Today's Baltimore oriole

FEMALE BALTIMORE ORIOLE, GREEN, MICHIGAN, MAY 24, 2014

Pentax K-3
Pentax 55-300 at 300mm
1/640 f8
ISO 800

Halved oranges do work as advertised as attractants for orioles, we discovered when we put these out a few days ago. This female is slimmer than the male and lacks its black head.

Daybreak at McMurdo Sound, Michigan

SUNRISE AT GREEN, MICHIGAN, MAY 28, 2014

Pentax K-3
Sigma 18-250 at 37mm
1/400 sec. f8
ISO 800

Of course it's not Antarctica, but it sure feels that way along the southern shore of Lake Superior in Upper Michigan with winter's remaining ice floes hanging on almost into June.

Today's goldfinch

MALE GOLDFINCH, GREEN, MICHIGAN, MAY 24, 2014

Pentax K-3
Pentax 55-300 at 300mm
1/500 sec. f7.1
ISO 400

My strategy now is to sit in a lawn chair about 15 feet from the feeders and just hold a motionless pose with the camera and long lens close to my eye. Within five minutes all the spooked birds will return, and if I move the lens ever so slowly I can catch a specimen in a closeup.

Brrgansers

COMMON MERGANSERS, GREEN, MICHIGAN, MAY 24, 2014

Pentax K-5
Sigma 18-250 at 105mm
1/80 sec. f8
ISO 400

It was another chilly morning among the inshore ice floes on Lake Superior when this matched pair of mergansers paddled by our cabin.

Wood ducks at dawn

WOOD DUCKS, GREEN, MICHIGAN, MAY 24, 2014

Pentax K-3
Pentax 55-300 at 260mm
1/200 sec. f8
ISO 1600

Ice floes are lingering into the Memorial Day weekend all along the southern shore of Lake Superior, and at dawn the other day I captured this pair through the front window of our cabin. Click on the photo for detail, or for a desktop.

Lincoln's Sparrow

LINCOLN'S SPARROW, GREEN, MICHIGAN, MAY 22, 2014

Pentax K-01
Pentax F* 300 f4.5 plus 1.5x Kenko converter (450mm)
1/160 sec. f8
IS0 400

It took some consultation of the bird books and fellow avian enthusiasts to identify this one. At first I thought it was a Chipping Sparrow, very common in the Upper Peninsula, but the divided brown crown and two-tone bill are markers for the Lincoln's Sparrow.

Female purple finch

FEMALE PURPLE FINCH, GREEN, MICHIGAN, MAY 22, 2014

Pentax K-3
Pentax 55-300 at 300mm
1/640 sec. f8
ISO 200

It took a while to find the distinction between the females of the House Finch and Purple Finch species, but the prominent white "eyebrow" bespoke the latter. Her erected crest suggests her mate has done something displeasing.

Crow

AMERICAN CROW, GREEN, MICHIGAN, MAY 21, 2014

Pentax K-01
Pentax F* 300mm f4.5 plus Kenko 1.5x converter (450mm)
1/1000 sec. f8
ISO 400

I shot this one through a window with my trusty 450mm lens-and-converter combination on a tripod. It's a little clumsy to aim and focus but the results are decent.

Female rose-breasted grosbeak

FEMALE ROSE-BREASTED GROSBEAK, GREEN, MICHIGAN, MAY 21, 2014

Pentax K-3
Pentax 55-300 at 260mm
1/1000 sec. f8
ISO 1600

The female of this species is hardly as gaudy as the red-bibbed male, but she nevertheless carries interesting markings.

Indigo bunting

INDIGO BUNTING, GREEN, MICHIGAN, MAY 19, 2014

Pentax K-3
Pentax 55-300 at 300mm
1/320 sec. f8
ISO 1600

Buntings look like goldfinches dipped into a tub of blue ink, and they're the same size and with the same tendency to spook, flit away and return in almost the same instant to the feeders. Three of the merry little birds are on the property at the moment, and we hope they hang around all summer instead of moving on to greener pastures as birds tend to do. This one was captured at dusk.

Baltimore orioles

BALTIMORE ORIOLES, GREEN, MICHIGAN, MAY 19, 2014

Pentax K-3
Pentax 55-300 at 260mm (top) and 300mm (bottom)
Both 1/180 sec at f9, with on-board flash
ISO 400

We'd never seen orioles at our feeders before, but this year a pair seems to have taken up residence, however temporary, at our cabin on Lake Superior. They hang around the hummingbird feeders, even though they're six times the size of the little birds, and are almost comical the way they have to grab one perch and lean across to drink from the neighboring plastic flower.

First deer of the season

WHITE-TAILED DEER, SILVER CITY, MICHIGAN, MAY 18, 2014

Pentax K-3
Pentax 55-300 at 190mm
1/100 sec. f8
ISO 1600

We were driving along M-107 at dusk near Silver City when we came upon a trio of whitetails still in their winter shag. We were happy to see them because there had been a big die-off of their species in the harshest winter Upper Michigan has seen in decades.

Today's Jay

BLUE JAY, GREEN, MICHIGAN, MAY 16, 2014

Pentax K-3
Pentax 55-300 at 300mm
1/2000 sec. f6.3
ISO 1600

Jays are around our cabin for only a few days in the spring, returning for a few days in the fall. They're easily spooked, so I shot this one through a kitchen window.

Today's Goldfinch

MALE AMERICAN GOLDFINCH, GREEN, MICHIGAN, MAY 17, 2014

Pentax K-01
Pentax F* 300 f4.5 plus Kenko 1.5x converter (450mm total)
1/125 sec. f7.1
ISO 400

For some odd reason our cabin property has become Grand Central Terminal for goldfinches, as many as 12 or 14 of them squabbling for places at our two finch feeders. This one hung onto his perch long enough for a decent portrait.

Today's Nuthatch

RED-BREASTED NUTHATCH, GREEN, MICHIGAN, MAY 16, 2014

Pentax K-3
Pentax 55-300 at 300mm
1/500 sec. f10
ISO 1600

The seed block says "For Woodpeckers," but this nuthatch doesn't care. He spent much of the day at dinner.

Today's Grosbeak

ROSE-BREASTED GROSBEAK, GREEN, MICHIGAN, MAY 16, 2014

Pentax K-3
Pentax 55-300 at 300mm
1/800 sec. f10
ISO 1600

Today our back yard was teeming with grosbeaks, jays, nuthatches, goldfinches, mourning doves and sparrows, and I made the most of the day. A pair of grosbeaks hung around the feeders all afternoon, and finally I was able to catch this one in a natural setting instead of on a feeder.

Today's Great Blue

GREAT BLUE HERON, CHICAGO BOTANIC GARDEN, GLENCOE, ILLINOIS, MAY 3, 2014

Pentax K-3
Pentax 55-300 at 190mm
1/1000 sec. f8
ISO 800

This one let me tiptoe so close that I actually had to dial back on the telephoto in order to get the entire bird into the frame rather than shooting at the full 300 millimeters and then cropping hard.

Grizzly

GRIZZLY BEAR, DENALI NATIONAL PARK, ALASKA, JUNE 18, 2010

Pentax K20D
Pentax 55-300 at 300mm
1/350 sec. f8
ISO 400

Now and then, rummaging through old photo files turns up a surprising keeper. This one was taken from an open window of a tour bus trundling through the Denali backcountry. The bear was just 50 yards away.