Visitors at the feeder

I put up a birdfeeder a few weeks ago, and it looks like the locals have found it...

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IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com/​photos/amckenzie4/6629​943741/

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com/​photos/amckenzie4/6629​945131/

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com/​photos/amckenzie4/6749​001413/

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com/​photos/amckenzie4/6629​950901/

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com/​photos/amckenzie4/6595​008581/

Nice shots. Well done. The Starling will be back and most likley will bring a few dozen of his closest friends! LOL They can be quite a PITA (IMHO anyway) they eat and eat and eat till everything is gone. I also see a longer feeder hanger in your future or the squirrels will leave nothing for the starlings. Feeders are great fun and can draw some interesting birds.

Thanks!

Yeah, I've already built a longer hook for the feeder. I need to rework the bracket that holds it, though, because I also went to a larger diameter of pipe. Maybe this weekend that'll get done.

Nice series of shots Alex. Your Downy is quite cute and the IQ on your cardinal is very good.
Keep feeding and shooting and bring us some more!
And BTW - Grizz is right, and IMHO, neither squirrels nor Starlings are your friends when it comes to maintaining bird feeders.

And so it begins! Hee hee! Man against the environment. But it'll have more joys than frustrations I'm betting. Good shooting and good luck.

ardeekay wrote in post #13767958
And so it begins! Hee hee! Man against the environment. But it'll have more joys than frustrations I'm betting. Good shooting and good luck.

Absolutely! Watching the squirrels take off while I pelt them with snowballs is priceless! (Actually, my aim is terrible, so I haven't hit one yet, but I've come close.)

I chased one the full length of the yard... the thing was sufficiently panicked that it ran PAST three trees while I ran after it. I can't think of the last time I laughed that hard, and I don't think I've ever seen my mother laugh that hard -- my folks were visiting from Florida for Christmas. I'm just lucky she didn't have a video camera handy!

cool series! love the cardinal shot

Thanks!

As a note, since the exif data seems not to have transferred through from flickr, all of these (except the squirrels) were taken with the Tamron 70-300 VC, at around f/5.6. I still can't get over the quality I got in that lens for as little as I paid for it.

The squirrels were shot with the Sigma 18-125 OS, which has been another fantastic lens. I screwed up, though, and left the ISO at 3200, which my 20d doesn't really like. That wasn't really meant to be a fine art shot, though, so I'm happy with it as it came out.