Bird Pictures...

[birdguy 3,943]

Among other things I was also a wildlife photographer.  

Before I became persona-non-grata on the Orbx forum I used to post one of my pictures once a week.  I will do that here if you guys are interested.

Most of my pictures are birds.  I took them while volunteering at the Bitter Lake Wildlife Refuge just outside of town.

The picture here is of 5 male Mallards heading out somewhere.  I call it 'Boys Night Out'.

I have about a thousand wildlife pictures all told.

Noel

[W2DR 1,860]

Great stuff Noel. Thanks..........

[khague3 46]

Wow, beautiful photo, nice work!

[HighBypass 2,339]

6 hours ago, birdguy said:

I will do that here if you guys are interested.

Please do, Noel. Especially if they have witty titles too. 🍻

[birdguy 3,943]

I'll post one every Sunday but I don't guarantee witty titles.

Volunteering at the refuge was the best job I every had even though I was never paid.  For about 7 or 8 years I spent at least half the week there.  I had the run of the place and a truck at my disposal whenever I showed up.  My camera was always with me.  It was a Sony A700 and  had a Sony 100-400 zoom lens.  

I finally got too old to be traipsing around the brush and climbing up and down the river banks and had to give it up.

Noel

[Chock 17,769]

That picture is fab. I'd love to see more of your stuff.

Funnily enough on the subject of birds, last week I had pulled my truck over for a break and there was a really beautiful little Robin in the hedgerow, he was really friendly and came right up to me, so I got a really good look at him.

That's not my best bird encounter though. One time I was flying my glider over Leicestershire, circling in a thermal starting at about two thousand feet, and a large seagull came right over to my plane and joined me in the thermal. He was right alongside the canopy, on the left, so close that if I'd have opened the DV panel and stretched my arm out, I could probably have touched him. We circled together in the thermal for several minutes, going up to about eight thousand feet with the bird right alongside me all the way. It sounds cheesy, but it felt like we really had a connection, just enjoying flying together, with me working the controls back and forth to stay nicely in the turn so I'd centre in the thermal, and the bird, in a far more elegant display of flying, just making minor changes to his wingtips to stay with me.

It is one of the best and most magical moments I've ever had, and of course it is always a great compliment as a glider pilot if you are doing so well in a thermal that even a bird comes over to join you. 🙂

[martin-w 3,235]

Wonderful bird story Chock.

 

Here's mine. Was walking along the breakwater the other day and a friendly looking seagull was perched there. I got quite close actually. Then he gave me a sidelong glance dropped a poo and then flew off.

Thats the best I can do. Sorry.

[W2DR 1,860]

Seagull poo. I remember it well. Growing up on the coast of California I saw a lot of that. We were out on on a salmon fishing trip one day on "Wacky Jacky"...a charter boat out of San Francisco. There were about 10 of us from the same office and it was a REALLY lousy day for fishing. Finally one of the guys, who had never been fishing before in his life, hooked one. A big one. A really big one. It took a while to get it close enough to the surface to actually see how big is was. The first mate on the boat estimated it at 35-40 lbs. About that time the fish decided to dive and the line started stripping. The tug-of-war began. After about 15 more minutes had passed the big fish came to the surface again. This time we knew it was his last. The reel was cranked, the fish came closer to the boat, the first mate grabbed the net to snag the fish, and then.........two huge jaws appeared and grabbed the fish away. Down and down it went. Line was spooling off the reel at a tremendous rate. Finally, there was nothing to do but cut the line and let the fish go. The sea lion who had grabbed the fish surfaced with the fish still in it's jaws, looked at the boat, shook the fish violently as if to say "I won" and swam away. Just as sea lion swam away the fellow who had caught the fish looked to the heavens and said "Oh Lord, why me.....". And at that very moment a gull flew overhead and unloaded...right on the poor fisherman's face. Some days are just better than others...........

[martin-w 3,235]

2 hours ago, W2DR said:

 And at that very moment a gull flew overhead and unloaded...right on the poor fisherman's face. Some days are just better than others...........

 

They do it deliberately you know. The other day I spied one little devil on a bombing run. Id bet good money I was the target. The $*^$# was looking down at me. All manner of complex calculations were taking place in that little brain. I guess his timing was off with his birdy contractions, so I escaped the splattering.

[Andiroto 37]

Btw, Happy Birthday, Birdguy! Stay healthy! 😉

[birdguy 3,943]

Thanks Andiroto.  It's my 87th.  I never thought I'd live this long.

Time for another little story.

It was in 1952 I think.  I was at Camp Pendleton and we were to ship out to Korea the following week so we all got week-end liberty.

A buddy of mine and I took the train up to Los Angeles and then a street car to Long Beach where the Pike, an amusement park, was located.

We wandered around and went on some rides and during our wandering we passed a booth where a lady in Gipsy clothing was standing.  She was a palm reader and offered to read our palms for 25 cents.  So went into her little booth and she read my palm.  She showed me the lifeline and said I was going to die of a heart attack when I was 50 years old.

I was elated!  I was an 18 year old kid and I thought I'm going to come back from Korea and live to be an old man.  Well, she was wrong.  Here I am 37 years past my due date.  And I can't believe I thought 50 was old when I was an18 year old teenager.

Noel

[n4gix 4,947]

4 minutes ago, birdguy said:

I was elated!  I was an 18 year old kid and I thought I'm going to come back from Korea and live to be an old man.  Well, she was wrong.  Here I am 37 years past my due date.  And I can't believe I thought 50 was old when I was an18 year old teenager.

I too thought 50 was old when I was a teenager Noel. Congratulations on making it past her prediction. 

I love that picture. It was perfectly framed. I do wonder why #2 was "out of synch" with the others though... 

[birdguy 3,943]

Chock, that might have been Jonathan flying with you in that thermal.

Noel

[birdguy 3,943]

44 minutes ago, n4gix said:

It was perfectly framed.

That's one of the secrets of making good pictures.  When I was taking pictures of birds in flight I had the camera set to run at 7 frames a second.  You will get 10-20 shots so you pick out the best one on the computer and then crop it for framing.  For shots of birds standing still focus on the eyes.

Noel

Edited December 25, 2020 by birdguy

[n4gix 4,947]

Yes, I get somewhat annoyed by the very noisy cameras clattering away during press conferences, and other public events. But, I do understand why. Some of the funniest pictures show the person's face in some truly amusing contortions so depending on the "tone" of the article, they can choose from many images from flattering to totally absurd...