This cactus wren called out to me as the sun was setting at the Desert Botanical Garden. He flew to the top of a saguaro cactus, giving me a great profile shot. When I later looked at the photo, I realized that he had a spider in his beak.Date: 19 March 2020Location: Phoenix, Arizona, United StatesOriginal resolution: 45 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic 9
I was at the Audubon Society's Smith Woods rookery, which was alive with nesting activity in late April. I caught this roseate spoonbill in mid-flight as it flew over the top of the rookery.Date: 23 April 2018Location: High Island, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6
Cape Coral is famous for its burrowing owls. We stopped by Rotary Park Environmental Center to get a lead on where to find them. Our first location had burrows but no owls. Based on an older map published by the city, I realized that most city properties had burrows. We found this owl on a sandy, vacant lot across the street from a small park. It's probably a male since they tend to guard the burrows in spring while the female is sitting on her eggs,Date: 17 March 2018Location: Cape Coral, Florida, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic CC 7
Date: 23 April 2018Location: High Island, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6
This great egret is making a precision landing on this branch as it fights a strong wind.Date: 19 April 2019Location: High Island, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic CC 8
Date: 19 March 2021Location: Sanibel Island, Florida, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic 10
Date: 19 March 2021Location: Sanibel Island, Florida, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic 10
Date: 8 April 2009Location: Port Aransas, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 6 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6
I was watching this roseat spoonbill carefully to try and catch it as it launched itself into flight from the dead branch. As you can see, the bird launches itself out and down to pick up the speed it needs to fly.Date: 23 April 2018Location: High Island, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic CC 7
Date: 13 March 2019Location: Sanibel, Florida, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6
Date: 19 March 2021Location: Sanibel Island, Florida, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic 9
Date: 19 April 2019Location: High Island, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic CC 8
We were hiking at the Bailey Tract in Ding Darling National Wildlife Refuge when I spotted an osprey in the distance, sitting in the marsh grass at the edge of a pond. It would splash in the water, then take flight, and then return to the water. I caught this photo of it in flight.Date: 12 March 2019Location: Sanibel, Florida, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic CC 8
Date: 28 September 2022Location: Tomball, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 45 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic 12
This snowy egret appears to be a bit of a narcissist.Date: 12 March 2019Location: Sanibel, Florida, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6
I was photographing egrets and spoonbills at the Audubon rookery on High Island when my wife looked down below the blind and saw this purple gallinule at the edge of the pond. Purple gallinules are a type of swamphen. They spend much of the year in Central and South America, but they breedr along the Gulf Coast of the U.S. and Mexico.Date: 19 April 2019Location: High Island, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic 10
Date: 19 April 2019Location: High Island, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic CC 8
We were returning to our cruise ship when we spotted this bald eagle pair in a Sitka spruce near the ship. I hurried up to our room, grabbed my camera and 500 mm lens, and went up to the fantail of the ship to shoot directly across at the birds. The eagle with the rounded head in the background is the male, and the eagle with the larger head in the foreground is the female.Date: 6 July 2022Location: Juneau, Alaska, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic 12
Date: 23 April 2018Location: High Island, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 36 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 12
Date: 31 December 2013Location: Dlass, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 12 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6
The whooping crane is the tallest bird in North America and an endangered species. They winter in Aransas National Wildlife Refuge, so I took a birding tour by boat out of Rockport to see if I could get some photos of the birds. Our boat captain did a great job of finding this family of cranes in the marsh along the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway. The immature crane has brown markings and, while hard to see, has a crab in its bill.Date: 20 March 2018Location: Aransas National Wildlife Refuge, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6
Date: 22 March 2018Location: Independence, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic CC 7
Date: 20 March 2018Location: Aransas National Wildlife Refuge, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic 9
Let's face it; this bird isn't exactly pretty. My tour boat was headed back to Rockport from Aranasas National Wildlife Refuge, when the captain spotted this immature brown booby, which is a long way from home. They normally hang out in the Caribbean.Date: 20 March 2018Location: Aransas Bay, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic CC 7
Date: 12 March 2018Location: Sanibel, Florida, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic CC 7
I took this shot of a great egret as it swept in for a landing at the rookery at the Audubon Society's Smith Oaks Bird Sanctuary.Date: 23 April 2018Location: High Island, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6
Date: 25 March 2011Location: Longhorn Cavern State Park, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 12 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic CC 7
Female Ruby-throated Hummingbird (Archilochus colubris)Date: 29 April 2011Location: Camp Wood, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 12 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6
Date: 12 March 2018Location: Sanibel, Florida, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6
Date: 19 April 2019Location: High Island, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic CC 8
Date: 16 March 2021Location: Sanibel, Florida, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic 9
Date: 15 March 2018Location: Sanibel, Florida, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6
Date: 16 March 2021Location: Sanibel Island, Florida, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic 9
We were out on Tarpon Bay near the rookeries, and I spotted this Great Blue Heron looking like it ws about to fly off. Instead, it made a short hop, and I caught it in mid-air.Date: 15 March 2018Location: Sanibel, Florida, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6
Date: 19 March 2021Location: Sanibel, Florida, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic 9
Date: 23 April 2018Location: High Island, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6
I was using a macro lens to shoot wildflowers at Desert Botanical Garden when my wife saw the hummingbird behind me. I turned around and got a few shots of it feeding on bellflower beardtongue before it flew away.The lens is an out-of-production Nikon 70-180 macro zoom that requires a screw-drive from the body to focus and is therefore not partcularly fast. I was surprised that I managed to nail focus on the hummingbird, but sometimes you get lucky.Date: 19 March 2020Location: Phoenix, Arizona, United StatesOriginal resolution: 45 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic 9
I could see this great egret was getting ready to take off and got this shot not long after it left its perch.Date: 23 April 2018Location: High Island, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6
Date: 19 March 2021Location: Sanibel Island, Florida, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic 9
While this egret appears to be jumping up, it's actually trying to land with nesting material in its mouth. The high wind speeds on this particular day forced large birds like egrets to create a lot of drag with their bodies so that they could control their landings.Date: 19 April 2019Location: High Island, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic CC 8
This immature ring-billed gull was flying beside our boat on Sundown Bay when I captured it with backlit wings from the morning sun.Date: 20 March 2018Location: Aransas National Wildlife Refuge, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic CC 7
I was following this brown pelican with my camera and managed to catch it just at the point of contact with the water as it landed. It looks like it's standing on the water and flapping its wings.Date: 15 March 2018Location: Sanibel, Florida, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6
This American White Ibis was wading pretty close to me in the Bailey Tract at Darling NWR, so I decided to take a close-up. The late afternoon light really brought out his features.Date: 14 April 2021Location: Sanibel Island, Florida, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic 9
Date: 19 April 2019Location: High Island, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic CC 8
Greater Yellowlegs | 23 April 2018 | Bolivar Peninsula, Galveston County, Texas, United States | Nikon D810 | 36 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6
I was at the rookery at the Audubon Society's Smith Oaks Bird Sanctuary during nesting season. Many of the eggs had hatched. This female egret is standing guard after fending off another egret attacking from below.Date: 23 April 2018Location: High Island, Texas, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom Classic CC 7
Date: 7 July 2016Location: Kennebunkport, Maine, United StatesOriginal resolution: 20 MPProcessing: Processed from RAW using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 6
