Snowy plovers on the beach

If you walk far enough down Limantour Spit in Point Reyes National Seashore you're very likely to encounter these threatened shorebirds. My walk on this day in March was no exception, and I had a chance to snap off a few shots as they scurried down the beach.



I like the pose and the breeding plumage of the plover on the left in this frame, but unfortunately, they only stayed in this position for a few moments, and I wasn't able to get a shot without that distracting stick in it.

Singing loud and clear

I've always hoped to get some shots of songbirds singing, and this sparrow at Limantour Beach in Point Reyes was most happy to oblige.



It sang and sang while I slowly rotated around its branch to try a few different angles, getting some of the sandstone cliffs and some of the sky as the backdrop.



Finishing up its last note:





I also wanted to remind everyone the 2010 Defenders of Wildlife Photo Contest voting period runs until Sunday, April 4 at 5pm Eastern. If you haven't already, I would like to encourage you to go to their site to vote for my image of Tomales Bay State Park, which was selected as a finalist. You can learn more about the contest and see my image in my previous post. Thanks!

Peaceful moments

Well, a very busy past few weeks has kept me away from posting new images, but I did manage to slip out for a great early morning walk along Limantour Spit two weekends ago, and we went for a terrific camping trip to the North Coast redwoods this weekend (many images to come, I'm sure -- once I've actually had a chance to look at them). But first, I thought I would share two relatively serene scenes, at least as far as sanderlings go.



For anyone that has watched these guys frantically pick at the beach and stay one step ahead of the waves, they seem to be in constant motion. It was a nice change of pace to capture some fleeting quiet moments with them before they picked up speed again and took off up the beach.

Sunset at Torrey Pines State Reserve

We had a really nice short trip to the San Diego area at the end of last week to finally check out the world-famous Zoos down that way. It rained a fair amount, but we did have a fantastic sunset the first night we were there, as we explored the beach at Torrey Pines State Reserve. I took an awful lot of pictures at the San Diego Zoo & Wild Animal Park and at SeaWorld, and I'm hoping to find the time to make a few picture-filled posts here this week.

The sky was really quite dramatic throughout the sunset:


And we were treated to some of the local wildlife as well. It was great to see this young California sea lion come ashore at this really well used beach. We saw him hopping through the breakers for a few minutes before he came out to check things out.

My first attempt at photo blogging

It seems like everyone is getting into the blogosphere now, and I suppose its finally time for me to give it a try. I've been posting my nature and wildlife images to Flickr for a few years now, and have built up an archive of around 700 images as of this posting. While I enjoy the community that Flickr offers, I also often have more to say of the story that goes into the pictures I take, and I feel like a blog is a better place for that to be.



Since shorebirds are my favorite subject, it seems appropriate to use them for the inaugural image. Here's a pair of semipalmated plovers along Limantour Beach in Point Reyes National Seashore. What I love most about this image is the expression of the bird in the background. From this trip, I came back with a variety of plover portraits, but the images that stood out the most for me had something cute or different in the background. I suppose some could consider it distracting, but for me, it shows the expression of the birds and gives it a bit more life. While this pose was just the finish of a stretch during some preening, I see a look of pure glee -- sort of fitting for these cute little birds.

Here's the more "normal" version of this image. I like this one too, but it doesn't pull me in quite the same way.