January 04, 2018

National Aviary (Pittsburgh)

January 04, 2018/ Gwen Morrison

Last Friday afternoon was very cold in Pittsburgh – and a lot of people decided it was a good day for the National Aviary. Our first clue that it was going to be crowded was the full parking lot. We pulled into a parallel space across the park from the aviary and walked across the frozen, snow dusted paths to the gate in the fence around the Aviary. The priority was food instead of seeing birds since we hadn’t had time earlier for lunch. The café area was crowded but we managed to satisfy ourselves enough to last until dinner…and then headed to the Wetlands area. We walked in a few minutes before feeding time. The schedule feeding times are great for picture taking. They have several spoonbills and I got a picture of the underside of bill like I did for the white ibis on South Padre Island; the spoonbill underside is the same concave shape. I also realized that spoonbills are don not have totally bald heads like vultures, but they certainly have a receding feather-line.

The flamingos seemed to be doing their preening while standing on one leg.

As the staff (and volunteers) started feeding the birds, the birds moved about more, and I was able to get different angles of the same bird. Some of the colors change dramatically.

There are sometimes surprising patches of color that become visible only from the side or back.

The hadada ibis has wings with a sheen.

Some birds are small and fast…hard to photograph except when worms are offered on the railing and they fly down to gobble them up.

Some appear drab but have ‘personality’ when viewed via the camera’s zoom.

One of the pelicans flew up to the top of a tree in the enclosure….closer to the glass roof….alas no sun while we were there.

Of course, there was water below the bridge walkway we were standing on…if there were fewer people around I would taken more time to photograph the variety of ducks present in the exhibit.

As I turned to leave - I noted the brilliant yellow tail feathers of a bird on one of the pipes high overhead, near the ceiling…a last hurrah for the wetlands exhibit.

November 29, 2017

South Padre Island and Bay Cruise – Part 3

November 29, 2017/ Gwen Morrison

The last part of the field trip was a cruise on the bay. The first ‘sight’ was a lighthouse with scaffolding around it as we neared the dock on our bus.

Then we were off and looking for Peregrine Falcons under the bridge. We spotted several but there was only one that was positioned for pictures.

There were mud flats with Laughing Gulls,

An Osprey surveying the scene, and

A Great Blue Heron walking awkwardly in the mud.

There was an island that provide roosting sites for Great Blue Herons (7 of them in the foreground) and Roseate Spoonbills (8-10 of them in the background).

This is the best picture I got of the Roseate Spoonbills as we cam around their side of the island.

Brown Pelicans, Double-crested Cormorants, and laughing gulls were groups on the sandy beach.

What birds to you see in these two pictures? So you see the Green-winged teals (2 males and a female), Black-Necked Stilt (2), Great Egret, Laughing gulls.

As we headed back to the dock, there were Double-Crested cormorants on pilings we were passing

And a Laughing Gull settled on the highest point of our boat.

There were so many Brown Pelicans. It’s thrilling that their numbers have recovered from the brink of extinction caused by pesticide pollution!

November 28, 2017

South Padre Island and Bay Cruise – Part 2

November 28, 2017/ Gwen Morrison

Our second stop was the South Padre Island Convention Center. There are boardwalks on one side of the building for birds (and other wildlife) viewing. My best pictures there were: black-necked stilt,

A Tri-colored Heron,

2017 11 IMG_5963.jpg — An alligator that was still at first but then headed toward the shore…stalking

A Common Gallinule that was making its way close to the shore (fortunately it wandered further upslope…no drama),

And a Green heron.

We walked to an area where there was a small area of planted vegetation. The small birds there were too hard to photography in the vegetation, but there were quite a few monarchs roosting…a little rest before continuing their migration.

We continued around the convention center buildings. There was a Little Blue Heron on an abutment,

A pelican almost too far out in the water (I didn’t notice the grebe until I looked at the image on the larger screen of my computer),

A Great Egret (not the black legs and feet),

And a Reddish Egret.

At the front of the convention center, I took some pictures of the facades. These must hold up to coastal storms.

There were mud flats on the other side of the convention center….mostly drying since the tide was out. There were White Pelicans,

Brown Pelicans,

Black Skimmers (in the foreground), and

A strutting Tricolor Heron.

As we walked back to the bus, there were some White Ibis walking across the parking lot with us. The underside of the bill was different than I expected!