#46
|
|||
|
|||
Quote:
I don't have the picture handy but we had some kind of tiny owl land in the tree in our back yard in the last couple of years too. Might have been a Saw-Whet Owl. That's it for sightings for me. As for the 300mm lens... the one I have is a Canon EF300mm F/4L IS. It's an ancient lens in the Canon system. I bought it in 2003, it came out in the 1990s. It was something like $1600 back then. A lot of money. I've had it ever since. It has been serviced once about $350 IIRC, that was in 2017, the IS was not working correctly after all those years. In terms of shooting birds 300mm is pretty short with a 35mm sensor body... it is a lot more reach with an APS-C body. I haven't had an APS-C body in a long time though cause I mostly just use my camera to shoot people. 300mm prime is long for sports a lot of the time. Not long enough for a lot of wildlife. I have a 1.4X Teleconverter.. that gets me 420mm f/5.6 with a little loss of contrast. I've had to have the Teleconverter serviced too but that wasn't very expensive, it was something in the mount and they charged me very little. (Canon service is absolutely amazing IMO) I have little desire to buy anything fancier or much of anything new at all.. lenses have gotten absolutely ridiculous.. the next step up to the 300mm f/2.8L costs like $3000 I think, and it's enormous. The 300mm f/4 is already a PITA to carry on a hike. If you go up to a 400mm f/2.8 or a 600mm lens you're getting on towards $10k or something I think, and they're absolutely enormous and you need a really expensive tripod... when I've seen people using them for birding they often have a Gimbal too, which I'm sure costs a fortune. Better to rent but all these lenses cost a lot to rent too. I've never rented a super-telephoto but I have had good luck with rentals in general. Somehow I'm sure if Canon cancels the 300mm F/4L IS that I have and comes out with a Mk II version the price will be $3000+. Almost everything they update goes up by 2X in price on the lens side the last 10 years it seems. Supposedly the prices are set based on the Yen to Dollar ratio when the product ships, then they never adjust prices which is part of it. But the market seems to be demanding every higher performance and is willing to spend a fortune. It doesn't seem like prices are any better on the Nikon or Sony sides. Last edited by benb; 11-21-2019 at 08:56 AM. |
#47
|
|||
|
|||
"nicely done (though i'd imagine schlepping 100 pounds of seed is no fun)"
well, it's not a big deal really...our costco sells 40 pound bags for 15 bucks...one bag fills two 5 gallon buckets we keep right there...we got rid of both HBO and netflix which covers the food...the birds are a lot more entertaining to be honest... we are getting sparrows of all types, blue jays, small woodpeckers, chickadees galore, morning doves, tons of cardinals, differ types of finches and many more can't yet identify...but tons of them and have a huge lilac tree right there for them to take cover in...bonus as well is the cats who love to sit in the window and watch it all unfold... |
#48
|
|||
|
|||
Quote:
|
#49
|
|||
|
|||
Impressive songbirds are like methheads... they never stop moving.
I really want a great flight shot or a shot of a bird taking off in my quiver of photos.. I have some of slower moving birds like Gulls (easy), Pigeons (harder), etc.. I have one neat shot of a blue jay splashing in the water.. otherwise it seems any time I spot a cool bird perched I get a bunch of shots of it sitting still that are great and then I manage to blow the shot when it takes off. There is a lot of skill required there, and I know it's not my gear. |
#50
|
||||
|
||||
Glad to see there are some other bird watchers/Ornithologists here. My favorite class from college and also the one I retained the most information from was Ornithology. We met twice a week. Wednesday nights from 6-9 and then Thursday morning at 5am to go out bird watching. I can still remember the fist time I saw a Rose Breasted Gross beak.
|
#51
|
|||
|
|||
Quote:
when I first got started, I ended up spending so much time on it, that it ate into my time for cycling. One would imagine that this could easily take 4 hrs on a weekend morning (or more) I don't really dare to dream that I can capture the good action shots (taking off, landing, etc). maybe when i'm retired |
#52
|
|||
|
|||
I haven't been in a photography club since around when I got married.
But a lot of this type of photography the contests were dominated by retired folks who had a LOT of time to go sit by the water and wait. Same thing with travel & landscape photos. |
#53
|
|||
|
|||
funny little aside via birds...they mostly hate us...they really do...it's just instinct and they are most likely right...I used to be a zookeeper...worked with the largest and most "dangerous" African livestock ones...once they got to know you...smell and vision...you were mostly fine unless you did something really stupid...meanwhile, the keepers who worked down in the bird world complex were constantly being attacked...always being taken over to the emergency room with small wounds from air attacks...they don't care much for us...
|
#54
|
||||
|
||||
Quote:
|
#55
|
||||
|
||||
Actually does have a small red area on its belly, sort of between the legs. Very hard to see in the wild - barely showing in the pic I posted. It's bigger than the similarly colored (but lacking the red spot on the belly) Hairy and Downy (smallest of the 3) woodpeckers.
|
#56
|
||||
|
||||
Quote:
|
#57
|
||||
|
||||
The Yellowhammer has more black on its back, lacks the sharply defined white spotting of the Red Bellied Woodpecker.
|
#58
|
||||
|
||||
Quote:
|
#59
|
||||
|
||||
Used to go fishing in Voyageur Natl. Park with an old Belgian guy who mistakenly referred to them as goons. We don't have them here as far as I know. Would like to hear one again some time.
|
#60
|
||||
|
||||
Red-tailed hawk and hummingbirds
We have an abundance of different kinds visiting us.
My wife really got into recently; she has several books and reads up on any new species she identifies. This year, we had a lot of hummingbirds and whereas they usually just eat from the feeder and fly away, we had one that actually seemed to watch us through the kitchen window every time it showed up. Really neat to watch. We also have a friend who is into falconry, he came out a little while ago with his red-tailed hawk. Majestic bird, especially close up. |
|
|