Two days ago after leaving the auto tour route at Bear River MBR I was able to photograph two phalarope species in a wetlands that were feeding side by side.
Twelve years ago this morning I woke in Grand Island, Nebraska. I was a little more than 800 miles from my destination of Salt Lake City.
February 2nd is World Wetlands Day to raise global awareness about the critical role of wetlands for people, wildlife and our planet.
It is the season of phalarope migration here in the Great Basin hub of the Pacific Flyway and one of the best places to view these shorebirds is along the causeway to Antelope Island State Park.
Water levels have been dropped in some units at Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge for dike maintenance and this made me think of what might happen in the future due to climate change and if more dams are built on the Bear River and how the reduction of water reaching the refuge might be a huge issue
Red-necked and Wilson's Phalaropes have started their fall migration and one of the places where they gather in large numbers is the Great Salt Lake where they show up in the tens of thousands to feed and rest before continuing their journey.
I know how blessed I am to be able to see and photograph the spellbinding spectacle of thousands and thousands of Wilson's Phalaropes lift off and take flight en masse
Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge auto tour route is still closed and many of the birders, bird photographers and nature lovers are itching to know what birds are there because after all spring migration is an exciting time at the refuge.
Wow, today is the last day of the year 2016. This is my photographic year in review from Utah, Idaho and Montana!
I was photographing a Wilson's Phalarope chick and it was in fact the youngest phalarope chick I had ever seen!
I am seeing more and more Wilson's Phalaropes at Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge and the majority of the birds I see are hatch year birds.
Bear River National Wildlife Refuge was lovely yesterday morning and one of the nice surprises I found was this juvenile Wilson's Phalarope on the west side of the auto tour route.
On my recent trip to Idaho and Montana I didn't have many opportunities with Wilson's Phalaropes except for one at Red Rock Lakes National Wildlife Refuge's Lower Lake.
One thing I know for certain is that we can't drink dust.
In early June while in western Montana there was a pair of Wilson's Phalaropes on a small, privately owned pond near a gravel road foraging for prey that I couldn't resist photographing.
Since I began photographing birds in Florida I have gotten used to getting wet to photograph shorebirds, wringing wet at times but my gear has never been as wet as it was the day I took these images from inside the pickup.
There were hundreds of thousands of Wilson's Phalaropes near the shoreline of the causeway, whirling around in the water and along the marshy areas not far from the park entrance.
As 2011 comes to a close and 2012 is just hours away , I wanted to do one more blog post for the year.