Articles and Collections

Texas Flycatchers: A New Collection

Posted October 18, 2013 by Two Shutterbirds

Least Flycatcher at Lafitte's Cove during spring migration 2013 — *Least Flycatcher* at Lafitte’s Cove, Galveston Island, Texas during spring migration 2013. Canon EOS 7D/600 f/4L IS (+1.4x TC). High-speed synchronized fill-flash.

Surely flycatchers must be counted among the most interesting birds to watch as they “hawk” insects from mid-air above land or water, or swoop down to the grass to snatch prey and then return to their perches to consume it. In this new collection, we include images primarily from the Texas Gulf Coast and Rio Grande Valley. Enjoy!

Yellow-bellied Flycatcher at Anahuac National Wildlife Refuge, Texas. — *Yellow-bellied Flycatcher* at Anahuac National Wildlife Refuge, Texas. Canon EOS 7D/500mm f/4L IS (+1.4x TC). Natural light.

If all mankind were to disappear, the world would regenerate back to the rich state of equilibrium that existed ten thousand years ago. If insects were to vanish, the environment would collapse into chaos.–E. O. Wilson

Additions to Collections: Stalking the Hunters and Avian Portraits

Posted August 10, 2013 by Chris Cunningham

Over the the past few weeks I have been quietly slipping new images into the Avian Portraits and Stalking the Hunters: Additional Images Collections. Please take a look!

Male Purple Gallinule Portrait, near Pilant Lake, Brazos Bend State Park, Texas. — *Portrait: Purple Gallinule* near Pilant Lake, Brazos Bend State Park, Texas. One of the most spectacular birds in North America, the Purple Gallinule takes an active role in parenting and engages in raucous fights during the spring. Canon EOS 7D/600mm f/4L IS (+1.4x TC). High-speed synchronized fill-flash.

“To the complaint, ‘There are no people in these photographs,’ I respond, There are always two people: the photographer and the viewer.”― Ansel Adams

Avian Portraits: A New Collection

Posted June 8, 2013 by Chris Cunningham

Sometimes I find myself able to get close enough to birds to fill the frame without being able to fit the whole bird in the shot. Rather than fight it, I go with the flow and shoot portraits! I’ll be adding new portraits of captive and wild birds to this collection as I encounter co-operative subjects.

Peregrine Falcon portrait — *Portrait: Peregrine Falcon.* Captive bird, natural light. Canon 7D/100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS. Thanks to Mary Anne Weber of the Houston Audubon Society for access to her collection of beautiful rehabilitated raptors. Photo taken at the Sims Bayou Urban Nature Center, Houston.

Additions to a Collection: Galveston Island Birds

Posted May 26, 2013 by Chris Cunningham

“To a man, ornithologists are tall, slender, and bearded so that they can stand motionless for hours, imitating kindly trees, as they watch for birds.”–Gore Vidal

Galveston Island has been a central focus for our birding activities during spring migration 2013. Over the past week I have been quietly adding images to my Galveston Island Birds Collection. Please take a look.

Common Nighthawk Portrait at Lafitte's Cove, Galveston Island, Texas — *Portrait: Common Nighthawk*. As a child in Minnesota I watched nighthawks feeding on insects high in the air. I never dreamed I would get such a close look. Lafitte’s Cove, natural light.

Soon I will be trying to acclimate to the broiling Gulf Coast summer–and dreaming of staking out coastal migrant traps during fall migration 2013. It’s not that far off . . . the earliest crop of migrants should start showing up in late July! Can’t wait!

Ruby-throated Hummingbird at Lafitte's Cove, Galveston Island, Texas — *Ruby-throated Hummingbird* at Lafitte’s Cove, Galveston Island, Texas. Shots like this showing specular reflection and structural color sparked some reading on the optics of avian color–and may have hatched an area of research regarding those hard to identify female and juvenile hummingbirds. High-speed synchronized flash.

Texas American Sparrows: A New Collection

Posted April 6, 2013 by Two Shutterbirds

Seaside Sparrow at McFaddin National Wildlife Refuge, Texas — *Seaside Sparrow in a Characteristic Pose* at McFaddin National Wildlife Refuge, Texas Gulf Coast. This sparrow has an extremely limited range in the U.S., the Gulf and Atlantic Coasts. Photo taken in August under natural light.

American sparrows (Family Emberizidae including longspurs, seedeaters, towhees, juncos, and sparrows) may be among the least appreciated of all birds, but they can be charming–although treacherous to photograph with their quick movements and often suspicious natures. They can also be tricky to identify. Based on their huge numbers they are among the most ecologically significant of all birds. Please take a look at our new sparrow collection.

Young House Sparrow at the Edith L. Moore Nature Sanctuary, Houston — *Young House Sparrow* at the Edith L. Moore Nature Sanctuary, Houston. Although this species is probably most peoples’ concept of a sparrow, House Sparrows are not American sparrows at all. House Sparrows are members of a Eurasian group called weaver-finches and were introduced into North America in the 1850’s.

Birds of the Edith L. Moore Nature Sanctuary: A New Collection

Posted March 30, 2013 by Chris Cunningham

Carolina Wren with nesting materials at the Edith L. Moore Nature Sanctuary, Houston — *Nesting? In early February!?! You gotta be kiddin’ me!* A Carolina Wren collects skeletonized leaves for a nest under the eaves of the cabin at the Edith L. Moore Nature Sanctuary, Houston. February 2013 started out warm, signaling an early spring. Several major cold fronts soon followed, however.

Houston Audubon’s Edith L. Moore Nature Sanctuary is a gem: 17 acres of dense forest and thicket in an easy-to-get-to suburban setting. A great diversity of food plants, both native (e.g., yaupon holly, trumpet creeper; scarlet buckeye) and non-native (Ligustrum, Pyracantha) no doubt contribute to the diversity and abundance of wildlife. Any time is a great time to visit, but we visit especially often in winter and spring, particularly for the resident and migrating songbirds and raptors, some of which can be seen in this small collection.

American Robin with Ligustrum Fruit at Edith L. Moore Sanctuary, Houston — *American Robin with Ligustrum Fruit* at the Edith L. Moore Sanctuary, Houston. Ligustrum is a foreign invasive, but Robins and Cedar Waxwings enjoy the blue-black fruit.

Cooper's Hawk with nesting materials at the Edith L. Moore Nature Sanctuary, Houston — *Cooper’s Hawk with Nesting Material.* A mated pair of Cooper’s Hawks is currently nesting at Edith L. Moore. One bird is seen here with some conifer bark it just stripped from its perch. Photo taken in late March.

Additions to Collections: Texas Ducks and Galveston Island Birds

Posted March 2, 2013 by Chris Cunningham

Over the past few weeks I’ve been slipping new images into the Texas Ducks and Galveston Island Birds Collections. Please take a look!

Female Ring-necked Duck at Brazos Bend Sate Park, Texas — *Female Ring-necked Duck* at Brazos Bend State Park. Ring-necked Ducks are generally not common at Brazos Bend State Park–except this year! Mated pairs could be seen feeding in the shallows off the islands in Elm Lake in February, but males would not venture into open water when humans were around. Photo taken at Elm Lake with high-speed synchronized fill flash and IS Mode 2.

Male Gadwall in flight over Elm Lake, Brazos Bend State Park, Texas — *Male Gadwall in Flight* over Elm Lake, Brazos Bend State Park.

New Article: The Rules of Composition

Posted February 17, 2013 by Chris Cunningham

Compositional rules apply to all the arts, and they are critical to producing interesting photographic images. Many rules exist, but a handful are simple and powerful. In this article, I discuss the rules I implement to produce my favorite images of nature.

Sparring American Bison at Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming — *Sparring American Bison* at Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming. This image utilizes several major compositional techniques. **Rule of thirds:** the action (the butting of heads) lies along a vertical and horizontal line about one-third the way from the bottom and right of the frame. **Filling the frame:** no wasted space. **Negative space/background:** triangular regions around the animals “point” the way to the action. This was actually a dangerous shot to get. Shortly after this photo was taken, the rest of the herd started pouring into the valley, literally chasing us out. Bison are the most dangerous animals in Yellowstone NP: they injure about three times as many humans as bears do.

Additions to Collections: Texas Ducks and Some 2012 Favorites

Posted January 12, 2013 by Two Shutterbirds

The jet stream being directly over Texas for the past several weeks has meant appalling weather and much time spent on the computer. As a result, some new images have been added to Texas Ducks and Some 2012 Favorites. Please take a look!

Snowshoe Hare in Summer Colors, Kalaloch, Olympic Peninsula, Washington — *Snowshoe Hare in Summer Colors* at Kalaloch, Olympic Peninsula, Washington. For MP: Critters don’t get much cuter than this!

Some of our 2012 Favorites: New Collection

Posted December 24, 2012 by Two Shutterbirds

2012 was a great year in the field, and a great year at home. We’re excited to share some of our 2012 favorites. We continued to photograph the birds and other wildlife of Texas, from the Rio Grande Valley to Central Texas to deep East Texas. We also got a chance to spend a week on the Olympic Peninsula and surrounding areas in Washington State, including Puget Sound. We worked hard to improve our photographic technique in both long telephoto and macro work and tried to keep up with developments in digital photography: we are all about getting better. We worked at continuing to expand our ornithological knowledge and know many more birds by sight and sound than we did when we started the year. We also took the plunge and decided to set up our own website and share our explorations with a wider audience. We are excited about the future and are currently planning excursions to places we have never been to see birds we have never seen before. . . .

American Robin on moss, Hoh Rain Forest, Olympic National Park, Washington — *American Robin Fledgling on Moss*, Hoh Rain Forest, Olympic National Park, Washington. The temperate rain forests of the Olympic Peninsula are some of the most beautiful and exotic habitats in North America.

New Article: Perspective in Nature Photography

Posted October 21, 2012 by Chris Cunningham

Photography is the art of compromise: shutter speed versus aperture (and depth of field), ISO versus noise, versatility (zoom) versus sharpness (prime), and so on. In nature photography, obstructions often give the shooter little choice about tripod and camera position. When choices are available, other compromises come into play. Namely, tripod height affects not only an animal’s appearance in profile and the look of the environment, but also photographer reaction time. In Perspective in Nature Photography I explore these issues.

Broad-winged Hawk in tree, Houston, Texas — No choice: *Broad-winged Rodent-hunter in Dense Forest.* This Broad-winged Hawk was perched at a height of about ten feet in a dense patch of woods. This shot was literally the only one available, taken through a foot-wide opening in the foliage. After watching me drag my tripod and 500mm f/4L in a semi-circle through a tangle of brush for ten minutes trying to get a better perspective, the bird became annoyed and flew off.

New Additions to Collections

Posted September 16, 2012 by Chris Cunningham

Although being in the field regularly is always preferable, bad weather and the threat of bad weather have kept me indoors of late. Birding time has been transformed into computer time: additional images have been added to the Stalking the Hunters: Additional Images, Texas Ducks, and Galveston Island Birds collections. Expect more in the near future.

Loggerhead Shrike with snake at Brazos Bend State Park, Texas. — This Loggerhead Shrike has just seized a snake. Shrike numbers increase significantly during the cooler months at Brazos Bend State Park. Shrikes, like other birds with black masks are challenging to photograph: the light has to be just right to capture a catchlight and a well-defined eyeball. Photo taken near water’s edge, Pilant lake.

Thermoregulating Great Blue Heron at Brazos Bend State Park, Texas — *Thermoregulating Great Blue Heron?* at Brazos Bend State Park, Texas. Herons and egrets can be seen occasionally in this sort of pose on hot, sunny days. It has been speculated that this is related to thermoregulation, but to my knowledge the details remain obscure. On the sweltering days when I see this sort of behavior, it would seem that warming up in the sun would be the last thing a bird would want to do–unless they are sterilizing parasites or pathogens thermally while employing gular fluttering or “panting” to keep their brains from frying. Photo taken at Pilant Lake.

Birding by Camera | Adventures in Nature Photography