Tag: River S Unit

Four Hours

A close-up view of the head of an American bittern

In December 2013 I visited Ridgefield after a long absence and came across this bittern late in the day as the sun momentarily peaked through the clouds, giving me some beautifully soft light. It lasted but a moment and the bittern was moving as it hunted along the shoreline, so I was thankful I got a nice picture when it paused for a moment in the open in front of water that was reflecting a patch of blue sky.

The funny thing is, I came across this same bittern four hours earlier in a very similar spot and a very similar pose, but then it was completely overcast and raining, leaving some small drops on the bittern’s head. I like each picture for different reasons, but it clearly shows the impact of not just the different light but also the different reflections in the water, as in this picture all of the sky was gray.

A close-up view of the head of an American bittern

A Mouthful of Bullfrog

An American bittern prepares holds a large bullfrog in its mouth

Normally I’m pretty good at spotting bitterns at Ridgefield but I saw them on only three out of ten visits to the refuge over the Christmas break. I worried I was losing my touch until I found this bittern on Christmas Eve slowly working the channel beside Rest Lake. I suspect the real reason I haven’t seen as many this year is that the grasses in this area, normally my best spot for seeing them, have been cut lower in places, eliminating cover for both the bitterns and the animals they are hoping to catch.

The bittern snagged a large bullfrog from the water as you can see in the top picture. In the picture below the bittern has swallowed most of the frog with only the rear feet sticking out of its mouth. The bittern has protected its eyes from the frog’s claws with a nictitating membrane, a common tactic in the chaos of swallowing something that doesn’t want to be swallowed.

An American bittern swallows a large bullfrog

New Year’s Day

A male bufflehead dives under the water to feed

I started 2015 the way I ended 2014, visiting my favorite little wildlife refuge. We had a cold snap that froze some of the smaller ponds and this male bufflehead was one of two that were hanging out with a flock of American coots working a small section of open water near the road. Like other diving ducks, bufflehead flatten out their tails on the surface of the water and push themselves forward into the dive, using their beaks to break the surface tension of the water.

Lovely way to start the year.

Water

A great egret eats an American bullfrog in the rain at Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge

In 2001 I bought what at the time was my most expensive lens, Canon’s 100-400mm lens. Since then it’s gone with me on every hike and nearly every trip and been one of my most treasured lenses. However the image stabilization system needs repair but I haven’t sent it in as I was hesitant to spend much money on a lens that could benefit from a modern re-design.

To my great delight, Canon finally brought out a new 100-400 lens and I pre-ordered the day of the announcement. It arrived on Friday so Saturday morning I opened it up and took it to my favorite refuge to try it out. One of the nice new features is that the lens has some weatherproofing, which I got to test with my very first pictures when I encountered this egret in the pouring rain. The egret was on the passenger’s side of the car so I slid over, stuck the lens out the window into the rain, and had just got the exposure and focus set when the egret struck into the water, pulling out this small bullfrog.

I meant to frame a little looser but in my haste to even get the shot I didn’t keep the camera quite level, so I rotated and cropped in post. Still I was pleased that with the zoom I was able to pull back and show a bit of the world these animals live in. The egret with its long featherless legs is built to wade in shallow water like this, able to hunt along the water’s edge, looking for frogs and fish in the water and frogs and voles on the land.

I’ve always loved photographing in the rain, especially to show how animals still have to go out into the rain to live their lives, and I’m thankful my favorite hiking lens now can as well.

Cold Confusion

A double-crested cormorant walks beside a frozen Bower Slough

I wasn’t sure what I was seeing when I first spotted a dark form walking along the opposite shore on a cold winter morning. It took me a moment to recognize it as a double-crested cormorant as while it’s a bird I’ve seen many times, it’s always been flying or swimming, not walking. I wonder if it was as confused as I was, as we had a rare day cold enough to freeze the water of the slough, icing over its favorite fishing hole.