February 13, 2013 [LINK / comment]

But wait, there's more bird photos!

I've taken quite a few more bird photos with my new Canon PowerShot SX50 HS camera over the past few weeks, and some of the resulting images are just amazing. Today I was driving along Bell's Lane in chilly conditions with dark skies and occasional sleet, just in case something interesting should appear. Well, I got lucky as I spotted two Meadowlarks only about 25 feet from the edge of the road, foraging in the pasture. Quickly I grabbed my camera, and here is what I saw:

E. Meadowlark

Eastern Meadowlark, on Bell's Lane. Do a mouse rollover to see a closer view.

On Sunday around noon, I was returning from church and the grocery store, and upon getting out of my car heard the distinctive high-pitched tseee, tseee call of Cedar Waxwings. I have seen occasional flocks here and there, but hadn't really had any good looks at them for several months. This time, the gorgeous feathered creatures were very cooperative, posing for me after I ran inside and came back with my camera. I took dozens of pictures, of which this was probably the best single one:

Cedar Waxwing

Cedar Waxwing, in Staunton. Do a mouse rollover to see two of them together.

Finally, Jacqueline and I paid a brief visit last month to a pond in Waynesboro where a Black-crowned Night Heron is often seen. Sure enough, there it was, perched on a semi-submerged log on the other side of the pond. The lighting conditions weren't great, but I was able to adjust the color saturation and contrast to yield a decent image:

Black-crowned Night Heron

Black-crowned Night Heron, in Waynesboro

The above photos can be seen on the Wild birds, yearly photo gallery page. Other new photos on that page include a pair of Redheads (male & female), which I saw on Silver Lake, near Dayton last week, and a Green-winged Teal, which I saw on a pond behind the Days Inn on the north edge of Staunton a few days before that.