Winding down 2012

Nothing much happening on a misty, dreary day on the the Texas Gulf Coast besides listening to a little Willie Nelson, so............

One of my favorite images from Bosque Del Apache. A Sandhill Crane departs a pond in early morning. I haven't decided this is a bird photo, a scenic or nature photo. Maybe all of the above.

A Snow Goose takes a drink of ice cold water, again at Bosque Del Apache.

You can't tell me this guy isn't aware of what's going on down below.

Must not be any Coke machines,  Red Bull or hot coffee around. It seems that wildlife only drinks water!

On the way to Aransas National Wildlife Refuge (back in Texas again) I pulled over to the side of the road to observe this Northern Harrier. It wasn't long before a Mockingbird came up and started slamming into the back of the hawk. Almost knocked it off it's perch a couple of times. This is a fairly sizable crop.

Here's another hawk that flew in front of me while I was standing on the boardwalk, Port Aransas, TX.  They're fast when coming straight at the camera and almost impossible (for me) to get in focus.

A juvenile Black-Crowned Night Heron that flew directly at me, again at the Bird Center, Port Aransas, TX. This is the only frame that came out sharp, and it's a full-frame uncropped image. Got lucky on this one.

Yes, Marianne. If you're reading this I'm saving as I go along.

One more hawk photo. It seems that a lot of people get excited to see hawks/raptors. I'm usually just as excited to get a picture that's in focus. While I enjoy taking bird photos but am looking forward to 2013 and moving on to the Hill Country and getting a few landscapes and some Texas Bluebonnets and Indian Paintbrush. So, Happy New Year to all!

More Roseate Spoonbills and the ARK sea-turtle release

Back to the Packery Channel for some more Roseate Spoonbill photos, then on to the ARK turtle release.

There were only 2 Spoonbills at the channel this morning, and while the smaller birds don't care where I am, the spoonbills are always very aware of my presence.

If I can't see you, does that mean you can't see me?

So much for that, this spoonbill is out of here.

Many bird photographers will get down in the mud and muck for an eye-level shot. Not me, thank you very much.

Tony Amos, along with two sea turtles has arrived at the beach for a release back into the "wild." ARK, Animal Rehabilitation Keep at UT Marine Service Institute on Mustang Island, rehabilitates injured and sick marine animals and then releases them back to nature once healed. Dr. Amos is the gent on the left with a camera strapped to the top of his head. The man in the center has on a t-shirt which says Turtle Patrol.

I didn't catch what type of turtle this is, but when rescued it was only about 5 inches long. It now weighs about 20 lbs, and was given the name "Lucky."

I don't know where the two spectators front and center got off to, but this island isn't that big. :-)

This is a logger-head turtle. When rescued it had lost a lot of weight and had a few various diseases.
Apparently it had a fish hook lodged in it and was found floating on the ocean, most likely not far from death's door. I believe it weighed 80 lbs at the time of release. Since it never was named, the children at the release named it Bevo, or Tevo. Something like that.

The release was successful. Both turtles swam off and I got another t-shirt I don't need, but the cost of the shirt, along with a little extra in change is going to a good cause.

Roseate Spoonbill

I'm not sure how this is going to function since it apparently quit working properly around the time I lost about 2/3's of my FB friend contacts, so I'll make this brief in case it doesn't post properly.

I went to my second favorite place for "birding" this morning at the crack of dawn and was able to capture this image of wading Roseate Spoonbills.

As the sun was rising over the horizon, I adjusted the camera's ISO from 800 to 400 so they would be less noise to process out of the image. Little did I know that a cloud was going to block the sun for a few minutes. With the reduced camera speed, less light, and a 1.7 teleconverter attached to the lens that doesn't auto focus as fast as the lens does without a teleconverter, I got this somewhat "soft" image as the spoonbills took that moment the cloud drifted over the sun to lift off.

One spoonbill didn't fly as far away as the others, so out of several attempts at quickly focusing I was able to capture one frame of this guy as he was landing. While it's not that difficult to photograph a spoonbill in flight, or wading, I haven't been able to capture one landing before. It's not quite what I want, but I'll take it.

Since the morning Spoonbill shoot was effectively over, I went to the Leonabelle Turnbull Center where this odd duck flew overhead. This is a severe crop. For some reason ducks aren't landing here, but are flying over this particular body of water.

Nothing else interesting was moving, and since I could see a tanker moving down the channel, I hurried over to the ferry boat landing in an attempt to photograph the dolphins that usually surf in front of this particular oil tanker. (Photo of ship not included) That ship was moving really making headway leaving me only enough time for one grab shot of this dolphin as he was catching air. This image also took a bit of cropping, but doesn't look too bad. Tomorrow will be devoted to soley dolphin photography. At least that's the current plan.

There are two ways to get onto Mustang Island. One way is by a short ferry boat ride from Aransas Pass, the other is by crossing over a causeway that connects the island to Corpus, about a 20 mile drive from Port Aransas and on the south side of the island.

This is one of the ferrys as it debarks on the other side of the "ditch." The ferry ride takes only about 5 minutes to cross the channel.

Now let's see if this blog will post. I've already gotten one "error message."