Birds from my porch (5 pics and a story)

Today was a day of errands - I left the house at 8:30 and got home at 3:30, stopping at 11 different places. Considering that today was a beautiful day, I wasn't happy.

But I did collect all the necessary parts to build a bigger better bird feeder pole. I'm tired of having two because the cool birds always land on the other one. The squirrels have (b)eaten my current feeder poles to death, the poles turn so my sticks are never facing the right way, the sticks are too short, the birds have pecked them crazy and removed most of the bark so they shine too much, and the poles hold only one feeder each. So I got an 8-foot pole, another feeder and some suet. Hopefully I'll get a chance to build it tomorrow. AFTER I go shooting.

But to commemorate I decided to do some final shooting on the current poles. It was getting ready to rain so the birds were feeding like crazy. The sun was perfect. So I filled the feeders and turned the poles so the sticks faced the right way. I got my camera with the trusty 100-400, and looked out the window to find a squirrel ("Bruce") eating my sunflower seeds.

So I went back outside to chase him away. He ignored me. I went closer. He ignored me. I went closer, and he finally hopped off the feeder, and ran way.

He ran four feet, sat there and ignored me. So I moved closer. And three birds landed on the feeders. And Bruce ignored me. So I moved closer and Bruce finally ran away into the woods.

But the birds didn't. And then more came. Considering that I was only about 6 feet from the poles I was quite surprised.

So I got my camera and stood on the upper deck. And started shooting.

26 minutes and 162 pictures later I decided to call it a day.

Here's one of each.


Blue Jay - my first decent shot. Sorry about getting all that "hand of man" in the picture, but it's my first decent Blue Jay.

Great Photos! You have a good variety of birds coming in to your feeders. I have the same camera set up as you and a bird feeder, but I haven't gotten anything close to as good as your photos. Great job getting a bluejay. They won't let me get close enough for a good shot. What is your trick?

Cool claws on that nuthatch.

i am in awe of you're bluejay pic. i have one that occasionally comes here,but only for a fraction of a second.the rest are great too. i have to get a 100-400 lens
jeff

What? No photos of Bruce?

Very nice photos, Scottes. The Blue Jay came out just fine.


Jaime

Excellent Scott! I love the Chickadee

Great shots. Your blue jays are much better looking than the solid blue monsters we have around here.

Great shots Scottes.... or is it Great Scotte's shots? Say either of them three times fast and you'll prove you are a sucker for doing what other people on the net tell you to do.

Vince

Very nice Scott.

they are all beautiful Scott

I especially love the house sparrow
but all are lovely

8)

Thanks for posting those pic's Scottes. Excelllent shots. I had lost interest in my feeded now maybe I'll take another look

JZ

Trick? I think I'm slowly perfecting the art of bird feeder photos...

Place the feeder where you can shoot it from multiple angles. I can shoot mine easily from 3 windows and an upper landing off the deck.

Give them someplace to land. I tie sticks to the tops of the feeder to get a natural landing place. I used to also use a dead tree - a small tree that I placed in a bucket of sand. I trimmed most of the branches leaving only a few to land on. It never really worked out for me, though. I'm not sure why.

Don't use smooth-barked sticks. They'll often reflect sunlight too much, and blow out. Get some nice rough-barked ones. Anywhere from 1/2" to 1" diameter seems right for most feeder birds.

If you have woodpeckers or nuthatches, hang a section of log about 4-6" diameter and a foot or two long. Drill small short holes in the back side and fill these with suet or a peanut butter/suet/oatmeal mix. Put a hook in the bottom and hang a suet feeder from it.

Shoot from a blind - open a window and pull the curtains together and stick the lens through the curtains.

Move slowly at all times. After a while they'll get used to you, which is what allowed me to move out to the landing where I stayed ducked behind the railing and barely moved. The railing was a perfect support for the lens, too.

Watch the light, and prepare the feeder sticks to catch the right light at different times of the day.

Place the feeder sticks at different heights - from the upper windows I shoot down a bit and get the lawn as a background. From my basement window I shoot up at about a 45-degree andgle, and can use the trees as a background and sometimes the sky. The trees as a background can be tough as some light will reflect through the trees in my yard. Note the bright spots in the last picture - I often lose pictures because of bright post like those. Compare that to the chickadee shot with the lawn as the background - nice and evenly lit and grass is just about 18% so it meters perfectly. However, the trees in the background can give more variance than just the solid green lawn which eventually gets boring.

Multiple feeders with multiple food helps, too. Different birds show up.

Keep the squirrels away (right, Jerry?) because they'll eat everything and scare the birds away.

Paint your house white to act as a huge reflector... My wife laughed at this one, too.

I think that's it...

Wow, Scottes, those look like they are right out of a magazine!

BC

Wow, those are all great shots!!! I've got several feeders around the yard, just too far away from the house I think. I like you're idea of shooting through the curtains. Seems everytime they see that white lens, they're gone

Kirk