Another visit with the albino nightheron

I am convinced that the rare albino bird lives in a specific area of the bay. For the third time, I was able to photograph this bird while it cooperated quite well. Many other birds were in the area (including the juvy reddish egret I posted in my previous blog), and the albino seemed to not be bothered by anyone else (many birds walked by it, including the juvy snowy egret shown below). In fact, while other birds appeared to get into minor confrontations with each other, only once did I see the albino bird disturbed by another bird that happened to walk too close.

I hung out with it for awhile, until the reddish egret got my attention. So once again, here are some photos of this rare bird. May it continue to thrive.

Reddish Egret

My list of first-sightings on Biscayne Bay continued to increase, now that I can add the reddish egret. Having only photographed this bird on Florida Bay and the gulf coast, this was a rare treat to see this fun bird. The tide situation was perfect for the morning, but the winds were high enough to make the water messy. I was able to move in close to the shoreline where most of the wading birds were feeding. Within a span of about 1/5 mile, there were several birds and most of them were juveniles, tricolor herons outnumbering all the others that included little blue heron, snowy egret and ibis. And oh yes, my little yellowcrown nightheron albino was found among them today as well.

As I concentrated on the albino, a frisky bird flew into the area and it was colored a bit differently that the rest. At first, I believed it was a juvenile little blue heron, but with more observation I was able to see that it was something else. As I continued to watch it, I began to see the tell tale signs of a reddish egret. It appeared to run across the water chasing a bait fish jumping and with that, I knew I had a reddish egret, a juvenile one at that. This bird searches for food in the most comical way with its wing fanning and jumping.

This was going to be great if I could capture it with a full wing span facing the camera while it catches a bait fish. But, it was not going to be easy and ended up being  impossible. Here's why. The bird did not like me around and consequently stayed a fair distance away (the closest it came to me was about 30 feet away). Upon approaching the bird, it would move itself farther away and this went on all morning. I chased that dang bird over about 1/4 mile span. Imagine if you will how this happens when shooting from a canoe. In order to move the boat well I need my paddle, which means I cannot photograph. Many times, I missed opportunities to shoot the bird in good light and position because I had paddle in hand. As an alternative, I was able to use one or both feet to move the boat in the shallow water, but with the wind, this took some effort and was slow going.

In the meantime, the bird was jumping around, sometimes toward me, sometimes away. This went on for some time. I managed to capture some of its antics, but never achieving exactly what I wanted. I did capture it with a pufferfish in its beak, but the image was not sharp enough, as was the case many times as I tried to stay focused on the fast moving bird.  The water was messy from the wind and grass and the background sometimes interfered with the bird. The bird moved around so much that it often ran out of my sweet spot for lighting or was facing away from the camera. I stayed with it as much as I could, until it finally flew off toward the shoreline, about a 300-ft distance. At that point, I gave up. At least these photos demonstrate some of the movements of the reddish egret.

Mangrove Blurs

Recently, I launched from Blackpoint marina on Biscayne Bay. Normally, this location is not my first choice because it does not provide as many opportunities for wading bird photographs as other places on the bay. But, this area has the most beautiful shoreline and creeks to wander in. It was at Blackpoint where I was first introduced to Biscayne Bay, so it is a special place, if for only that reason.

It is also where I have done some experimenting with mangrove photos. About 1/2 mile north of Blackpoint is a small lake that is somewhat hidden behind a couple small mangrove islands that separate it from the bay. In the morning, this is an exceptionally beautiful and quiet place where I don't mind floating around gazing at the trees and water. On this particular morning I was floating around some mangroves that were full of large propagules. They happened to be in good light as well. Propagules are the seedlings that hang like cigars from the branches and occurs primarily during summer. It was relatively calm and protected where I was so the water was uninterrupted. The clear reflections of the thick mangroves were so real looking. I began to play around with photographing those reflections by causing small ripples in the water with my paddle blade. Here are a couple of shots. To someone that is unfamiliar with mangrove trees, it might seem a bit scary if this is what they saw in the water.

Attempting these reflection shots inspired me to try something different. Awhile back, I had fun using a blur technique when visiting Fairchild Tropical Gardens one time. I was pleased with the effects and thought it might be interesting to try it with the mangroves. Lots of trial and error in getting the right exposure and blur, I worked between shutter speeds of 1/6 to 1/13 and apertures no larger than f16, staying mostly within f22-29. ISO was set to its lowest level. The sky was nicely clouded over, which made it easier to expose. I was quite happy with the outcome. One of the photos is at the top and here are a few more. The last photo was shot on another day and with that, I attempted to include the propagule reflection in the water. The bonus was the smoky like appearance of the water caused by the camera movement. For all these shots, I used a vertical motion with the camera.

Bon Appetit

During my many visits to the Biscayne Bay or Chokoloskee Bay bird rookery over the years, I have watched and photographed nestlings fed by a parent. This is never an easy scene to capture. It happens quickly with lots of commotion and often times hidden behind branches and leaves, and fluttering wings. Every once in awhile, I can capture the moment with some success. Here are some photos, recent and past. Birds represented here are cattle egret, great white egret, snowy egret, cormorant and brown pelican. To your health little birds!

The spider has a mate

Not one to pass up an opportunity, I went back out to Biscayne Bay on a second day with perfect conditions. Between rain and winds, opportunities like this don't come often during these strange summer months. I had success on Friday, so I thought I would repeat and head to the bird rookery and after that, check out my moth-eating golden silk spider in the creek.

I haven't had a moment to check out my rookery photos, so for now, the topic continues to be the golden silk spider. I found the same spider that I photographed while she ate a moth yesterday, but today there was no remains of the moth in the web. Instead, the spider had a mate.

Spent some time photographing a couple more spiders; one in particular was closer and considerably larger than the first one. I decided to toss a small mangrove leaf toward the web. It instantly got caught in the web and in a split second, the large golden silk was on it. The spider's legs and antennae were all over the leaf, looking for animal protein to consume. After a few minutes, the leaf fell out of the web. I repeated this three times and attempted some photographs. On the fourth try, the spider did not budge after having been fooled.

All photos shown here were shot with sky as background, same with the previous blog's photos. Flash was used on all photos.

Moth for lunch

As soon as the rain cleared out, the winds calmed down. Perfect conditions for Biscayne Bay. The sky was clear all morning, with the exception of the low thermal clouds on the horizon during sunrise. Once the sun cleared them, it was blue skies the remainder of the morning. Today, I would take full advantage of the calm conditions and stayed on the water 5 hours. Most of that time was spent at the rookery and there are photos from that visit. I headed back to the launch site and on the way, detoured into one of the many creeks along the western shoreline of Biscayne Bay. In the canopied creeks, I can find my favorite 8-legged subject, the golden silk spider.

There were several spiders not far from the entrance of the creek. When attempting to photograph them, the trick is to find one that is in full view and good lighting. I always use my flash when photographing the spiders because most of the time they are backlit or shadowed by the canopy. As I paddled, I searched above and within second, found my subject for the remainder of the day. The spider had a large object in her web; soon it became apparent it was a butterfly or moth.

This spider was very difficult to find a good angle and light on it. I wanted to see the spider in full and struggled to get into the best position to do that. Overall, I was able to shoot the spider as it ate its meal from two very good perspectives. The flash did the trick and made it possible for me to shoot at a low shutter speed (1/250) and high aperture (f14). the higher aperture was necessary to get the depth on the spider and the moth.

Always looking for a new or unique composition with the golden silk spider, I was lucky to have come upon this one today.

A second visit with the albino yellowcrown nightheron

Since discovering this odd bird, I wondered if I would see it again. Wondering is over; I came back to the same area and it was feeding in the grasses. This morning, the outgoing tide competed with the 10 knot easterly winds. Despite being on the water 4 hours before low tide, there was plenty of grasses revealed for the wading birds. This is not always the case with water levels greater than a foot or so. But it appears the prevailing easterly winds have swept the grasses up into the shallows, creating clumpy grass islands everywhere. This is an interesting way to find wading birds as the water levels are relatively high right up to the edge of a grass island. This makes approaching a wading bird very tricky when there is wind.

The east wind was assertive and my boat was easily blown toward the grassy areas. The waves caused the boat to rock, making photography impossible. My only chance of capturing the birds was to get close enough so that I could anchor the boat with my feet. Several yellowcrown nightherons (adults and juvys) and a few other wading bird species speckled the grassy area. It didn't take hard looking to find the albino yellowcrown, it was alone on one of the islands, furthest from the shoreline. Excellent! I might possibly be able to approach the bird. Soon, I was foot-anchored and attempting to photograph the albino bird within about 40-50 ft. Clouds were passing over the sun on occasion, but otherwise, lighting was excellent. Over time, the winds settled down and the water receded enough that I could easily ground the boat and keep it stable.

Lots of other activity was happening near by. Normally, I would go after the dancing tricolor heron that was busy catching food; but today, I wanted to stay with the white yellowcrown nightheron as long as possible. Later, I came up on a normal colored yellowcrown nightheron and to contrast it with the albino, included a few photos of it here. In addition to its white feathers, notice the albino bird does not have the white breeding plumes on its head, and it has a yellow beak rather than a black one.