One of the biggest reason we bought the house we did is for the very large yard. It is almost a full acre and we are 3 miles from downtown center. Kinda crazy. I know there are larger lots here in Charlotte and 1 acre doesn’t compare to some of you who live  in the sticks, but it is awesome for us. The dogs love it, love it, love it. They will run and run and play all day. They have made a little path around the fence and sheds. And I feel sorry for whichever squirrel stumbles when I open the back door, they will be a goner if these dogs ever manage to catch one. While we were house hunting and checking out the neighborhood, we saw three deer in a yard about 10 houses away. That was pretty cool. Then one night after a late shoot I came home to an 8 pt buck standing in our driveway! We have had deer int he backyard, they jumped the fence to get in and out and the other night a herd of 8 strolled right across the driveway while we were standing there. I’m sure there is other wildlife around, but that is what I  have seen so far. Oh, we have heard an owl a few house away. We want him to come here!

We also love birds and decided to put out feeders. And before you knew it we have 9 feeding stations set up! Can you say obsessed committed! We have replaced some of our earliest ones with better and prettier ones. We just were gifted with an awesome anti-squirrel feeder from Lesley’s mom that spins the squirrels away, can’t wait to see that in action! So now we have 7 feeders with seed and 2 with suet. It has been awesome to watch the birds. We have some many kinds it is kinda crazy, we can have over 10 species in an hour! We have had 2 types of woodpeckers, cardinals, wrens, finches, bluebirds, all kinds! I am hoping for blue jays but that would be both good and bad, as I hear they chase away a lot of other birds. We would love an owl and a couple of other types of woodpeckers, but we are mostly very happy with what we are getting.

I decided I would like to take some pix of these birds for both fun and for help in identifying the ones we couldn’t. So, I dug up my 300 f4 and took the screens off the windows and started shooting. Now, these photos are not of the best quality, many are shot at very high ISO’s and are cropped very heavily, like 1/8 of the frame or even less. I could do better with a 400 2.8 and a 2x converter, but, alas, I sold mine about 10 years ago when I stopped shooting sports. So here is what I have done with what I have on hand! If you know any of the birds I can’t identify or notice an mis-identified birds, please let me know!

pt

Eastern Bluebird - we love our bluebirds and hope they nest nearby this spring. We have 3 houses throughout the yard spaced well apart.

Eastern BluebirdNot sure who this is, maybe a wren?

Tufted Titmouse - a very regal bird

Tufted TitmouseA common DoveDowny Woodpecker - we LOVE the woodpeckers. We have also had a Red Bellied Woodpecker

Downy Woodpecker

Purple Finch - we also have an orange-faced one, but I can’t find him in the bird books or online.

Goldfinch I beleiveBlack-capped ChickadeeNuthatchWe love our Cardinals! We have quite a few of them and just love the flashes of red!I love the ‘What is he doing, What is he pointing at me’ look in his eye!Not sure, do you know? Some kind of wren or sparrow?3 kinds of birds on the feeder at once!Grackles  - the jury is still out on them. They come en masse and make a mess. Those are two bluebirds on the wire in the background.Thought this was a gold finch, but now I am not sure. Some help, please?I hate the squirrels. But just can’t bring myself to shoot em yet. They’ll just keep coming. 

I’ve been getting a bit restless and cranky lately. Those of you who know me well know that that is not a good combination. I get a bit, well, um, snippy. I need to be doing something, creating something. I need to be shooting something, anything. I’ve been reading some blogs that say just go shoot anything, it doesn’t matter what. If you are a car photographer, you don’t have to shoot cars ALL the time. I know this to be true. Just shoot. But, what to shoot. I can fall into a rut just like most any photographer where you feel like there is nothing to shoot and then quite conversely, I can find my self with an over abundance of ideas. It is the hot and cold of the creative mind. You get stuck behind a computer. You get stuck trying to figure out how to earn a living. You get stuck building a shed. Just shoot. I’m not complaining, I love what I do and couldn’t see doing anything even if someone would hire me! The day to day stuff of life can weight on a creative mind, as can whatever internal battles there are. And if you have a creative mind, you have internal battles, well, wars sometimes! Just shoot. So today I finally decided that I just had to shoot something, anything. I thought I would go for a drive, maybe look for a location or find some people, anything that caught my eye. Shiny! But then I got caught  at the desk finishing up an assignment, it started raining, the cleaning crew came and the blinds installer came. Enough stuff to squash my plans. Then I decided to just find something, anything. As I  watched the rain I kept seeing patterns in the drops, in the splashes. They looked great. I thought about lying down and trying to shoot some of those drops and splashes. Not the most original idea, it’s been done by most everyone with a camera. And of course it was now about 5pm and the light was going, going, going……. Stop coming up with excuses to not shoot! Solve the problem, make some photographs. Just shoot. So, I did. found a spot with lotsa drops and laid down and started shooting, I was using the highest ISO setting onthe camera, 6400!, But as soon as I laid down and started shooting, I felt good, no, make that great! I started seeing other places I could lay down and not get totally soaked. I started to play with camera settings and angles, I started shooting! Feels good. The photos aren’t going to win any awards, aren’t going to appear in a magazine or and ad and they aren’t going to make me any money. They are just the product of a creative problem that I tried to solve, the product of one side of my brain winning a battle. Just shoot.