If you’re not a morning person, and I’m not, nature photography can be ‘challenging’ at times. In order to get those sunrise and early light photographs, well, you have to get up before the sun does. When the place you are headed to is 125 miles away, you’ve got to get up really early to beat the sun. The alarm went off at 3:00AM this morning and I was off to Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge near Cambridge, MD where I shared the sunrise with an Osprey.
That early morning light did look nice on this tree. Blackwater NWR is a great place to watch eagles, osprey and hawks along with other birds that are migrating through the area. Today, there were White Pelicans. It’s a great place to practice BIF (bird in flight) photography and it takes a lot of practice.
Blackwater is also a good place to see birds just hanging out in the trees, like the immature Bald Eagle below. The refuge has an eagle cam watching over a nest with two young eagles. You can check it out at this link. We are fortunate to have a good population of Bald Eagles in the Mid-Atlantic states and a lot of places to easily observe them.
Occoquan National Wildlife Refuge is a relatively new addition to the federal refuge system. Located in Woodbridge, VA, it was previously an Army research center from 1950 – 1998. Its life as a protected refuge has just been getting underway in recent years. This year, a bird banding station has been created. Above, a volunteer checks the wing on a Song Sparrow for condition and to attempt to identify the age and sex of the bird. Below, the newly banded and recorded Sparrow is ready for release. I was given the privilege of releasing this two year old after photographing its portrait and then being instructed on how to properly hold the bird.
Unfortunately, you’ll also come across an incredible amount of trash, most of which was lost or tossed overboard by recreational boaters. Looking out at Occoquan Bay, the floating pieces of plastic trash are easy to spot among the wildlife.
Today’s weather was glorious and a perfect start to the spring season. I spent the morning at Huntley Meadows park and the scenery and wildlife matched the weather. For example, numerous Wood duck couples were in the park shopping around for the best duck house availability. The male Wood Duck (above) is certainly the most colorful duck in North America. Many Red-headed Woodpeckers (below) were also busy, flying back and forth between trees to store nuts in the crevices of the tree bark.
The Great Blue Heron, an inhabitant of the park throughout the year, was also on-hand. From its perch in a tree, it could observe all of the activity that was taking place around the park.
During the winter, when trees are bare and grass is brown, it’s a good time to concentrate on photographing birds and streams and waterfalls. This morning I drove to Shenandoah National Park to hike to Rose River Falls, but when I arrived at the park’s entrance station I was disappointed to find the park road closed due to snow and ice conditions. I remembered that another trail to Whiteoak Canyon Falls started outside of the park boundary, so after spending 40 mins. Googling my iPhone for directions, I made the trip to the trailhead.
The hike was fairly strenuous, with steep, rocky terrain covered in snow and ice much of the time, but the scenery was a great reward. The streams and waterfalls along the way still had good water levels and there were lots of opportunities for photography.
