Northern Shoveler, Isn't She Lovely?

Northern Shoveler, female, photographed at Bailey Tract, Sanibel, FL.

Isn't she lovely? Somehow that song plays in my mind when I look at her and think, from the perspective of a Northern Shoveler, male, it's true.

Here she is with a Blue-winged Teal, male. Two different types of bill, each adapted for a specific type of feeding. Photos taken with the Canon SX 50 HS point and shoot super-zoom camera. Nature is wonderful.

Sora, Bailey Tract, Sanibel, FL. and Canon SX 50 HS.

Sora, Bailey Tract, Sanibel, Florida. I had fun at this location photographing this rail and other birds yesterday with my Canon SX 50 HS point and shoot super-zoom camera.

Soras are usually secretive birds that stay in the shadows, but this one came out into the sun and the open at the end of the day, hunting for food before the cold (for here) night set in.

Soras are beautifully colored and I love their tail. It reminds me of a White-tailed Deer's tail.

The Sora was on the first water area on the right on the main trail. Here's a long view with an immature White Ibis for scale.

There were many ducks there. I will post more about them tomorrow. Here's a female Mottled Duck, resting in the grasses, but still alert. One of the things I like about the Canon SX 50 HS camera is the fact that it zoom out to 1200mm (and beyond in the digital range, up to 4800mm) which allows you to get close photos of birds without disturbing them. This is a big plus in bird photography.

An immature Osprey sat on a dead tree, surveying the scene, eyes alert. I always am paying attention to the way the light falls on the bird and what subtle and unique photos it makes. One does not always have to have a perfectly front lit bird for an interesting photo.

Here it is showing the whole body.

This immature Tri-colored Heron still has rust colors in its plumage and was dramatically posed in the late sunlight against the dark water.

Photography is so much fun. I enjoy playing with the effects of light and shadow and capturing intimate glimpses of birds.

A "Rail-ly" Good Day: Clapper Rail and Sora

Clapper Rail

The chin is not white and does not contrast strongly with the breast.

The eye is reddish and the auriculars (cheek area) are gray.

Hunting for small fish.

Rails really like to be stealthy and stay hidden, which challenges the autofocus systems on cameras.

Don showing people the rails. Pretty soon a crowd was gathering and for some birders, who had never seen these bird species before, these were life birds.

A bonus was the Sora, another species of rail.

It was smaller, with a smaller yellow bill.

It also stayed in the grasses and hunted.

Peek-a-boo.

Wow, two rails in the same binocular view, a Clapper Rail and a Sora. This turned out to be a "rail-ly" good day, as my pun-prone husband said. On a tip from SWFLBirdline listserve that someone has seen a Clapper Rail at the Bailey Tract on Sanibel Island, FL, we headed over there today. We approached the east pond and saw someone looking at birds. Voila, out came a Clapper Rail, then a Sora. It was a grayish overcast day, just the type of light level rails prefer and photographers don't. I had my Canon SX 40 HS point-and-shoot superzoom camera (which zooms out 840mm and beyond to 140x) with me. These were photographically challenging conditions, not the least of which was that rails like to stay hidden. I I was hand-holding the camera. This camera does not take as high quality photos as a digital SLR, but its ability to zoom out and take close-ups of birds leads to more intimate views which are great for studying identification.

You can learn a lot about bird identification from your photos. It's like taking the bird in your hand back home with you. Make sure and take lots of photos of the bird from different angles. Here is some information on the rails, based on our field guide.

Clapper Rails are divided into two groups of subspecies: the Western North American Group (with 3 subspecies) which has rich reddish brown underparts and auriculars and a contrastingly white chin and the Eastern North American and Caribbean Group (with 5 subspecies) which is slightly smaller, has grayish auriculars, from gray to pale reddish brown underparts, and a less contrasting whitish chin. By range alone, this bird is in the Eastern North American and Caribbean Group. It is also in the very dull gray end of subspecies in this group. This most likely places it in the subspecies crepitans. Birds in this subspecies breed on the Atlantic coast from MA to NC and winter along the southeast coast. The picture in our Stokes Field Guide to the Birds of North America at the top of page 159 was taken on Sanibel, FL (several years ago) also in January and looks very similar to this bird. Could it be the same one?

Soras are monotypic, that is, they do not have subspecies.

By the way, as we just said in our last blog post we have great news. We are coming out in March with two portable new guides, The NEW Stokes Field Guide to Birds: Eastern and Western Edition, that are a split of our national guide, The Stokes Field Guide to the Birds of North America (which came out in 2010). These new regional guides will contain all the same wonderful photos and text of our national guide and will be the most current of all bird field guides available. (By the way, these are not at all the same as our previous Stokes Field Guide to Birds, eastern and western regions published in 1996 which are going out of print.)

Have fun taking bird photos and through them learn how to better ID birds.