Month: March 2015

If you’re a bird photographer, Spring must be the best time of year because so many birds are desperately trying to call attention to themselves, none more-so than the small Marsh Wren. Although you might not always get this close-up of a shot, it’s easy to get a clear shot of them because they hang on the top of reeds loudly proclaiming their desirability.

This is a “classic” Marsh Wren pose,

and I’ve got an awful lot of them over the years. These were taken a little over two weeks ago.

When I returned a little later to Theler I immediately noticed that most of the reeds where I got my first shots had fallen over. In fact, there were so few reeds left standing that I didn’t expect to see the Wren at all. I was wrong; although the wren (or wrens) weren’t singing, one was frantically building new nests.

In fact, it was so busy dashing about that most of the time I found it nearly impossible to keep it in frame.

The last time I visited, though, the wrens were neither singing loudly nor frantically building a nest. There was an awful lot of tail flashing, though,

particularly when another wren would fly by. I don’t read Wren well enough to know whether the bird was trying to get its mate’s attention or whether it was warning other wrens to stay away from it’s much smaller kingdom.

It’s always a Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah kinda day for me when I can walk the boardwalk at Theler Wetlands surrounded by darting Tree and Barn Swallows. It’s a little too early for that kind of experience, but a few Tree Swallows have returned, and I always marvel at how close you can get to them before they fly off.

Not sure if this one was greeting me or complaining that I was disturbing his attempts at finding a mate, but it’s pretty unusual for one to actually vocalize while sitting on the boardwalk railing.

Maybe they’re a little grumpy that the weather has been so variable, in the mid-60’s one day and in the high-30’s the next , but for whatever reason this one seemed annoyed that I was walking by.

Judging from the number of carvings in the railing on the boardwalk out to the Sound I’m pretty sure that the boardwalk is a favorite of human young lovers, and it seems to serve the same function for the Tree Swallows.

My favorite moments are when the swallows seem perfectly oblivious to my existence, whether resting on the rail

or rocketing through the air seemingly inches away from my head, diving so fast that all you see as they pass is a blur.

I do love my day-long trips to the coast or the even longer five-day trips to Malheur or Sacramento, but it’s still the short trips to Theler Wetlands, Port Orchard, or, even, Ruston Way that get me through the year. Even in the middle of winter I usually find one day a week when it’s not raining. The birds at Theler may not be as numerous or as exotic as those I see on longer trips, but I can’t remember a disappointing walk there. Late winter/early Spring days often bring birds I don’t see in the middle of winter, like this Downy Woodpecker

that I located while trying to locate a bigger woodpecker that was making a much louder banging than this little woodpecker was capable of producing. The woodpecker I was looking for instead turned out to be a Red-Breasted Sapsucker that was amplifying his pecking by pounding on this birdhouse.

I’m quite familiar with Red-Shafted Woodpeckers who use anything they can find to amplify their mating “calls,” but I had no idea that Sapsuckers used the same trick.

Our recent warming has led to an influx of songbirds like this Golden-Crowned Sparrow.

I particularly enjoy trying to capture shots of small songbirds because they are much more challenging than Geese, Great Blue Herons, or most ducks. They constantly flit about; when they’re not flitting, they’re usually perched in shrubs that make it difficult to focus.

Of course, occasionally you get lucky and they’ll land on a single branch just above you, like this female Purple Finch

and this Black-Capped Chickadee both did.

Of course, you hear a lot more songbirds than you ever see; there’s been a virtual chorus of songbirds my last few visits to Theler.