Getting Close to the Action

Earlier this month I spent a few days in Florida shooting birds.

 

In particular I visited two places that I knew was home to many of our flying friends. One is Green Cay Nature Center & Wetlands in Delray Beach. The second is the town of Flamingo in the Everglades National Park where a boat toured the brackish backwaters among the mangroves. I enjoyed my time at both of these locations.

 

Thankfully I was able to get close ups of the wildlife yet stay far enough away from the birds by using a long telephoto lens.

 

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To find information about the Green Cay Nature Center & Wetlands:click here.

 
To book a two hour backwater boat tour in the Everglades from Flamingo Adventures click here.

 

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Written by: Arnie Lee
 
 

Things With Wings

 

Like many others, I’ve been fascinated with flight and things that fly.

On a recent trip to the parts of the USA where the sun is bright and warm, I had another chance to look skyward.

Here’s a short gallery of some of the sitings that caught my eye.

 
 

For those who are interested these photos are from Death Valley National Park, Ash Meadows National Wildlife Refuge, McCarran International Airport, Creech AFB, Nellis AFB and Everglades National Park.
 
 
Written by: Arnie Lee
 
 

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Earth Day “it’s for the birds”… and us too

Today is Earth Day. I’m guessing that many of you haven’t a clue as to what it’s about. Maybe you can get a glint of Earth Day here.

I recently completed writing what has become an annual article about Earth Day. Yesterday morning as I was having coffee and reading the Sunday NY Times, I was quite surprised that I didn’t find a single mention of Earth Day throughout the entire newspaper. But I did run across an interesting article that has a similar theme. As a lover of the outdoors, I’m an avid participant in nature photography. Having spent more than five decades with camera-in-hand, I’ve collected my share of wildlife images. Along the way, I’ve found that the most challenging parts of this favorite activity is capturing the varying graceful, delicate or powerful movements of birds in flight.

Yes, I like birds but I don’t consider myself a bird-watcher. Yet according to Brian Kimberling[1], there are some 5.8 million bird-watchers in the US. I’m not sure where he derives this number but his mention of The Audubon Society most likely accounts for a good share of them.

Last December amid our holiday festivities, I recall hearing about the start of Audubon’s annual Christmas Bird Count. During a two week period, participants take a census of birds in their geographic area with a main goal of studying how bird populations have changed in time and space. After reading Kimberling’s article, I have a better understanding of what these studies are telling us about the environment of all the non-bird species, i.e. us humans.

According the Audubon Society’s report, there has been a noticeable change in bird migration in recent years. The report says: we were able to look at the winter distribution of 305 species to see if their winter range had shifted over the last 40 years. We discovered that 177 of these species showed a significant shift north and this northward shift was correlated with an increase in mean January temperatures in the contiguous 48 states of almost 5 degrees during that time. You can find more details on the Audubon’s website.

Five degrees in 40 years. This is a pretty large increase within the lifetime of many of us. Obviously it’s a big deal to the habits of the birds.

Shouldn’t we be concerned? What do you think? I’d like to hear from you.

Written by Arnie Lee

[1]”What Do Birders Know”, NY Times Sunday Review Section, April 21, 2013

 

 

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