H.J. Ruiz – Avian101 – Page 711 – "My Backyard Visitors" – All about birds

Interesting Information Related to Birds

I’ve just received an interesting email from my friend Jessica Pellien from Princeton University Press that I consider it would be important to my followers and readers. I’m posting her email that will be conveying the information much clearer:

Hello H.J.,I have a few super exciting things share with you, so bear with me.

First, I am delighted to announce that Tom Stephenson and Scott Whittle, co-authors of The Warbler Guide, are collaborating with the ABA and NYC Audubon on a race to see and photograph as many bird species as possible 24 hours. We are, by now, familiar with the concept of a “Big Day,” where teams race to see and hear as many birds as possible in a single day, but these teams are made up of elite birders and many of the “sightings” are actually made by ear. The Photo Big Day is an attempt to level the playing the field by reducing the reliance on ear-birding and limiting species counts to actual photo-documented sightings. Tom and Scott will be part of Team Warbler and their inaugural Photo Big Day will be held on April 22 in Southeastern Texas. You can read more about the Photo Big Day, join the fun, or support a team at this site: http://www.photobigday.org/

Second, a while back we solicited opinions on a birding app that will identify birds by song with greater than 90% accuracy. Thanks to the feedback from that survey we now have a terrific name and logo for the app that captures the magic of this awesome new technology. BirdGenie™ will be available later this spring (exact date tba) and I am excited to share the new logo with you. You can read more about this pair of apps (Backyard Birds East, Backyard Birds West) at the following links:

East: http://press.princeton.edu/titles/10411.html

West: http://press.princeton.edu/titles/10412.html

The apps will be available on supported Apple® or Android® smartphones or tablets and will contain approximately 60 species for each region. Essentially, users will record bird songs with their built-in microphone, the app works its Shazam®-like magic and provides you with the closest match or a list of suggested matches. These recordings can be stored in the app and your findings can be shared directly from BirdGenie. The app is self-contained so once it is downloaded, you don’t need internet connectivity to use the app in the field. Our goal is to put easy bird identification in the hand of everyone in North America and introduce the excitement of bird watching to a larger segment of the population much like popular SkyView or Star Chart apps have created a new audience for astronomy.

Best,

Jessica

Jessica Pellien

Assistant Director of Publicity

Princeton University Press

BirdGenie™

Tags: birds, important information, Interesting information, nature

Get Good at It!

There are countless people that love birds, they are used to see them flying around or perhaps sitting on a tree branch, some in their backyard or the park, and lots of other places you get the idea. They also see photos of birds on the Internet in galleries or blog like this one. I read their comments saying the birds look so nicely posed and colorful. Like many of them would say: Why couldn’t I shoot pictures like that? Next, they grab their point and shoot camera and go out there and try their hand and seek to get a great shot. They see a nice bird sitting on a fence across the street and click the shutter. Right away they they check the shot and get a sudden surprise! They see a house with a fence with a small dot on top of it… that’s the bird.

That’s the crucial moment when they realize looking at the picture, they could hardly see the bird that they saw so clearly through the viewfinder.

I say to that… Don’t get frustrated right away! Simply, you did not use the appropriate camera to get the right results. The only way to get close up photos is using using a long lens or zoom lens!

Keep in mind a few things that are of great importance to help you be successful in your quest and why is it that you need special lenses.

Birds are small and very fast moving creatures and by nature they keep their distance from people as well as from animals for their own safety. This translates to the fact that you can not approach birds close enough to take good pictures with a “point and shoot” camera. You will definitely need a long lens or zoom lens in order to being able to shoot from a reasonable distance from the bird.

There’re countless brands of cameras and lenses that could bring you a lot closer to achieve a decent capture of a bird.

There are several not too costly cameras that have most of the necessary elements to get what you’d like to star seeing better pictures. I suggest that you do some Web searching for cameras and pick one with the required features for wild life pictures of course within your budget and good enough to use and hone your photographic skills.

You’d be surprised how soon you’ll pick up the skills and improve your bird photos!

“Go for it!”

Text and photographs © HJ Ruiz – Avian101

Northern Mockingbird

House Finch (M)

Brown-headed Cowbird (F)

Mourning Doves

Northern Cardinal (M)

White-throated Sparrow

Tags: birds, Brown-Headed Cowbird, House Finch, important information, Mourning Dove, nature, Northern Cardinal, Northern Mockingbird, photography, photos of birds, White-Throated Sparrow

Planning Ahead

Thanks to the few rain days that we had, our plants are greener and are growing leaves at a faster rate now. I can see more flowers showing their beautiful petals here and there, it really looks like Spring! My lawn’s not green yet, it has a green tint only but I know that once it gets totally green then will grow like crazy, and that’s my cue, for keeping the landscaping looking good is my heavy work.

Lately, I’ve been searching for new bird hot spots on the internet, they’re many in the State of Florida and there’s one that is located in Alabama, for this one I’m tempted to take a 6 hour drive and check it out! I heard that is a good place for photography in general and has a bird preservation park.

Part of my other plans is another visit to Florida, possibly September, there some more locations I’ll like to check, I couldn’t do it during my last trip.