Nature Photography with Belmont Summer Camp – Part 1

This is my third summer to lead a summer camp nature photography session for the Howard County Conservancy’s Summer Camp. Every year is different. This year the weather was perfect on photo shoot day. I am illustrating this post with pictures I took – the children took many more than I did and pushed the abilities of the camera’s they were using to the brink. There were two groups of campers. The younger group was the first to head out and elected to go the fastest route to the woods. Almost everyone took a picture of the path into the trees.

Looking up I noticed some spider webs high in a tree.

I took one picture since none of the cameras the children were using had enough zoom…but quickly moved on to things they could take: the root end of a fallen tree,

A tree that had fallen across a small stream and was too rotten to use as a bridge, 

Curls of grass as we headed back to the meadow, and

Caterpillars.

As we were heading back to the Nature Center we realized that the path through the cut grass contained a lot of ticks. It was tick-check time as soon as we got back to the Nature Center!

Birding through a window – June 2017

My favorite birding-through-a-window episode was a gray catbird at the bird bath just outside our front door. It happened in mid-afternoon on the first of the month. At first, I thought the bird had come for a drink…but it jumped in a used the bath! It seems like I am seeing catbirds more frequently this year – or maybe I am just more aware of their sounds and am looking for them when I hear them.

There are the usual birds around our house as well: the grackle,

The robin,

The dove (precariously perched on our anemometer),

Finches (gold finches and house finches both),

And blue jays.

Belmont – June 2017

I was asked to lead a hike yesterday at Belmont Manor and History Park – part of the ‘third Saturday’ program for June. There was a component for pre-schoolers that was done in the Nature Center. The day before the event, I decided to take the trail I’d planned for the hike (make sure things were as I expected). Unfortunately – a path that is usually mowed through one of the fields was not so I had to change my plans for hiking to the stand of Bigleaf Magnolias. I took a close-up picture of a mullein in bloom before walking back to the Carriage House to decide on a new plan.

I walked down the path and into the woods like we do for pre-schoolers. There were some interesting insects

But most of the plants along the way are invasives: multi-flora rose (below), autumn olive, and wine berries.

I decided to play it by ear and let the group that showed up to hike make some choices about what they wanted to do. The staff filled the bird feeders near the nature center so there were plenty of house finches around to observe…and mockingbirds and starlings and red winged blackbirds.

It turned out the group on Saturday included younger children and a couple were wearing flip flops. We decided on an easy hike down to the pond and saw bluebirds and trees swallows on the nest boxes. The bluebird babies were visible through the opening in the box! We also saw dragonflies and red winged blackbirds. The children found several black and white feathers during our hike as well. The younger children and parents went back to the nature center after the hike to the pond and the hike continued up to the Belmont Cemetery. We walked around talking about the research that has been done and spotted a box turtle! It was probably the high point of the hike (other than the birds).

Photographs through my Office Window – January 2017

My office window continues to be a great vantage point for photography. The heated bird bath and a usually well supplied bird feeder attract quite a few birds. Some are occasional visitors (or I don’t catch them on their rounds very frequently): Chickadees,

House finches,

Starlings (the sun was just right to catch this bird’s coloring), and

A downy wood pecker (because of the chisel-like bill….otherwise it could be a Hairy Woodpecker).

The cardinals I see more often…but they seem to be more nervous than usual (perhaps because of the red-tailed hawk frequenting the forest behind out house).

The juncos I see all the time – they are the most frequent visitors to our deck.

The mourning doves have been arriving in larger groups this month. They look very fat on cold days when they have their feathers fluffed out.

We do have a hawk that comes to the edge of the forest. The blue jays usually make a big ruckus when it is in the area…making it easier to photograph.

The jays themselves seemed to enjoy the heated bird bath more than any other bird. The stop for water and then fly off to the maple or tulip poplar.

Yesterday we woke up to a dusting of snow (this has been a warm January with less snow than usual for our area). As soon as it was light enough I took some pictures of the bird bath (no bird tracks) and the feeder (a few tracks on the nearby railing.

An hour later – it was obvious that a lot of birds were out and about!