Welcome back to Maine

Howdy all! Megan and I are in Maine, at her parent's house. There is a ton of snow here. It was up to my knees in places yesterday, and four inches of snow fell overnight! Yesterday was fantastic for photos. Snow everywhere, sticking to the trees, and alternating sunny and dark skies made for some powerful light. Red-breasted nuthatches are going strong here at the bird feeders. Even more tame than my last visit, what fun they are to photograph. Here is a shot from yesterday afternoon.

Maine is really beautiful place. I'm sure the snow can get old after an entire winter, but being here reminds me of what winter really looks like!

Tom

Irruption- The Red-breasted Nuthatch

I've been looking for a red-breasted nuthatch ever since Jim McCormac said he had seen a few at our ODNR offices here in Columbus about a month ago. I struck out at work, but did manage to finally see and photograph this tiny little nuthatch at Blendon Woods Metropark yesterday. Supposedly, these birds "irrupt" out of the north woods when pine cone seed production is low, and, this year is one such year. I haven't heard anything about seed production in the north country, but there have been plenty of reports of these birds across Ohio.

At Blendon, this individual was staking out the feeder in the Walden Wildlife Refuge near Thoreau Lake (a small reservoir, technically.



These birds are very handsome. The black and white head, reddish brown belly, and the slate blue back make quite a color combination.



My camera has a three shots per second burst mode. It is fantastic for taking photos of birds. Now if I only had that 300 mm F/4 Canon lens...this photo would be all that sharper (while I'm dreaming, it would be even more sharp with the 300 f/2.8!)