Broad-winged Hawk
By: Pat Coate
Last Sunday the Canyon Camera Club sponsored its 8th Annual Photographer’s Dream Day at the Mount Morris Dam & Visitor Center. There were tours of and views from the dam and a couple of great seminars on photography in Letchworth State Park presented by Gary & Phyllis Thompson of Image City Photography (Rochester). There were many different subjects to photograph, including antique autos and bikes, and people in costume – a bagpiper, Seneca Indian, Mary Jamison, pioneers.
My favorite subjects to photograph, however, were provided by Ron Walker of Friends with Feathers. Friends with Feathers is an organization whose stated mission is to educate the public about birds of prey. Mr. Walker had on hand a broad-winged hawk, barn owl and barred owl that for various reasons cannot be released. It was fun to see these birds up close and learn more about them. Tidbits of information from the Friends with Feathers website are shown below in quotes.
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1 September 2010 | Categories: Nature | Tags: Barred Owl, birds of prey, broad-winged hawk, barn owl, Friends with Feathers | Leave A Comment »
Marquette Golden Eagles
By: Pat Coate
We recently trekked out to Milwaukee to drop our daughter off at Marquette University. Situated on Lake Michigan, Milwaukee seems to be a vibrant city with an appealing waterfront offering biking/walking/jogging trails, parks, an art museum, Discovery World, ethnic and music festival sites. Milwaukee also offers a great variety of ethnic food and we enjoyed a Mexican restaurant, La Fuente, for dinner in the 9th (?) Ward.
The Marquette Golden Eagle was the most unique bird we saw. During our limited time along the waterfront, we only saw fairly common birds such as Canada geese, mallards, mixed flocks of swallows, ring-billed gulls, and pigeons. During our drive (near Crystal Lake, Illinois) we passed two groups of Sandhill cranes in the fields but not conveniently located for photo ops.
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27 August 2010 | Categories: Nature | Tags: Barn Swallow, Ring-billed Gull, Milwaukee | 1 Comment »
Black-capped Chickadee
By: Pat Coate
Over the past couple of weeks, the chickadee count at our backyard feeder has increased and their busyness and calls greet me most mornings. They are the first to the feeder after a refill, often barely able to contain themselves while waiting for me to move the requisite few steps away. They don’t seem to require this distance for our dog, who is often right under the feeder while they grab a seed and retreat to the nearby maple tree.
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19 August 2010 | Categories: Nature | Tags: Black-capped Chickadee | 2 Comments »
Great Kiskadee
By: Pat Coate
A couple weeks back, I had the good fortune to get together with my roommate and five other friends from college, whom I hadn’t seen in many years. We had a grand time cruising from Baltimore to Bermuda. While in Bermuda I spent a morning birding and biking. I had read that Bermuda had many of the same birds that we have in WNY and it was very true, but I did manage a couple exceptions.
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13 August 2010 | Categories: Nature | Tags: Great Kiskadee, White-tailed Tropicbird, Bermuda | 2 Comments »
Algonquin Moose
By: Pat Coate
Even more than birds, I really enjoy seeing moose (and catching them with my camera is an added bonus). As such, I spend some time each year ‘stalking’ them in Algonquin Provincial Park in Ontario. Most years I am able to at least see them along Highway 60, which cuts across the southern portion of the park, and other years I have been lucky enough to see them while canoeing or hiking. Here are some photos of this year’s moose, seen along Highway 60.
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4 August 2010 | Categories: Nature | Tags: Moose | 3 Comments »
Logan, Maddie and Lilly with Tom (check out the Mon@rch tattoos)
By: Pat Coate
My sister and her young family recently visited and we had a wonderful morning learning more about birds and getting to see them up close at Tom’s banding site in Napoli. Tom is very knowledgeable, gracious, and a born educator.
What fun we all had – as expressed so well by Maddie: “Bird banding was awesome! You should have seen the birds that were there!” Here are some pictures from our birding experience.
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2 August 2010 | Categories: Nature | Tags: bird banding | 3 Comments »
Common Ringlet
You always need to stay close to nature . . . . have you ever given a try to holding a butterfly on your finger?
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21 July 2010 | Categories: Allegany State Park, Butterflies, Flickr, Nature, photography | Tags: finger, hand | 3 Comments »
Baltimore Oriole & Fans
By: Pat Coate
My husband and sons grew up fans of the Baltimore Orioles. Over the years we’ve enjoyed games at both Memorial Stadium and Camden Yards. So it was a special pleasure to spend some time observing the team’s namesake at a nesting site near Jamestown, NY (Audubon location).
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14 July 2010 | Categories: Nature | Tags: baltimore oriole | 2 Comments »
Tess and her first live bird!
Just over 100 days old and Tess is already enjoying bird banding! I can’t wait for her to get older and start to explore what nature has to offer her.
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9 July 2010 | Categories: Allegany State Park, Bird Banding, Birds, Flickr, Nature, SWAT Station, iPhone | 2 Comments »
