Some New Faces to go with the Familiar Ones...

We're way behind posting, but hopefully will catch up this weekend. Waaay back on the 2nd we took a day trip out to Tombstone and Whitewater Draw, one of the earliest visits of the season we've made to the popular birding site. The excuse for the trip was our Phoenix friend Donna and her mother Shirley visiting from Florida making a multi-day tour of Tucson. Add to that another friend Margie who was taking the scenic route to her place in Mexico, and Derald, who we talked into joining us to help balance out all the females, and we had a crowd! Shirley had never been to Southern Arizona before, and she was pretty much astounded by the vista as we rounded every corner. Our general plan was a morning departure, spend a couple hours checking out Tombstone (the town too tough to die), purported at one time to be the largest city between St Louis and San Francisco in the mid-1800 heyday. Then, after a bite of late lunch, head the 25 miles to Whitewater Draw to watch the Sandhill Cranes return from their feeding to gather at the wetlands there.

Interestingly, on our first stop in Tombstone, sort of an art gallery co-op, we ran into an astronomical celebrity! Bob Kepple looked familiar to me as we entered and roamed around, but it wasn't till we saw the "Night Sky Observer's Guide" in front of him (he is co-author) that I remembered we had chatted just this last summer at the Astronomical League meeting. He lives nearby in Sierra Vista and just happened to be volunteering that day to tend the gallery. Since all of us had a little astronomy background, we chatted it up and he pointed out his astronomical-themed paintings he had done. Unfortunately, he didn't make any sales to us, but we did take him up on his recommendation for lunch and headed to the Longhorn. Most of the females in the group shopped on the way, Margie for art and jewelry, Donna and Shirley for souvenirs. I caught Melinda making out with a cigar store Indian, and also captured mother and daughter before they ducked out of view into another shop.

After lunch at the Longhorn, we headed to Whitewater Draw. It is always a surprise as to what will greet us on our arrival, but we were gratified there were lots of cranes. Unfortunately, the water level was just about the lowest I've ever witnessed. The ponds that were usually filled with coots and duck varieties were mostly dry, and while there were lots of cranes, they were not particularly close to the viewing areas. The waterfowl attendance was very low, though we did spot some Northern Shovelers and Cinnamon Teal. Shown above too is a Say's Phoebe, showing the characteristic short loopy flights of flycatchers, oftentimes landing at the same spot they launched.

Of course, I was overjoyed to catch my favorite of the location, the Vermillion Flycatcher. The male is so spectacular, how can you not love him? The female is a drab brown, and was hanging about nearby. Interestingly, I've never seen more than a single male - I think they are pretty territorial. Whether I've been seeing the same individual year after year, or different ones, I'm not sure, but I'm glad to have captured him. This one fluffed the feathers atop his head, and looks like he's wearing a really bad toupee from the rear...

Inevitably, the sun headed for the western horizon and the birds started settling in for the night. The Northern Harrier that we saw last trip made a couple passes, always producing a commotion when passing as the birds shout out warnings. I spotted a Loggerhead Shrike, but he was too fast for me to catch with camera. At left is a shot of our group (except for me) at one of the viewing stands, with the sunset-lit LBT dome atop Mount Graham 85 miles distant. From left are Donna, Shirley, Margie, Derald and Melinda. Always visible from the site is the profile of the Chiricahua Apache Indian chief Cochise, in a landmark called "Cochise's Head", nearly 50 miles distant. By the way, ALL of these shots were taken with the Canon XSi shooting through a small Meade telescope - an 80mm F/6, 3-element APO (480mm focal length), with manual focus, of course.

The sun set, and as darkness approached, so did additional cranes, returning from nearby fields to the water for safety from predators. I was able to get one more shot in the dying light against distant pink clouds. The deafening noise that 30,000 cranes make is hard to describe, but even as the frigid temperatures envelop you, it is difficult to leave as hundreds and thousands more arrive, flying invisibly over your head, yet calling to those already on the ground. As we finally walked back in the dark, we had yet one more friend to greet from last year - a Great Horned Owl, seen only as a faint silhouette in a tree, yet confirmed by his glowing eye in the flash picture. We finally departed for civilization, enjoying a fine Italian dinner near Derald's house in Corona de Tucson, and we made it back home about 10pm, even getting to watch the last few plays of the Arizona Wildcats losing to arch-nemesis ASU. But still a great day spent with friends and the cast of characters we visit once again at Whitewater Draw.

Melinda's bird pics

Dean promised, in his previous post, that I would post my pictures from our recent bird excursions...so here we go!

First up are my pictures from our Whitewater Draw trip, a few weeks ago. Even though we have now been there several times, there is something magical about seeing thousands of Sandhill Cranes together. These really are my 'best shots', as they are pretty difficult to photograph - especially in the air!

You really have to click on these photos to enlarge them, in order to see the detail on the birds.


Of course, there are other birds at Whitewater Draw. We see numerous Shovler's, Buffleheads, there were some Snow Geese hiding amongst the Cranes, and occasionally you see something that is totally a 'new' find on "your personal birding list". This was the case for me, this trip! While I have seen plenty of Cattle Egrets, I have never seen a Great Egret...until this fellow showed up! It can be tricky, picking out the specific characteristics that define each species. You can clearly see in this photo that this guy has the characterisic yellow beak, and black legs. He seems to enjoy watching the little Buffleheads bob around in the water as much as the human observers do. Seeing, and photographing, this majestic bird was a highlight for me on this trip!


Our next excursion, as you know, was locally to Sweetwater Wetlands. Since Sweetwater is only a few miles from our house we are really enjoying going there! Whitewater Draw is a good 1.5 hour drive; so if we can get find some good birds closer to home we're glad to go see them on a regular basis! Dean posted his pictures from the trip - including the bobcat we saw! Wow!! I was wishing we had brought a can of Fancy Feast to lure her closer. What a beautiful animal! I managed to get some decent bird pictures at Sweetwater.

First up is the Ruddy Duck, displaying breeding coloration, and his mate. If you didn't know that this was possible you may have thought someone painted this guy's bill with bright blue paint! How incredibly bizarre!












This little cutie is a Ruby-crowned Kinglet. I've been hoping to see one since seeing it in my National Audubon Society Field Guide. They are the smallest of birds, with the exception of hummingbirds, so not easy to find! This little one was quite friendly, and I think it would have landed on our heads if we had stayed quiet and still enough. As it was, it would land on branches within 2-3 feet of us! This picture is just about life size, without enlarging it to see detail....cute!!





You may need to click on this picture to enlarge it and see the sweet little Common Yellowthroat Warbler in this picture. It was hiding among the reeds and the grass, but belting out a song! Since this was the only one I saw all day, it's nice to give it some recognition. Like many warbler's, the Common Yellow Throat is quite small - much smaller than their voice. They seem to be the Ethel Merman's of the bird world!










Another warbler here. If you guessed this one's name to be "Yellow Warbler" you'd be right! There were lots of these flitting around, this one held still long enough for me to get a picture.











This guy has been getting a lot of local attention, among the birder's in the area. Leucistic Vermillion Flycatcher's are pretty rare, and often mistaken to be albino's, which they are not. An albino would have 'pink' eyes (absent of color, so appearing pink). This little guy has black eyes! While this is not the best picture taken of one of these, it's my picture - and I was really pleased to have gotten to see it and photograph it!





This last picture is of Dean with our friends, Jenny and Frank. Jenny and I work together and we had a great time introducing them to Sweetwater! Fieldtrips, like this, are always fun to share with friends!

Rancho Hildago and Whitewater Draw

This week we had friends Dave and Joan visiting a mere 150 miles away in southwestern new Mexico, so today we took a day trip to visit and spend some time with them. They bought land near Animas, NM last year, and were spending time at the development. We talked them into a lunch in Douglas, about an hour away, then a side trip to Whitewater Draw, a favorite attraction of ours. Fortunately, they agreed!














The construction west of Animas is not your normal project - it is an offshoot of Arizona Sky Village - an astronomy-themed development about 30 miles to the west near Portal. It is geared towards astronomers - give them pristine dark skies, and make sure there are none of the normal "security" lights that adversely affect your night vision. Over the years, they have sold all the plots in the Portal area, so they moved to, and bought a working cattle ranch west of Animas - Rancho Hildago. We met mover and shaker Gene Turner at the ranch headquarters and the 5 of us talked for about an hour about their experiences at ASV and some of the plans for Rancho Hildago. It sounds like a spectacular project, and with 2,000 acres there, lots of elbow room! The ranch headquarters were very comfortable and well-appointed, and the guesthouse where Dave and Joan stayed was also very nice. The landscape could be called high plains (elevation about 4,700 feet), with some mountainous hills off in the distance. This project is still in it's infancy, but is likely to be a future astronomy hotspot!

After our time with Dave and Joan, we were headed west towards Tucson, and they east back to Animas, so unfortunately, we had to drive separate cars for the rest of our day... We headed southwest for the 1 hour trip towards Douglas for a late lunch. A good sign you are in the middle of nowhere (where astronomers love to be!) is if you have to drive over an hour for a grocery store or a restaurant! Since I was the only one who had been to Douglas (twice for the Cochise Classic bike ride), I was in charge of picking a spot. Recalling there was a restaurant in the Hotel Gadsden, we headed there. What a spectacular place! The lobby is magnificent - an Italian marble staircase and marble columns with a 42 foot wide Tiffany stained-glass desert mural. The food was great - half of us had the lobster enchilada special, which were great - no leftovers to worry about!

Finally, about 3, it was time to head to Whitewater Draw. A regional birding hotspot, the previous trip a couple weeks ago the Sandhill Cranes arrived very late in the day and seemed fewer in number than previous years. We weren't sure what to expect this visit. We found some cranes waiting for us upon our arrival, but at quite a distance from the observing platforms. They again seemed to be congregating in some fields to the west. But we were able to take some photos of cranes flying past the LBT telescope on Mount Graham 75 miles to the north and Snow Geese moving west towards the fields.














We searched around for other birds and fortunately, my personal favorite, a male Vermilion Flycatcher was in the area and was very obliging as I stalked him and was able to get within about 60 feet. The flycatchers are interesting in that they will fly an irregular path in search of insects, but almost always return to the same perch. This behavior seems to be followed by almost all varieties of flycatchers... Anyway, I got some fine shots of this fellow - but I couldn't decide which I liked better - the over-the-shoulder look or the formal-portrait pose. I also got a nice shot of him taking off, showing the red plumage over nearly everything but his wings and tail.


As sunset came and went, there were a number of owls hooting a couple hundred yards to the south. With the onset of twilight, one was spotted moving to a branch about 50 yards away, and I was able to get a semi-decent shot of the Great Horned Owl. The large yellow eyes and already dilated pupils in the growing darkness was it's most striking feature.

Some of the cranes moved over to the wetlands area from the fields, but always stayed on the far side of the water. I am sure there are only about a third of the birds from last year, but it is still an amazing visual and aural feast as twilight descends. Probably at least one more trip this winter yet! All of the bird photos taken with the Canon XSi and Meade 80mm F/6 triplet APO.

A Whitewater Draw Quickie!

For years and years we've made at least a couple of trips to Whitewater Draw, a wetlands operated by Arizona Fish and Game. If you are new to the local population of cranes, feel free to peruse the search that reveals some of our recent visits. Word is getting out now, but a few years back, few knew that upwards of 30,000 sandhill cranes wintered there from Mid-October to Mid-February. With all our alternate activities over this Winter, we hadn't made it yet, and with the end of their stay approaching, we jumped at the chance for a road trip yesterday with the new Ford Van.

We left late in the day for us, about 1:30, and once we hit Benson, decided to stop and pay a short visit to friends Pat and Betty, who we've not seen or talked to much since Christmas. Our "15 minute" visit turned into a half hour, and after driving through Tombstone without even thinking about another stop, got to Whitewater Draw right at 4pm, 2 hours before sunset.

We feared that last year's drought and rumors of a broken irrigation system might have left permanent damage to the bird population, but with plenty of rain this year, the ponds and wetland's water level was about the highest I've ever seen! With a quick latrine stop, we snagged the last parking spot in the lower lot and hiked in towards the hiking trails. Fortunately, the rattling calls of the cranes greeted us like old friends, and as we approached a crowd of observers nearest a group of cranes about 75 yards away, we recognized friends Gary Rosenbaum and Frank Gacon, who we'd just seen at the astronomy club meeting the night before!  After chatting for a bit, we continued on to an overlook with a bench for relaxing.

I had a new lens to check out - a Canon 300mm F/4 gotten recently from Astromart. While not a pricey fast one for astronomy (and seemingly football games!), with a 1.4X converter, it got me into the 400+mm focal length that seems the minimum for shooting birds.  While I've got telescopes for ultra-closeups, the autofocus of a real camera lens allows shooting in dim light and on moving objects that I don't even try with a 700mm or longer telescope.  The shots above are testament that it works pretty well, though even stopped down to F/9 or so seemed to have a narrow depth of field...

Once parked at our little overlook (where most of the benches I recall had been removed!), it was nice to take the standard shots I shoot every year - at left is shown the distant mountaintop profile of "Cochise's Head" with part of the flock of cranes in the foreground.  Certainly the 300mm was a perfect focal length for that!  And at right is shown the Large Binocular Telescope atop Mount Graham, a good 80 miles (!) distant, with a flight of cranes crossing in front.  I was shocked to see the white snow atop Graham.  We had plenty of rain in Tucson last weekend, but the mountains near Tucson didn't get any snow, but it was certainly there.

While most of the cranes kept their distance, fortunately we had other diversions. Not far from the seat we found on the trail on one of the dikes, a mated pair of northern shovelers were easier to catch with tails in the air, feet furiously pumping to keep their heads under water, than their heads above water. And at right is an American Coot coming ashore right below our vantage point. While they have a distinctive look above water, their disturbingly ugly feet are only spotted on land - eww gross!

The sun continued on its path, sinking below mountains to our west.  Of course the cranes that have been out feeding wait till after sunset to return, some flying right over us, as shown at left.  At right a trio of distant cranes pass the last rays of sunlight illuminating hills to our north.  It was about this time that I met a woman from Prescott having issues with her camera.  While she said she was taking a class in using it, she knew little about it and was randomly changing modes on it trying to get decent results.  Near tears, I gave her some advice on using her equipment which seemed to improve her mood.

But even as darkness descended upon us and picture taking became more of a challenge, the action picked up! While we wandered back to our vehicle, the noise of the cranes increased in volume as the skies filled with their return. At left the silhouette of dozens of birds were captured against the deep twilight. And finally at right, the last images taken were of an American Coot with somewhere to go, leaving a wake against the twilight...

All in all it was a fun trip.  The 300mm lens worked well - it took all the above pictures, though the early ones used the 1.4X converter.  The van worked great too, was fun to drive, getting us back home in less than 2 hours, after we decided to again not stop in Tombstone.  We're still thinking of another trip before the cranes leave - we'll see!

Whitewater Draw 2014!

Yesterday saw us finally getting to Whitewater Draw for the first time this Winter.  We've been there and posted many times, and is always a fun day trip for us, about a 2 hour drive to the southeast of Tucson.  It is amazing that the high desert of the Sulfur Springs Valley can host such an amazing variety and number of birds, especially the sandhill cranes, which winter here after migrating down from northern Canada.  We announced our intentions to the astronomy club last weekend and had 7 people in 3 cars meet us there.  I understand that last year they had some issues with irrigation pumps, with some of the ponds bone dry, so it is always a bit of a surprise what you will find there.  But it looks like all is well, there was a goodly amount of water in all the ponds, though a distinct lack of plants, so not a great food source for smaller waterfowl.  We were gratified that there was a good supply of cranes though...


A couple of our group were there for the first
time, and it is always fun to see it through their eyes - I think they were impressed!  We got there about 2:30 and stayed until well after sunset, perhaps 4 hours.  There was a good initial supply of cranes, but not particularly close to the viewing stands, perhaps 75-80 meters away.  I was ready for that by packing in my William Optics 11cm F/7 refractor (770mm focal length) telescope, which zooms in on them pretty well.  The disadvantage, of course, is that it is manual focus, and with birds there just isn't time to use live view for critical focus for every frame.  But by carefully using live view and making sure the adjustable diopter lens on the viewer was set properly, I got a good percentage in decent focus - perhaps 40% or more on non-moving targets.

Because at the "near" distances involved, the telescope provides a pretty shallow depth-of-field.  One bird might be in perfect focus, but one right behind or in front might be blurry with the 700+mm focal length.  I like learning new techniques and methods, and as I posted a week ago, I learned about focus stacking to improve depth of field.  Multiple images are taken at different focus settings and the images blended in Photoshop.  As shown here at left, a single image shows some birds in sharp focus, but those behind are quite blurry.  In this case, I took 4 frames in quick succession while racking the fine focus slightly.  Blending them together in Photoshop provides the image at right with a better focus range.

Similarly in this shot of a single bird, while it is in sharp focus, I wanted the reflection in the water, the bird and the stalks behind all in focus.  Taking 3 images at various focus accomplished it.  There are some artifacts in some of the blends, especially in high-contrast areas near the crane necks in the image in the preceding paragraph.  I'll need to get more experience to see if it can be minimized, but it isn't too objectionable...

I shot a couple things besides cranes - here is buddy Bernie who came down with us on his first visit to Whitewater.  He got a new Canon 6D the other week, so was having fun with his new camera system.  When he got far enough away I could focus on him with the WO telescope, I snapped him.  At right is a long-billed dowitcher, which we saw in Mexico a couple weeks ago, and I think we've seen it at Whitewater before too.



Always up for a good challenge, catching the cranes in flight with the telescope, especially when focusing manually, seems to be a nearly impossible challenge.  But that didn't stop me from trying.  As it neared sunset, the cranes that were in the shallow water mostly departed for nearby fields for some late-afternoon feeding, providing lots of chances.  In the fading light, mostly guessing at focus, panning along their path, if you can catch the iris in their eye, you must be living right!  The only unfortunate thing is that the wing position is identical in both of these...

Sunset came and went, and the birds stayed away
- visible in hay fields a couple miles to the west - thousands and thousands of them.  Only a few hundred remained anywhere near us, at left visible silhouetted against twilight colors in a multiple-frame panorama.  We waited, knowing that they would eventually return.  Whether their delayed return was due to the warm temperatures ( at near 70F, I think it was the warmest I'd ever seen there in January!) or perhaps because of the nearly full moon, I don't know, but finally nearly a full 45 minutes after sunset, with nearly all hints of the sunset gone, their increasing rattling calls finally signaled their return.  The western sky filled with their hordes, though it was too dark to do much with the cameras.  For this last exposure I switched to the kit lens, shot at full zoom of 85mm for a tenth of a second. 

Our intrepid band of observers caravanned to Tombstone where we rejoined for dinner at the Crystal Palace, finishing our meal just as a LOUD band was starting to play.  It was a nice way to draw a great day to a close...  We'll try to get down again before they leave in another month or 6 weeks.  It is always a fun trip on a slow weekend!