NYPL Prothonotary

Here's a few shots of this little fellow who entertained many at the New York Public Library in NYC from October 21 through October 28, the night of which he disappeared, hopefully with his tail against the wind.

http://www.pbase.com/j​ps_photo/nypl_oct_22oc​t23_10

An amazing find and great photos John. These birds are quite common here from spring through late summer here in SC. In certain locations they can be found in good numbers, especially during breeding time in and around the Cypress swamps. I sure hope the bird in your images headed south to the safety of a milder climate and to find some of his own to make the journey north again in the spring. Thanks for sharing your rare encounter and images.

John Sheehy wrote in post #11255702
Here's a few shots of this little fellow who entertained many at the New York Public Library in NYC from October 21 through October 28,

Actually, he was there for about a month, but only the last week did he get identified and draw a lot of attention.

Wow!

John Sheehy wrote in post #11255702
Here's a few shots of this little fellow

BTW, the EXIF ISO values are pretty meaningless here, as many of these shots were well "under-exposed" at their ISOs. I tried to get a good mix of high-blur-risk ISO 800 and lower Av-pri shots, action-freezing with manual settings, fill flash from fixed ISO, etc. I wish the camera could be programmed to do a burst of very different exposures, like a manual with fast shutter speed, followed by a slower shutter speed with more exposure, and then fill flash at a medium ISO.

I don't fear high ISOs when I am filling the frame with the bird. Many of those shots in that gallery are uncropped.

Noise is not just about ISO or even exposure index; noise is really more about the number of photons captured from your subject or frame. Most people get an attitude against high ISOs, I think, because their experience is from heavily *cropping* high ISOs, and that's really like using a P&S for high ISOs, in many ways.

Wow, you got some fantastic shots of this little guy. I hope he made it home for the winter. They are strictly bug eaters, so he probably wasn't finding much around the city.

canonloader wrote in post #11259433
Wow, you got some fantastic shots of this little guy. I hope he made it home for the winter. They are strictly bug eaters, so he probably wasn't finding much around the city.

He was eating bugs (bugs are on trees and on the ground, even in the concrete jungle), but he also developed a carbohydrate habit. He ate breads and fruits, and licked (but did not seem to eat) lettuce and coldcuts. It seemed at times that he was licking the moisture beneath such wet food scraps on the ground. Allegedly, someone was feeding
him meal worms.

He seemed to have picked up begging from the house sparrows, and took it to a more aggressive level. One miserable, grouchy woman tried to smack him out of the air when he hovered in front of her, above her tray of Sushi.

I've seen this behavior before. There are large public atriums with vegetation in the city, and one of them had a Gray Catbird, two Ovenbirds, a Common Yellowthroat, and a Brown Thrasher, last winter. A different Yellowthroat and a Catbird were there the previous winter as well. All except the Brown Thrasher visited people sitting at the tables.

I have shot Prothonotary's here from a boat, real close to their nesting holes. They did not seem to have any problem with me being just 8 to 10 feet away. They were very curious of me, and this was way out in the woods, along the Mississippi River, far from any city. I can see them becoming use to people, and that is very cool. As long as the idiots don't try to swat them away.

canonloader wrote in post #11261221
I have shot Prothonotary's here from a boat, real close to their nesting holes. They did not seem to have any problem with me being just 8 to 10 feet away. They were very curious of me, and this was way out in the woods, along the Mississippi River, far from any city. I can see them becoming use to people, and that is very cool. As long as the idiots don't try to swat them away.

The second and last day I spent with the bird, it was eating fruit from a fruitcake on a table on and off for the last hour before sunset. Several photographers and birders were standing around the table, and at one point when he went up into a tree, everyone else but me left. I sat at the table and started packing my stuff up, and down he came again on the table, and then he hopped up on the chair next to me, about 18 inches away, and started to nod off. I found this quite ironic, as someone posting to a NYC birding blog was criticizing the photographers for acting like "paparazzi", and made a reference to me specifically because of the number of pictures and videos I took. He said to let the bird be, in peace. I am very sensitive to when birds are uncomfortable with my activity, and this little guy was totally oblivious (as many young warblers are). If I was stressing this bird out, why did he come and perch 18 inches from me to rest?

I came very close to having at least one of the photos in the New York Times' City Blog, but they sent the request to my pbase messages, and pbase's software said that I had no new messages, when I in fact did, and I got it 3 days too late, when I just got curious about what the "old" messages were. By the time I decided what I wanted to do, the article was already posted, with someone else's pictures, both of which were very good, but one of them was superb:

http://cityroom.blogs.​nytimes.com …rbler-barron/#more-237603

Wow, nice find. If I knew this earlier, I would pack my 500L to there and doing some city portrait shots with it.

You can't stress a bird that is not sitting on a nest. They have wings. Didn't anyone tell that guy? LOL