Tag Archives: nature photography

Photo of the Week – May 12, 2011

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Last weekend, I had a little time to get out to a couple nearby Rainwater Basin wetlands.  These shallow wetlands rely on precipitation to fill them, and are often dry by early to mid summer.  I went out to see how they were doing this spring, which has been cool and dry.  It was a beautiful calm evening, and there were still a few areas of water.  (It was also just a little early in the season for mosquitoes.)

Springer Basin wetland west of Aurora, Nebraska.

It’s migration time for shorebirds, and the two wetlands were packed with sandpipers, phalaropes, dowitchers, and a few ducks.  I even spooked up an American bittern as the sun was going down.

A foraging sandpiper's image reflected in calm water.

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Blue-winged teal were the only ducks at the wetland.

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Shorebird tracks leading into the wetland at sundown.

Photo of the Week – May 7, 2011

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As I was walking along one of our restored wetlands this week, I stumbled upon a pile of black feathers, with a few tiny red ones mixed in.  I’m guessing it was the remains of a red-winged blackbird, but was surprised at the white bases of the red feathers.  I can’t think of any other bird that would have that combination of colors, though, especially along a wetland like that.  These two tiny red-tipped feathers were stuck on a grass blade right next to the larger pile.

Tiny feathers from an alleged red-winged blackbird stuck to some grass near a bigger pile of mostly black feathers. The Nature Conservancy's Platte River Prairies, Nebraska.

I wonder if the blackbird fell victim to the same Cooper’s hawk I’d seen in the same area a couple weeks before.  That one dropped a half-plucked, still alive robin as I drove past on an ATV (I hope the hawk came back and finished the job…).