Immature Green-tailed Towhee Next To A Creek
This was the first immature Green-tailed Towhee I have seen this breeding season and I am hoping that it won't be the last one I photograph this year.
This was the first immature Green-tailed Towhee I have seen this breeding season and I am hoping that it won't be the last one I photograph this year.
I was excited and enchanted by seeing and photographing at least two Spotted Sandpiper chicks yesterday morning near a creek up in the Wasatch Mountains.
I was extremely pleased to find and photograph my first Gray Catbird juvenile of this breeding season yesterday morning high in the Wasatch Mountains as it came into view on a hawthorn tree.
The soft, early morning light was beautiful when I took these juvenile Cliff Swallow images and I am pleased with how the photos came out.
It is always a thrill for me to photograph Say's Phoebes so when I spotted a family group of them yesterday morning in northern Utah I was delighted.
I dug through my older files and found this photo of a fledgling Mountain Bluebird perched on a wire fence that I photographed in July of 2017 up in Montana's Centennial Valley.
Then the noise suddenly stopped and I saw the silhouette of a European Starling fly out of the tree with the Cooper's Hawk hot on its tail, literally.
The more I have looked at this image over the past year the more I liked it for the flight pose, the look at the Red-tailed Hawk's plumage colors against those yellow leaves and somehow the poor lighting conditions became less significant to my eyes.
I've been collecting images of immature White-crowned Sparrows that I have taken over the past month or so up in Box Elder County because of all the different settings I have photographed them in.
I've been trying for over a month to get decent images of fledgling and juvenile Cedar Waxwings and hadn't succeeded but yesterday I was able to take a photograph of an immature waxwing that I actually like.
This time of the year male and female Spotted Towhees have finished raising their broods and their young are learning how to be on their own but they do look a touch ragged as they molt into their adult plumage.
Yesterday the "unexpected" bird was a juvenile Osprey in the Wasatch Mountains. I'd say it was unexpected because I'd been photographing songbirds and wasn't expecting to see North America's "Fish Hawk" in the same area.
I know, I could grumble about not being able to photograph the young Cooper's Hawk taking its prey down just feet away from my Jeep but you know what? Being there to see nature in action was enough for me.
There was plenty of bird activity where chokecherry trees lined both sides of the gravel road, the most numerous birds foraging on the chokecherries were American Robins and many of them were immature birds.
I'd driven up into a Wasatch Mountain canyon and was waiting for the sun to rise over the mountains when I spotted several juvenile Barn Swallows perched on a fence right next to the road in lovely morning light.
Even though the sun was high I couldn't resist photographing a juvenile Lazuli Bunting that flew in and perched on a Utah Serviceberry branch because to my eye the setting was both enchanting and very appealing.
It was a lot of fun photographing adult Gray Catbirds earlier this year and photographing the juveniles learning to be on their own has been equally fun and entertaining.
In the past week I have photographed so many birds in a Wasatch Mountain canyon that I thought I would share a group of them in a photo gallery.
I spent a few minutes yesterday morning focusing on young Chipping Sparrows foraging in a stand of Chokecherry trees, there were several of these juveniles flitting around in front of me in nice light.
This juvenile Mountain Bluebird was hunting for food its own, perching on sagebrush and then diving to the ground after prey.
Juvenile Western Kingbirds may look sweet like this one does perched on a fence but they can be rather pushy when it comes to demanding food from their parents and they are also quite noisy too while they are begging.
I've taken my share of crappy photos during the time I have been focused on photographing birds but this photo of a juvenile Black-crowned Night Heron crapping in flight may be the crappiest of them all.
Back in March of this year I started watching and photographing a pair of Red-tailed Hawks in the process of building their nest on the face of a high cliff, these two juveniles are the results of the hard work of that pair of hawks.
Last month I had a few opportunities to photograph juvenile Mountain Bluebirds in a Wasatch Mountain canyon while they were being fed by adults and as they learned to hunt on their own.
Imagine moving down a gravel road and seeing just a tiny flash of movement and light-colored plumage in a stand of green vegetation and trying to figure out if it is a bright leaf in the breeze or a fledgling Yellow Warbler in a split second.
I'm a little like this sleepy juvenile Burrowing Owl this morning, I overslept, my coffee still hasn't kicked in, I'm yawning frequently and I am still sleepy.
Luck was on my side when I found the family of Mountain Bluebirds in good light plus they were close enough to take quality photos of them, first the male then the female and the juveniles.
Two years ago today I had a fantastic time photographing Short-eared Owl fledglings on tumbleweeds that were in front a fence in northern Utah.
When I spotted this immature Black-crowned Night Heron on the wing at Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge in April I hoped it would fly in closer than it did, still I liked the photos I took of it with a clear blue sky in the background.
I was delighted to be able to photograph the female Yellow Warbler as she fed her young and to watch the fledgling as it fluttered its wings and gulped down the food the female brought it.