| Photojournal
- 14 and 18 November
2005
Two
twips to T'wassen
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I had tried to find
the Horned Lark by the Tsawassen ferry jetty on the 13th, but
didn't. Other people had reported it there on the 13th, so I had
to go back to see if I could find it. I went out on the morning
of the 14th, again travelling to the end of the gravel road beside
the main road. Aside from several gulls, I found only one bird
in the area: an American Pipit.
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Anyhow, the 14th was
Monday and I had to go on to a meeting at work, so I didn't find
the lark on Monday.
The reports of the
bird kept coming in, though, and by Friday I was champing at the
bit and finally headed out that way after leaving work early.
I took River Road, and ran smack-dab into an early rush-hour backup.
It was stop and go for kilometers, and it added at least 45 minutes
and probably an hour to the drive.
The only consolation
prize was a Bald Eagle in a funky tree beside the road.
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| So when
I finally got to the Lark's supposed location, the sun was already
going down. |
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| Shooting
more to the south, everything was pastel. Light like this is good
for landscapes but not so great for birds (unless they're very still
birds). |
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| Well, I
was there, so I cranked up the ISO on my camera and went looking
for the bird anyway. (Increasing the ISO setting makes the camera
faster but gives the images more noise.) Some motion caught my attention,
and just from the shape of the flight paths I saw, I figured I had
Snow Buntings. Turns out that I was right. Here's one of the little
guys. |
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| There were
six of the buntings, and I followed them around, taking a fair number
of shots. This was good, because most of the shots turned out way
too blurry. For the following one, I laid on the ground and rested
the camera and lens foot on the ground to help minimize camera shake. |
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There, you can see
all six buntings: the four across the front, one right behind
the second from the left, and one more, out of focus, behind the
leftmost of the front four. I was pretty happy to see these birds,
as I haven't seen Snow Buntings in about a year, and they're such
cute little birds.
However, I was looking
for a Horned Lark, and the lark didn't show. That made this the
second time in November that I'd unsuccessfully made three trips
to find a bird. Maybe my beginner's luck is wearing out.
Missing the target,
Tom
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