Month: May 2016

I originally went to Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge because I read that it was the best place to see Avocet chicks. Three years later, I’ve still never seen a chick there. But I have gotten the best pictures I’ve ever gotten of Avocets, and this trip was no different.

We saw this Avocet resting just outside the Tour area on our first visit.

As it turned out, it was the only area where we saw Avocets on our first visit.

That was alright with me as the rich, sunrise light highlighted the gold on their heads and necks.

Further out, Avocets were skimming the water with their strange turned-up beaks which is a behavior that makes them distinctive.

I’ve always assumed they used that bill to somehow strain food from the water. That assumption was challenged, though, when I noted that other avocets were foraging for something in the tall grass.

I know they frequent the Great Salt Lake because brine shrimp is one of their main foods, but it turns out that they also eat seeds, aquatic insects, and crustaceans. They apparently use their curved beaks to stir up insects, not to strain out insects.

I find it impossible to observe birds over any length of time and not want to find out more about them and their lifestyles.

I’ve been encouraging Leslie to take her own pictures at wildlife refuges for several years now, hoping that she might enjoy the experience as much as I do. Besides, you can never tell which side of the car will provide the best shots. This trip we had very similar equipment, minus a 1.4 extender, which, as it turns out, can make more difference than I would have imagined.

To me, her shots are a reminder that the most important factor in birding is being at the right place at the right time. The Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge is one the best places I know to be in Spring. It’s hard not to get good shots if you’re there early in the morning and you’re paying attention.

Leslie got this shot of a small flock of Pelicans sleeping and preening at the beginning of the auto tour.

She got this shot of Canada Goose goslings before I’d sighted anything worth shooting on my side.

I actually sighted this Western Grebe with chicks and Leslie had to shoot it through the open window, but it’s still one of those magical sights that’s hard not to love, especially since it’s not nearly as common as seeing goslings.

Leslie didn’t seem as fond as I was of this shot of White-Faced Ibis flying,

probably because some of the birds are slightly blurry. I suspect I like it more than she does because I realize better than she does just how hard it is to get birds in flight while driving around a refuge.

Leslie made me back up to get this shot. At first, she thought these were two different kinds of birds, but they’re both White-Faced Ibis.

I love the shot because it’s the perfect illustration of how important the angle of the light can be while photographing wildlife.

This is probably my favorite of Leslie’s shots.

Leslie probably didn’t enjoy the refuge as much as I did, but she seemed to enjoy taking pictures while she was there and that’s definitely the most important aspect of the experience.

Usually I try to free up two to three weeks when I visit Tyson and his family in Colorado since its so far to drive. That’s how I’ve managed to finally visit places in New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming that I’ve always wanted to visit. We couldn’t spend that much time this visit, but that doesn’t mean that I was going to just drive past the Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge without stopping, certainly not this time of year. In fact, we managed to visit it for two to three hours on our way there and two more times on our way home.

We managed to sight four different birds we never see in the Pacific Northwest before we even got to the official drive-through tour. It would have been hard to miss this Western Kingbird which repeatedly flew up and back to its barb-wire perch hunting insects.

It would have been even harder to ignore this Meadowlark blasting out its distinctive song.

It would have been easy to miss this Curlew, but since it’s one of the few places where I’ve ever seen them regularly I kept a close look out and spotted several of them,

while Leslie spotted this Pheasant, a bird she loves to see.

And these weren’t even the birds we had come here to see; those were to come a little later. It proved to be a great break in the middle of a long journey.