I love photographing gulls. Whether they are feeding, resting, preening, fighting, calling, or in flight gulls are one of my favorite bird species to have in my viewfinder.
Two years and one day ago I only photographed two birds on a trip out into the West Desert and this light morph Ferruginous Hawk made the trip well worth the journey out into the cold.
Great Blue Herons are very patient hunters and there are times when they are hunting that they move so slowly that it is barely perceptible.
When I got back home and uploaded the images I took of the drake Common Goldeneye I could see that his bill had pigment issues and that it wasn't a white feather stuck on his bill.
I have a backlog of raptor images I took earlier this week but I wanted to share one of a species that some people hate or many bird photographers prefer to ignore, the European Starling.
Three days ago I had one minute with a beautiful adult female American Kestrel and her partially eaten prey at Farmington Bay WMA.
Think carefully before you make a trip to Utah to photograph our overwintering Bald Eagles in the valley. The inversions are awful and can be life threatening.
Today I am focusing on an adult male Northern Harrier that I had in my viewfinder for a few seconds yesterday that was on the wing over the marsh.
Typically I have a personal rule about having eye contact with my subject and I also want a catch light but to get this coot photo I had to break my own bird photography rules.
I was only going to share this image today but as I processed this photo I thought about all the times I have photographed American Kestrels on this same exact post over the years.
All three of the Hooded Mergansers were close to me because there was a shelf of ice that prevented them from swimming out into the middle of the pond.
Finding two uncommon birds this week at the same olive tree really has me buzzed and to finally see a Rusty Blackbird has made me feel like jumping over the moon.
I found an immature Red-tailed Hawk in the marsh at Farmington Bay WMA yesterday and spent 28 minutes photographing it including when a Northern Harrier harassed it.
Some winters here in the Salt Lake Valley I see quite a lot Common Mergansers while in other years I only see a few. I'm hoping that this winter I will see plenty of these beautiful, sleek diving ducks.
In 2018 fossil hunters in Siberia found a extremely well preserved bird seven meters down a tunnel in permafrost that turned out to be a 46,000 year old Horned Lark.
I saw a few harriers on the wing yesterday at Farmington Bay WMA and I was able to take a few photos of a female Northern Harrier that still had frost on her nape.
I'm anxious to start photographing the ducks I see close to home during the winter here in the Salt Lake Valley and from what I understand a few Common Goldeneyes have shown up.
Yesterday morning not long after sunrise I spent some time photographing a light morph, immature Ferruginous Hawk hunting for its breakfast.
Ten days ago I found and photographed this adult male Rough-legged Hawk as it perched on a Russian Olive tree at Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge when I was heading home.
You might wonder why I decided to use an American Robin photo on my Thanksgiving post today and I will explain how I picked this image.
Among the duck species I look for during the winter are American Wigeons which are medium sized dabbling ducks.
Yesterday morning the first birds I spotted and photographed was a pair of adult Red-tailed Hawks side by side on a rocky ledge in early morning light.
This Common Raven looked to be alone but there was another raven foraging on the ground across the river that this bird could see.
I could see a Bald Eagle being chased by a gull in the sky and my heart skipped a beat because I know it is time for me to keep an eye on the sky for Bald Eagles again.
Lately I've been seeing and hearing more and more Canada Geese close to home and that has made me start thinking about winter, snowstorms, whiteouts and high key images of birds.
Three days ago I spotted an immature Great Blue Heron resting at the edge of the water at Farmington Bay WMA and couldn't resist taking photos of it.
Yesterday morning I was able to take close up photos of a drake Green-winged Teal paddling away from me at Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge.
You take photos of ten species of birds and the twelve photos of a Ring-billed Gull in flight are the images you are the most excited to view when you get home.
Even though it is now four years later I still look for this striking leucistic Red-tailed Hawk in Tooele County and hope to find and photograph it again one day.
I was looking through images I had taken this summer and decided to share a close up of a male Belted Kingfisher with prey that I photographed in the Wasatch Mountains this summer.