Juvenile Gray Catbird With An Eye On Me
Two years ago I was able to find and photograph quiet a few young Gray Catbirds high in the Wasatch Mountain canyons including this one who seemed to be keeping an eye on me.
Two years ago I was able to find and photograph quiet a few young Gray Catbirds high in the Wasatch Mountain canyons including this one who seemed to be keeping an eye on me.
I enjoyed being able to take portraits of this Pronghorn buck in nice light as he nibbled on the leaves of the sagebrush that dots the island.
I can't imagine not seeing these beautiful Mountain Bluebirds feeding, breeding and raising their young in the mountains that are close to where I live.
For a couple of years now I have enjoyed photographing Cedar Waxwings high up in the Wasatch Mountains from spring through the tail end of autumn.
It seems that I have spent a lot of time photographing Willow Flycatchers this year and I am happy that I have because I enjoying taking photos of these flycatchers.
My persistence and knowledge of a Willow Flycatcher's territory paid off again yesterday morning when the flycatcher flew in close and landed on a willow branch not far from where I sat in my Jeep.
The Willow Flycatcher perched out in the open high on a shrub with a clear blue sky in the background and I didn't even mind the foliage and branches behind and above the bird.
While I know that for some people this Green-tailed Towhee image might be a "little out there" for their tastes and personal preferences I don't photograph birds for them, I photograph birds for me.
The other bird I photographed that day in the high Uintas was a gorgeous male Yellow Warbler foraging in an aspen tree very close to where I sat inside a "mobile" blind at the edge of a dirt road.
Some days one good bird is all I get and if I hadn't spotted this cooperative Mockingbird on a Fragrant Sumac in northern Utah yesterday I would have been mostly skunked.
Even though this adult Cedar Waxwing is small in the frame because I photographed it from quite a distance it is one of my favorite images taken in the Wasatch Mountains four days ago.
I spent some time up in the canyons of the Wasatch Mountains yesterday photographing the birds I found including this handsome Green-tailed Towhee perched on a blooming Utah Serviceberry.
Imagine a bird whose bright yellow feathers rival the rays of the sun then add a black forehead, ebony eyes, black and white wings and you have a male American Goldfinch in breeding plumage. Feathered sunshine.
I was in far northern Utah yesterday and saw the hawks I expected to see but finding this Great Horned Owl was a bit of a surprise since I wasn't looking for Great Horned Owls.
Lately it has been wonderful to see and photograph more birds including raptors. I think the long dry spell that started the end of July might be over finally.
But for me the "Snow Birds" I have grown to love here in Utah are Rough-legged Hawks who only visit in the winter and spend the rest of their lives breeding in high subarctic and Arctic regions.