Cormorants

Whenever you see dead trees standing in water, look for cormorants.



Near Cleveland, North Dakota right by Interstate 94.



There were hundreds of them and many nests.



Previously
wiki

A Few Photos

Magpies are a more prominent presence at our place this year, but have been difficult to catch on camera:


Water marks on the trees from the flood last year:

Starling Color Swap

I'm not sure what this starling was doing, but we caught him in the act.
Did a color swap on the photo, so cream and purple instead of blue and green.
Going for a minimalistic oriental look. I like it.

Hooded Merganser

Another new one for my North Dakota bird photo collection.
Male (Drake) Hooded Merganser (Lophodytes cucullatus)
Raised Crest, evidently (cornell).
He makes a distinct funny/odd sound (enature).

audubon:
 His most distinguishing feature is his crest, or “hood.” At rest or in flight, this hood appears as little more than a white line behind the eye, but when the drake is alert on the water, the fully-raised crest reveals an elaborate hood of white on an otherwise black head.

So in other words, he can look quite different on water depending on how he holds his head.
(google it)

npwrc
(Ducks at a Distance)

Through The Fog

Ominous looking barn swallows on the fence:



Previously

Eared Grebe

Eared Grebe (Podiceps nigricollis)


Not that interesting of a photo, but a new one to add to my bird collection.

cornell
enature
npwrc

Marshbirds and Shorebirds of North Dakota

Other grebes I have:
western grebe
pied-billed grebe

Snowy

I missed the excitement around 5:30pm last night.
My partner grabbed my dslr w tele and took the photos.
He's been seeing snowys a lot this year on the way home from work and finally one camped out near our place so he could take photos with a decent lens.
Yay!
I hope I get to see one of these snowy owls too.

UPDATE 5Mar12

I got some snowy photos too! Same area and same time. Mine weren't as good, but still fun to observe and I got to see him in flight also. Thank you, Mr. Snowy.



The moon was out at this time so I shot a few moon photos and then layered it in to the owl photo. It was easy to do because similar colors and lighting.

Previously

Hoar Frost on the Prairie

Finally, something interesting to photograph out there this winter.







Ponderosa Pine:



Mailbox:


Hark a Lark:



I thought that was unusual to see a horned lark hopping around in February, but references say "year round" resident in North Dakota.
cornell
His pose makes me laugh.

hmhbooks peterson field guide
Yellow brow (Northern race) vs White brow (Prairie race)

Golden Eagle

We heard about snowy owls in the area (active during daytime) so we went for a drive.
No snowy owls, but what do we have here?




A golden eagle.
Location near the Missouri river.
He seemed kinda scraggly; made me think he was a juvenile.

Didn't get any clear photos.
We returned to the area next day and didn't see anything.

cornell
enature
npwrc

The Downy and The Goldenrod

I found an interesting tidbit about the downy woodpecker and the goldenrod plant.
Both are common/abundant in North Dakota, so maybe I'll get a chance to photograph them together some day.
The article said "Canada" goldenrod?
(Mag quote: "It attacks two species within the Canada goldenrod complex almost exclusively.")

Winter Treat For Downies
Birdwatching magazine December 2011 issue

See also:
fcps.edu
via
reddit

Here's a photo of a downy I took recently in November 2011.

Blogged previously here.
The hairy woodpecker looks very similar but is bigger.

Here's a photo of goldenrod I took in August 2011, which is the month it is plentiful all over the state.
Not sure if it's Canada goldenrod.



Blogged previously here.

There are 5 kinds of goldenrod in North Dakota.
npwrc
Asteraceae (The Aster Family)

MORE LINKS:

birdwatching
Goldenrod Bonus

From the same issue Birdwatching magazine:
ID Tips for the Pine Siskin
And
Peregrine Falcon vs. Snowy Owl

Bald Eagle Juvenile

Along the Missouri again, same area as the previous mature bald eagle photo.

The regal head:

A Little Excitement Saturday

So we had a little excitement Saturday...





On a trail by the Missouri.

Here's a favorite inflight photo:


Bald Eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus)
npwrc
The bald eagle is uncommon in North Dakota and is usually seen along the Missouri River in late fall/early winter and in the spring during migration to its northern breeding grounds.
Bald eagles do not acquire their white-colored head and tail until about 4 years of age.
The bald eagle feeds primarily on fish.

Feb 2010 NDOutdoors magazine:
listed here
Nesting in Numbers - Active Bald Eagle Nests Up in ND - Feb 2010 - (330Kb PDF)
pdf direct link
It wasn’t until the mid-2000s that the number of nesting eagles climbed in North Dakota.
To date, North Dakota Game and Fish Department biologists have logged 103 individual nest sites, some of which are no longer in use because the trees have fallen or the eagles abandoned the sites.
In 2009, Game and Fish biologists estimated that 66 nests were occupied by bald eagles, though not all eagle nest sites were visited and verified. Bald eagle nests have now been reported in 29 of 53 North Dakota counties.

enature
cornell
Cornell has some good juvenile photos alongside the golden eagle for comparison.
I'd love to get photos of the golden eagle too.

Photo Walk

Some photos I like from a photo walk.



(Continuing the into the sun tall tree shadows photography study.)



Red Admiral Butterfly. I like the angle and the wood texture background. I thought it might be unusual to see butterflies this late in the autumn? Captured another one on camera but could not positively identify.

Migrants

Swarms of noisy Sandhill Cranes (Grus canadensis) passed over our place yesterday (12 Oct 11).
North Dakota is on their migration route.

First the V:


Then the swarms:


This is the closest one captured:



cornell
npwrc

Surprise Under The Bridge

The big event this weekend was discovering a great horned owl sitting high up under a bridge.



Closeup:


We found him about 8am during a morning walk and took a bunch of photos with my S3 Canon.
Then we came back with all three of my cameras about 11am.
Still there.
None of my/our photos turned out very well (poor close up detail) because of the lighting, angle, distance, etc.
I think that's the first time in nature that I thought "tripod" because my subject actually stayed put.
My arms, neck, shoulders ached from holding a camera high up in the air, taking pictures, but also just plain gawking at him thru the viewer. I tried a video on him also.

He had his eyes closed a lot of the time, but if there was noise, he would open them.
Besides observing his eyes open and close, which is quite fascinating to watch on an owl, we also saw him turn his head way around, lift his huge clawed foot, ruffle feathers, and mostly just sit there and tolerate us humans.



Here's a size comparison with a pigeon, because there were lots of those perched up there as well.



What a privilege to observe!
Before we left, I thanked Mr. Magnificent for the photo shoot.

Northern Rough-winged Swallow

Another one to add to my list of North Dakota birds photographed.

Northern Rough-winged Swallow
(Stelgidopteryx serripennis)
cornell
enature

Yellow-headed Blackbird

Got my first photos of this bird so I can add it to my list and blog it. If I get more/better photos I'll add them here.
This is the first time I've noticed those patches of white on the wings.

cornell
Note female is brown with yellow patches and white streaking.
The other bird with the male yellow-headed blackbird was a male house sparrow.

Sparrow Headache

Went for a walk in the field and kept getting different sparrow photos.
And I'm like, oh no, yet *another* sparrow. LOL
Sparrows are so difficult to identify.
I think I probably ended up with several ones I already have, Grasshopper, chipping, clay-colored, etc.
I like this one of the clay-colored sparrow (previously):



One sparrow photo really has me stumped, but I didn't like the background on it anyway, so I'm going to see if I can get something better before I blog it. I saw a juvenile robin out there also.

Here's some of the grass photos I like:





No coneflower blossoms yet, but they're coming up.
Too much yellow sweet clover in the field this year. I hope it's not taking over.