A ring-necked pheasant stands tall among dried grass
Last week, I went to Byxbee Park (part of Palo Alto Baylands) looking for some of the wintering water foul. I saw plenty, but also came across three ring-necked pheasants, all in different areas of the park. I had seen them several times here before, but never three in one day! Usually they hang to the thick bushes, but occasionally they come out into the open to forage. The beautiful colors make this a stunning bird to watch.
I have quite a few full body shots, but I liked the portrait the best. I’ve included a couple other shots below.
A ring-necked pheasant stalks close to the groundA ring-necked pheasant walks through short grasses, with a wary eye for predators
A great horned owl sits on a tree branch at dusk, surveying the area for potential prey.
This week’s shot was taken near Bishop, CA in an open field with a nearby stream. Although I was out shooting landscapes, I had my 100-400L mounted on a second body and slung over my shoulder. I was glad I thought to bring this “just in case” setup. You never know when you’ll run into wildlife!
Some friends alerted me to the owl’s presence, and as I got closer, I was presented with two problems, both relating to the lighting conditions. First of all, the sun was setting behind the tree in which the owl was perched. This created a strong silhouette of the tree branch with the owl. Sometimes silhouettes can work well with birds, especially if there is a strong graphical element to the shape of the bird. That wasn’t going to work here, because the shape of the owl was a simple oval – nothing interesting there. Moving closer to the tree and beneath it shielded me from the setting sun and allowing my camera meter to expose properly for the scene.
Now I was presented with the second lighting problem – it was getting dark. I had my landscape tripod with me, but I had ditched it as I started stalking closer to the tree. I knew I wouldn’t have had time to set up my lens on the tripod anyway, so I was stuck hand-holding. I checked my camera-recommended shutter speed (I often shoot in aperture priority), and knew that I couldn’t hand-hold at that speed and keep the image sharp. So I did what any modern digital shooter would do – I cranked up the ISO. I knew I could at least have a chance of recovering the photo from excessive noise. There is no salvaging a blurry photo.
After I had fired off a few shots, the owl decided he would rather have a little more solitude and flew off to another perch. It was very serendipitous to have run into this bird – if I had gone out specifically looking for a great horned owl, I’m sure I never would have found one.
The photo of a ring-billed gull below will appear in the upcoming October issue of Bay Nature, a quarterly magazine dedicated to the intelligent and joyful exploration of the natural places, plants, and wildlife of the San Francisco Bay Area. The photo will appear in an article about the region’s various gull species, and how they are impacted by a changing habitat.
Ring-billed Gull portrait in soft evening light at sunset
I was selected as one of 20 photographers to be featured on Photoshelter’s home page this month. Photoshelter is the site that hosts my photographs for rights-managed licensing and online stock sales. From Photoshelter: “… you’re just one of 20 members selected to represent our community of 60,000 photographers this month.”
