You'll Put Your Eye Out!!!

 One minute they were grooming and smooching, Ringo giving TinyTine a delightful massage with teeth and tongue, and the next thing I knew, Ringo was all of a sudden sorta jabbing TinyTine in the neck. You liked the massage? How you like this? Bucks will be bucks.

 

And the poky-jabby move morphed into a push-fight.

 I hope you click on these and view them all larger, because my eyes, at least, aren't good enough any more to see the detail at this size. Look at TinyTine's eye in the photo below. (he's the right hand animal). It's shut. I have seen enough buck sparring matches now to get really nervous about the combatants' big vulnerable eyes. I wonder why I don't see more bucks with one eye, the way those tines rattle and thrust around. Maybe there's something in the architecture to spare their eyes when they're locked together, but it makes me extremely antsy to watch these matches.

 

The other thing that makes me nervous is the possibility that their antlers will lock together. Then what do I do? Go out and throw a tarp over them and take a hacksaw to them? Arrgh. What an awful thought, and far too dangerous to mess with. You could really get banged up getting in the middle of two terrified, locked-together bucks. It'd be like climbing into a Cuisinart.

So I watch these matches with a mixture of excitement and anxiety, hoping nobody gets his eye poked out, or worse. Obviously, Lil' Pisser is watching with some concern as well!

I love this portrait of the three of them. TinyTine on the left; Ringo on the right, and Lil' Pisser in the middle, right where he likes to be, alla time. Do you know how lucky I feel to be able to witness stuff like this?

 

This is what it looks like from the couch. Thanks to Bill for this shot of the deerstalker, stalking deer from inside the big heated blind! Most of my sessions are done around daybreak. I look out, see deer, throw on a bathrobe and go. I usually freeze my tuchis off in the process. 

Worth it, though, because the deer never know they're being watched, and they do whatever they do, which is exactly what I want them to do. 

Sorry to dash the vision of anyone who thought I get shots like this while wearing a ghillie suit and jungle-crawling through the little bluestem.

 

Do click on this one, to see TinyTine (on left) get a prong-scrape to his jaw. That HAS to hurt! I just hate the idea of fighting with your head. I would make a lousy whitetail buck. I'd be all, "You two fight it out. I'm gonna see if I can find a doe while y'all are going at it." I understand that young bucks do exactly that, with some success. :)

 

And click on this one, to see what I mean about the eyes being so vulnerable.  I do love how Lil' Pisser watches so intently. He's picking up pointers, for sure.

 

 It's hard to believe that TinyTine and Ringo had that tender couple of minutes earlier, as Tiny drives Ringo to the ground. Tiny is long and rather short-legged, but he's got tremendous hindquarters and a lot of strength. He's clearly besting Ringo here. If I had to guess I'd say Lil' Pisser is rooting for Ringo. He looks quite concerned.

 

 Tiny keeps driving, and Ringo is still down.

Finally, Ringo breaks, and Lil' Pisser leaps backward, too, as the clinch explodes in a defeat for Ringo. 

 I don't care who wins. I'm just glad nobody got hurt. You'll put your EYE out!!

 The two pals became combatants. And not long afterward, they went for Round Three! I couldn't get good shots that round because they were too far down the slope. Clearly, Ringo hadn't had enough.

 I was about to say I don't know how we got so lucky as to have all this fabulous buck action in the meadow. But I give all the credit to my little gal Flag, for stinkin' up the place and bringing them into the ring.
Now I'm curious as all getout to see if Flag turns up with a late fawn in August!

So the story goes, on and on. I love a story that goes on.

photo by Bill Thompson III

This post is dedicated to the memory of my Canon 7D, seen here in use, which probably made more than 250,000 photos for me and you before giving up the ghost on January 24, 2019. It was not performing very well, having increasing trouble seeing and tracking birds in flight, and its low-light performance was flagging. A probably minor issue with the SIM card slot (I couldn't get it in or out!) was simply not worth repairing, given that the camera is pretty much done for. It went to South Africa three times, to Ecuador twice; to Costa Rica four times; it gave us Jemima and Chet and all the beautiful birds and butterflies of Indigo Hill and surrounds. So when I couldn't re-insert the memory card, I knew it was time. I called Sonnie the Canon/Sony Guy at Midwest Photo Exchange, who knows me and what I do, and asked him what I wanted. What a thrill, to recognize his voice the second he picked up the phone! The entire transaction was finished in minutes, though we spent quite awhile catching up on other fronts. Gosh, it's lovely to just cut to the chase, eliminate the research, pick up the phone and ask Sonnie what to buy. My Canon 80D  (I like saying it because it sounds like Canon ADD) camera body arrived the next day (Jan. 25) and I've been having a blast test-driving it. Photos soon to follow. 

Because life without wildlife photography is just breathing, eating, pooping and sleeping. Thank you, 7D, for all the memories. 

Shooting a glorious sunbittern at Villa Lapas, Costa Rica. Trying hard to remember who took this. And it was Amy Girten, my dear love. Thank you. Glad to smoke you out. And yes, I remember dropping my iPhone 4 down over the bank onto rocks, and the sweet guide who retrieved it for me!

Stalking the Wild Kingfisher

If there is a warier bird than the belted kingfisher, I don't know one. Wild turkey? But turkeys taste good. They've got reason to be wary.

Did people once shoot kingfishers on sight? Have these birds evolved believing to their bones that we mean to kill them? These are things I wonder.

The same thing that makes kingfishers frustrating subjects for photography also makes them great fun. The Science Chimp loves a challenge. And now that I have a bitchin' Canon 70-300 mm 1:4-5.6 L IS
 telephoto lens, mounted on the nimble and responsive Canon 7D body,  the happy accidents turn out to be my best shots. This isn't fabulous, but oh what a cool position! Freezing birds in flight is so satisfying when you've been drawing them all your life, trying to figure out how those wings work.

Flying, always flying. Much more interesting than perched, you have to admit. And a bird with some habitat is always more interesting to me than one that fills the frame. That's why the 70-300 is such a good fit for what I like to do. Context. For a painter, it's all about context, giving the bird a place to live in your photos and paintings.

Ehh, anybody can take a photo of a perched bird...

It's getting close enough to get that photo of a kingfisher that's such a delightful challenge.

Getting eyeshine on one, so much the better.

They're like coiled springs, always ready to take off with a blistering rattle. 

The Science Chimp doesn't let a little vegetation or a few dead branches get in the way. DANG! This would have been such a sweet shot.

It's this kind of thing that can occupy me all day long, muttering and cussing and laughing at my lack of luck.

Well, this one doesn't stink... 

and this one is cool on a stick! Kingfishers remind me of woodpeckers with their spots, bars and patches. Not so far apart, taxonomically, I think.

This one makes my heart sing. Thank you, Kingfisher. See you in a few weeks? We'll do our dance all over again.

The Ultimate Chet Baker

Update on the peas: It went into the low 20's the night of April 2, and what parts of my several hundred pea plants that were sticking out of the straw mulch are looking decidedly dark and translucent this morning. Crap. I may wind up doing the whole durn start-em-in-the-greenhouse thing all over again. Well, my gardening is highly experimental, and I'm no stranger to failure. I'll keep you posted. I WANT PEAS BEFORE WE GO TO NORTH DAKOTA IN MID-JUNE. And I WILL GET THEM.

Update on the update, 3:47 pm April 3: Yep, more than half of the plants look like they've been nipped in half by frost, their little waists pinched, with the tops dying off. Some that were completely covered by straw look fine. The roots of the ones that are nipped are doubtless still alive, and they may send up more shoots, but I think some more pea planting is in my future. That's OK. I've got a greenhouse, and more seed. I still love the idea of starting them in the greenhouse, labor-intensive as it may be. It's a way to beat the rotten germination I get in the cold, cold ground. Looks like tonight's low of 26 is the lowest it'll go for the next ten days. Current plan: Start more, plant them next to the cold-nipped ones, see who wins. Life is an experiment, and the garden is but one of my laboratories.

S.J. Perelman:  "I guess I'm just an old mad scientist at bottom. Give me an underground laboratory, half a dozen atom-smashers, and a beautiful girl in a diaphanous veil waiting to be turned into a chimpanzee, and I care not who writes the nation's laws."

So here we are, with the last Chet Baker in snow photos that I suppose I'll take this wintry spring. You never know, though. We've had plenty of April snowstorms. Usually during those, I'm so busy hand-feeding baby bluebirds that I don't have time for dog photography.

Little dog, big barn. He loves to look for the animal inhabitants of such ancient spaces.

Looking for voles. Always with the voles. Here, he pauses while digging out a vole tunnel. I've never seen him catch one, but he enjoys the hunt. I grew up with a dachshund named Volks who, not having badgers to hunt, was similarly obsessed with shrews. He'd dig vast tunnels under tree roots, lying on his side, wearing his front nails to little buttons, and sometimes drag himself home, having been bitten and poisoned by a short-tailed shrew, North America's only venomous mammal. Back then, nobody knew Blarina brevicaudata had venom sacs in its tooth roots. And we used to think he'd been poisoned as he'd lie around for a couple of days afterward. Well, he had been, but not by an irritated neighbor. By a shrew.

Don't mess with shrews, Chet Baker.

He plunges down a steep bank, a picture of unerring grace

and races by me smiling. Did you catch that? Was I magnificent?

Always magnificent, Chet Baker. The best doggeh.

I will show you magnificent. Try this pose.

Ahh, perfect. Look at that topline. Thank you for that one. You look like a fullback, missing only a small leather helmet. 

Here I come! Ready or not!!

I'm ready, Chet Baker. Bring it on.

It was a very dark day, still snowing, actually, and I had no business getting photos like this with a 300 mm telephoto lens, but mine is not just any telephoto lens. It is a dream lens, on a dream camera. Not to mention a dream doggeh.

All photos taken with my Canon 7D and Canon EF 70-300 mm 1:4-5:6 L IS USM telephoto lens. You can get yourself one from my friends at Midwest Photo Exchange by clicking the links. Questions? Ask for Sonnie. He's the Canon guy, and he is awesome.  P.S. You will never be sorry you got yourself an awesome camera and lens. The sorry is in not doing it.

Redtails of Mt. Auburn

A very familiar sight in Cambridge these days is a wheeling redtail. Oh, what a magnificent, yet very familiar sight to see. Hodge and I are the perfect pair. I look down, noting small plants and insects and amphibians, and she looks up, never missing a single redtail. We nudge each other, and together make an entire naturalist.

I'm not sure when redtails took over Cambridge, but it was well after I left. I'm sure they weren't around when I lived there. Neither did Pale Male nest just off Central Park, either. Urban redtails are a new thing, a beautiful thing, a needed thing.



In Mt. Auburn Cemetery, they are busy making more redtails. Here's an active nest. How do I know that it's active, other than being told by my local authority?

Well, the camera reveals tailage. My new Canon 7D doesn't miss much, even high overhead in a thick pine. Like me and Hodge, we're a complete unit. I notice stuff, and my Canon 70-300 EF telephoto lens records it magnificently.

Flying redtails are a breeze now. Who could ever tire of seeing a bird like this spread out overhead?

So Hodge and I are watching a redtail sitting, on alert, in a tree, and all of a sudden it launches itself



almost flying out of the frame which was terribly exciting to me

and it lands and grabs an already quite dead and stiff squirrel that we surmised it may have killed yesterday

in this peaceful and rather appropriate setting

and it sets about tearing up said squirrel as we gasp in astonishment at the beauty of it all.

That's my Mount Auburn.

I was very pleased to get a comment from "Friends of Mt. Auburn" on my last post, offering me a private tour the next time I'm in town! Woo! I'll take you up on that, but I'm bringing Hodge along.

brief commercial:

If you like these photos and are thinking of upgrading your rig (highly recommended!) visit Midwest Photo Exchange on High Street in Columbus, Ohio, or on the web. Ask for Sonnie. He'll fix you up. I think you can see that he fixed me up! Finally having a camera rig that's as  quick a birder as I am is an endless delight.