Birding and Bird Photography

Aw man, I really want to see a pileated!
Busy feeders!

Alright, more photos...I'm all done going through photos here, just have to upload them.
These are from a lodge on the way to Mindo from Quito called Sachatamia. They had a lot of hummingbird feeders and bananas out for tanagers.

Blue-gray Tanager by 92shawman, on Flickr


Golden Tanager by 92shawman, on Flickr


Velvet-purple Coronet by 92shawman, on Flickr


Empress Brilliant by 92shawman, on Flickr

And these are from the hike from Mindo town out to the Reserve that we worked on:


Pale-mandibled Aracari by 92shawman, on Flickr


Ringed Kingfisher by 92shawman, on Flickr

 

We netted and banded in three different habitats: two days at a ridgeline undisturbed forest, three days at a pasture returning to forest, and two days at a more riparian area closer to the river. These are some from the first banding area:


Tawny-bellied Hermit by 92shawman, on Flickr


Violet-tailed Sylph by 92shawman, on Flickr

Crazy tongue!

Crimson-rumped Toucanet by 92shawman, on Flickr


Beryl-spangled Tanager by 92shawman, on Flickr

Caught a bat in the morning of the second day:

Leaf-nosed Bat by 92shawman, on Flickr


Plain-brown Woodcreeper by 92shawman, on Flickr

I don't remember what species this was, but I'm pretty sure it was a tanager

IMG_4028_edit_small by 92shawman, on Flickr

Feather mites or lice. We were originally recording them as lice, but one of the other volunteers heard that they might be mites instead, so we need to investigate that more. Either way, it's the "organized dirt" looking stuff

Wing mites/lice? "Organized Dirt" by 92shawman, on Flickr

 

When we weren't doing the sets of netting and banding days, we watched hummingbirds at feeders off the front porch and we had a morning of banding Andean Cock-of-the-rock birds at their lek. We put color bands on them to try to get a sense of which males display together and where they display in the lek. The problem is that there are only a few color-banded individuals so there are too many that aren't banded that display with the banded ones.


White-necked Jacobin by 92shawman, on Flickr


Andean Cock-of-the-rock Color Banding by 92shawman, on Flickr

We also went into Mindo for pizza and beer on a day off and saw some cool stuff on the way out:
A view of the cabin we were staying in:

The Reserve Casita by 92shawman, on Flickr


Southern Rough-winged Swallow by 92shawman, on Flickr

Brief glimpse of a Bat Falcon!

Bat Falcon by 92shawman, on Flickr

And then we had a wandering transect survey. We did a survey on the first day there, but I guess I didn't take many good pictures. The second day we shuffled everyone around and repeated the same trails. Lots of birds out there, tons of tanagers!


Flame-faced Tanager by 92shawman, on Flickr

The trails were quite tough sometimes:

Very muddy trails by 92shawman, on Flickr

One of the other groups had seen a Common Potoo on their survey, and he was still there at the end so I got to go out and see it!

Common Potoo by 92shawman, on Flickr

 

These are from the second set of banding, in the pasture/disturbed and recovering forest:


Plain Xenops by 92shawman, on Flickr

Punk-ass bird

Scale-crested Pygmy-Tyrant by 92shawman, on Flickr

Biiig brood patch:

Brood Patch on a Lineated Foliage-gleaner by 92shawman, on Flickr

The banding station was in the middle of a Club-winged Manakin lek, which was hilarious and entertaining! The males have "clubbed" inner secondaries and they display by sticking their wings up behind them and vibrating those clubbed feathers together, creating a "Beeeep" sound.
Pretty low light, unfortunately:

Male Club-winged Manakin by 92shawman, on Flickr


Club-winged Manakin Display by 92shawman, on Flickr


Chestnut-capped Brush-Finch by 92shawman, on Flickr

And some of the birds have ectoparasites, including ticks, mites, and lice. This was a tick that came off of a Hummingbird's head!

Hummingbird Tick by 92shawman, on Flickr

Quite a few hummingbirds in the nets. They were actually relatively easy to extract, as long as they didn't get their tongues tangled. The two that I extracted had hit the net and just kinda dropped into the pocket and didn't really struggle, so that was super nice.

Wedge-billed Hummingbird by 92shawman, on Flickr


Female Purple-bibbed Whitetip by 92shawman, on Flickr


Brown Violetear by 92shawman, on Flickr

On the complete other end of the spectrum were the treehunters, woodcreepers, and foliage-gleaners that all have strong bills and they're not afraid to bite and peck at you, so they get verry tangled!

Streak-capped Treehunter by 92shawman, on Flickr


Male Lemon-rumped Tanager by 92shawman, on Flickr


Esmeraldas Antbird by 92shawman, on Flickr


Crimson-rumped Toucanet by 92shawman, on Flickr


Male Masked Trogon by 92shawman, on Flickr

This poor guy had a messed-up bill:

Strong-billed Woodcreeper by 92shawman, on Flickr

 

Then we had a day between that set of banding and the next, so we did another round of netting for Andean Cock-of-the-rock (ACOR) and I went up with a small group to try to spot color bands on males displaying. What's also odd is that these ACOR photos all have like 10x as many views as the rest of the photos in this album on Flickr...
Got this banded guy:

Andean Cock-of-the-rock by 92shawman, on Flickr

The vegetation was very dense so sometimes we could only look through these little gaps to try and spot the bands:

Andean Cock-of-the-rock by 92shawman, on Flickr

And then I did some other birding while we weren't doing much else for the rest of that day:

Scaled Fruiteater by 92shawman, on Flickr


Golden Tanager by 92shawman, on Flickr


White-shouldered Tanager by 92shawman, on Flickr


Tropical Parula by 92shawman, on Flickr

And this guy was actually a regular evening visitor, but always quite the treat!

Broad-billed Motmot by 92shawman, on Flickr

And a Quetzal, too!! This is the best photo I ever got of it, unfortunately, but at least it's mostly visible!

Golden-headed Quetzal by 92shawman, on Flickr

 

Our last banding set was down in the valley more, closer to the river and right next to the cabin, which was really nice. We could sleep in a little more because we didn't have to hike too far to open the nets in the morning and we could stop into the cabin for snacks and hot chocolate if we wanted. Caught some different and very interesting birds, too!

Green-fronted Lancebill by 92shawman, on Flickr


Ornate Flycatcher by 92shawman, on Flickr

Antbirds are really interesting. They don't actually feed on ants, I don't think. They get their name because they follow ant marches and feed on the insects that flee from the ants.

Female Immaculate Antbird by 92shawman, on Flickr

It was easy to do more birding during the breaks between net runs, too.

Golden Tanager by 92shawman, on Flickr


Red-headed Barbet by 92shawman, on Flickr


Yellow-throated Bush-Tanager by 92shawman, on Flickr

Lots of tree-climbing birds. Spinetails, Woodpeckers, Woodcreepers, Foliage-gleaners, and more.

Red-faced Spinetail by 92shawman, on Flickr


Male Empress Brilliant by 92shawman, on Flickr


Rufous-throated Tanager by 92shawman, on Flickr

And that was the end of our banding! Not too many pictures that round because I was either extracting or actually banding (which was awesome!) so I wasn't taking photos...

 

But we still had one more day of birds while we hiked out!
Unfortunately the person that was supposed to bring the mules for our gear could only bring one donkey, so people with backpacking packs (including me) had to carry our gear out. It wasn't that big of a deal, but it meant that I couldn't take many photos 'cause I was carrying a duffle, too. We did see two Andean Solitaire nests along the trail, which was cool! Pretty white eggs with red spots.
And then there was an Ornate Flycatcher nest at the very entrance of the trail, so I got some good photos of the parents!

Ornate Flycatcher by 92shawman, on Flickr


Ornate Flycatcher by 92shawman, on Flickr

And two Crested Guans traveled through near the entrance, too. Weird lookin' birds!

Crested Guan by 92shawman, on Flickr

On the way back to Quito we stopped by another Reserve outside of Mindo called Bellavista Cloud Forest Reserve. Saw a really cool toucan and tons of hummingbirds at the feeders!

Plate-billed Mountain-Toucan by 92shawman, on Flickr

The scenery:

DSCN7800_edit_small by 92shawman, on Flickr


Buff-tailed Coronet by 92shawman, on Flickr


Gorgeted Sunangel and Buff-tailed Coronets by 92shawman, on Flickr

My favorite bird of the trip, with the boots with the fur (with the fur!):

Booted Rackettail by 92shawman, on Flickr

Size comparison:

Booted Rackettail and Buff-tailed Coronet by 92shawman, on Flickr


Masked Flowerpiercer by 92shawman, on Flickr

When Coronets land, they hold their wings all the way back for a second or two, which is very strange!

Buff-tailed Coronet by 92shawman, on Flickr


Speckled Hummingbird by 92shawman, on Flickr

And then there was this guy:

Turquoise Jay by 92shawman, on Flickr

And this guy!

Male Masked Trogon by 92shawman, on Flickr


Purple-throated Woodstar by 92shawman, on Flickr

And this guy just always looked pissed, it was hilarious.

Gorgeted Sunangel by 92shawman, on Flickr

Tons of hummingbirds!

Gorgeted Sunangel, Green Violetear, Buff-tailed Coronet, and Sparkling Violetear by 92shawman, on Flickr


Buff-tailed Coronet by 92shawman, on Flickr

The birds were very habituated to people, too:

IMG_4871_edit_small by 92shawman, on Flickr

And then there was this weird-ass bird that doesn't look like anything in the book, but we're pretty sure it's a juvenile Violet-tailed Sylph that is molting into it's adult plumage:

Immature Molting Violet-tailed Sylph by 92shawman, on Flickr

And that was the end of my Mindo-area trip!

 

But wait! There's more!
The day after we got back from Mindo a few of the group including me and my girlfriend went on a guided tour up to Antisana volcano and Laguna Micacocho. That was an awesome trip! We ate first stopped at a place with a view of cliffs that Andean Condors use to nest and roost and then we ate breakfast in a nearby lodge. Then drove up to the volcano and lake and saw some rarer high-altitude birds up at 13,000+ feet elevation! Was a little difficult to hold my breath to take stable photos while in thin air. Then we came back down and ate lunch at the same place we had breakfast and then we headed back to Quito and my girlfriend and I headed back to her town.
Highlights: at least 8 Andean Condors, Giant Hummingbird, Shining Sunbeam (how crazy is that name?!), Andean Lapwing, Carunculated Caracara, both Stout-billed and Chestnut-winged Cinclodes, Black-faced Ibis, Silvery Grebe, and Andean Teal.


Andean Condor Cliffs by 92shawman, on Flickr


Black-chested Buzzard-Eagle by 92shawman, on Flickr

Andean Condors look like flying mustaches

Andean Condor by 92shawman, on Flickr


Shining Sunbeam by 92shawman, on Flickr


Black Flowerpiercer by 92shawman, on Flickr

Huuuuge ass tail!

Male Black-tailed Trainbearer by 92shawman, on Flickr

Biggest hummingbird in the World:

Giant Hummingbird by 92shawman, on Flickr

Size comparison. The trainbearer is small, but not much smaller than most North American Hummingbird species.

Male Black-tailed Trainbearer and Giant Hummingbird by 92shawman, on Flickr

Condors!

Andean Condor by 92shawman, on Flickr


Andean Condor by 92shawman, on Flickr


Andean Condor by 92shawman, on Flickr


Andean Lapwing by 92shawman, on Flickr


Carunculated Caracara by 92shawman, on Flickr

I've got some more that I'll post tomorrow but right now Flickr's being a bitch to load and I'm exhausted.

 

Ok, more Antisana pictures!


Andean Lapwing by 92shawman, on Flickr


Plumbeous Sierra-Finch by 92shawman, on Flickr

Páramo habitat up at 13,000 feet elevation:

DSCN7852_edit_small by 92shawman, on Flickr

Rare Black-faced Ibis!

Black-faced Ibis by 92shawman, on Flickr


Chestnut-winged Cinclodes by 92shawman, on Flickr


Carunculated Caracara by 92shawman, on Flickr


Silvery Grebe by 92shawman, on Flickr


Andean Teal by 92shawman, on Flickr


Male Black-tailed Trainbearer by 92shawman, on Flickr


Shining Sunbeam by 92shawman, on Flickr

That's all for Antisana, now I need to upload from my trip to the Amazon and another trip to the Páramo up at Laguna Limpiopungo at the base of Cotopaxi.

 

Damn Kevin, lots of birds!!!

My first attempts at a bird in flight

Definitely need to work on getting the focus down and shutter speed... These are far from perfect but thought it was worth posting since the hawk had a mole or mouse in its talons!

1 by sconniehailer, on Flickr

2 by sconniehailer, on Flickr

 

Haha, yeah, I gotta post fewer pictures per post...this page is huge!

Awesome shots! Beautiful Swainson's Hawk.
They look in-focus to me, but I'm just looking on my phone. I tend to use only center/spot focusing for birds, do a cursory focus to get the lens in the range, then release and really quickly do a final focus as I take the picture. That way there's very little time between the spot focus and the shutter, which helps if the subject is moving.
How do you like the 400 so far? What body are you using again?

 

I'm using a 60D body. I love the 400 so far! Mainly by my comment i meant shutter speed, I was way to slow for the first few at 1/400 which i know is like minimal for hand held on this lense and then noticed what i was shooting at and bumped it up to 1/1250 sec and got a few keepers, but even then up close I wasn't impressed with the clarity so I need to up it more and do more playing. Thanks for the tips!

 

Nice! I think your body will handle higher ISO better than my T2i, so you'll get better shots with higher shutter speeds even if the light isn't as bright, but I could be completely wrong.
I have gotten really good at finding things to brace on and I find the tripod mount really nice to grab to hold very steady. I've turned mine around so the foot sticks back to the camera and I'll hook my thumb between the foot and the lens and then prop the rest of the lens on my index finger. That seems to be quite stable.

Thanks! Yeah they're crazy! The hummingbirds, especially. They were just fantastic!
Haha, yeah I was amazed that the guy that spotted it even found it in the first place! The only reason he saw it was because they saw the silhouette backlit by the clouds in the sky first. Then they could see it better without the backlighting at a different spot on the trail, which is where I took that picture. Crazy!

 

First of all, great collection of birds! Productive summer for sure :thumbsup

The whole spotting thing is so hard. I try to listen first then look at the area as a whole before narrowing my search. Sometimes you can see smaller movements easier that way.

 

Thanks!

I do pretty much the same thing for spotting birds, but with the Common Potoo being a nocturnal bird, the guy was just sitting up there sleeping like a log
No small movements or sounds or anything from him!

 

That is even more impressive!

 

Seriously! I would never have seen it. The guy that spotted it is amazing. Of course it helps that he is from Ecuador and has been helping with the project for the past 16 or so years, so he knows what to look and listen for.

 

Wow kevin thats a crap ton of birds, stellar trip

 

There had been reports of a Bar-tailed Godwit (mind you this bird is only found in alaska, russia,china and Australia ) seen on the shoreline of the bay behind the Corpus A&M university. Thos is the first sighting ever reported anywhere near tx. I went on the hunt to find him , and i looked through about 100 Marbled Godwits till i found it. Hes smaller than a marbled and a more pale white in color. Until yesterday i hadnt birded in a couple months so to see a super rare and new species got me excited for the fall migration.