing out the whites in his neck.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 500mm F4 IS II mounted on tripod with Wimberley II gimbal head
Aperture priority, 1/2500 sec @ F9, ISO 800, evaluative metering, -2/3 exposure compensation, 500mm
Caracara Wingspan at Sunrise
Caught this Crested Caracara as he was coming in for a landing at the Santa Clara Ranch raptor blind. Taken with my 100-400 II lens, which worked very well on this trip.
Aperture priority, 1/2500 sec @ F5.6, ISO 3200, evaluative metering, 400mm
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 100-400 II lens mounted on tripod with Wimberley II gimbal head.
Green Jay vs. Bee
This Green Jay was distracted by a bee doing a fly-by, which made for an interesting photo.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 500mm F4 IS II lens mounted on tripod with Wimberley II gimbal head
Aperture priority, 1/800 sec @ F8, ISO 1600, evaluative metering, +1/3 exposure compensation, 500mm
More Harris Hawks
Here are a few more Harris Hawk photos from last weekend.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 100-400 II lens or Canon 500mm F4 IS II mounted on tripod with Wimberley II gimbal head
Aperture priority, 1/3200 sec @ F7.1, ISO 1600, evaluative metering, -2/3 exposure compensation, 400mm
Aperture priority, 1/6400 sec @ F5.6, ISO 3200, evaluative metering, 400mm
Aperture priority, 1/2000 sec @ F9, ISO 1600, evaluative metering, 500mm
Aperture priority, 1/4000 sec @ F8, ISO 1600, evaluative metering, +2/3 exposure compensation, 400mm
Aperture priority, 1/3200 sec @ F8, ISO 1600, evaluative metering, +1 exposure compensation, 500mm
Harris Hawk Landing
Made another trip to Santa Clara Ranch in south Texas over the weekend. Had a great time, as always. Thanks Hector. Finally got to experience the raptor blind and it was awesome. With a somewhat slow start, the action picked up with Scott and I maxing out with 10 raptors at the same time with a couple of Harris Hawks and the rest being Caracara.
Started out using my 100-400 lens and later switched to the 500. Got several decent flight shots and wing spread photos when they came in to land. This juvenile Harris Hawk put on a good show.
I’d go back just for the raptors. Hope to make another trip next year.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 100-400mm II lens, mounted on tripod with Wimberley II gimbal head
Aperture priority, 1/5000 sec @ F5.6, ISO 3200, evaluative metering, 400mm
Reddish Egret vs. Great White Egret
While taking photos of a Reddish Egret fishing, a Great Egret flew in to challenge the Reddish for the best fishing spot. The Great Egret won this confrontation.
Although the sun was reflecting off of the water, had use positive exposure compensation to get lighted up the birds. It blew out the water but it still works.
Taken with Canon 1DX and Canon 500mm F4 IS II with 1.4X teleconverter mounted on Skimmer ground pod with Wimberley II gimbal head
Aperture priority, 1/3200 sec @ F9, ISO 1600, evaluative metering, +1 exposure compensation, 700mm
Aperture priority, 1/3200 sec @ F9, ISO 1600, evaluative metering, +1 exposure compensation, 700mm
Tim Timmis Photography 