Juvenile Tricolored Heron takes flight!

Birding Hilton Head Island and Pinckney Island NWR, SC

...continued from Saturday's post of the mama feeding the baby Tricolored Heron

While the first baby Tricolored Heron squawked a bit for food, the second baby Tricolored was busy doing something else...

Baby #2 doesn't have quite the hairdo as Baby #1, but he's still cute with those downy flyaway feathers on top.

...Baby #2 was determined to move and started exercising his wings, flapping and bobbing around.

...soon he was riding up and down on the willowy branch he was using as a perch...

...and then he took flight!

I think this was his first flight because I had been there all morning and had not seen any other flights.

Painting birds in an impressionistic style...

Matty art-directed me with these paintings. He's taking an art class right now and is helping me learn to be a bit more creative and looser in my style. He's all about creating something different and new, so he challenged me to get a little modern. In his exact words, "We all know you can paint and draw a bird, but can you make it interesting?" Okay professor....

Painting #39 Northern Cardinal in Evening Snow

I saw this bird in the dead of winter at a local park. Snowflakes were falling heavily and all was quiet except for the muffled sound of new snow consistently accumulating on old snow--a special sound you have to strain to hear, but one that refreshes and soothes. The bird was hidden deep in the center of an oversized bush, protected by branches as night was beginning to fall. The temps were wickedly frigid and this fellow was fluffed to gargantuan extremes. He was one of the most beautiful cardinals I had ever seen.

I had originally painted this guy in full form sitting on a branch, but Matty said, "Nope...get rid of the branches and show me something interesting." So...I just started painting over the branches and the bird, thickly applying paint where it felt good, remembering the darkness...and the cold...and the silent sound of falling snow. Eventually this fellow emerged, and Matty liked him. He liked the chunkiness of the brown paint and the fact the only things in focus were the bill and eyes. He said it was an interesting painting because you had to think about where the bird was and what he was doing.

Painting #40 Goldfinch in the Grass

A saw this little American Goldfinch in a meadow last year. He was surrounded by green leaves and brown grass. Autumn was just starting to creep in, and he was looking a bit scruffy as he carefully poked through teasel stalks. His molt had just begun and his beautiful breeding plumage was starting to fade into the subdued shades of winter, but as I stood in the field and watched him, thoughts of winter were no where around. It was hot that day...very hot, and it felt like summer would go on forever.

I also had already painted a branch with this one and was about to paint the teasel seed head the bird was looking at when Matty said, "Why do you want to add that in? You don't need it. It's interesting right now to see him in the intense green. There's energy. Leave him alone and get rid of the branch." I stammered, "Really? Don't I need to add details to the bird....don't I need to add shadow?" He added, "Mom, can you tell it's a goldfinch?" I shook my head yes. "Then...leave it." So I did, and I love it! I can feel the heat of the day and the sweetness of the bird. I remember everything without seeing the detail.

Painting #41 Autumn Chickadee

Chickadees are my favorite bird. I can hear their cheerful sounds outside my kitchen window all year long. It never fails, as soon as a Chickadee sound registers in my brain, happiness and joy follow! They are happy little powerhouses, and it seems they have the same effect on lots of people. Thank goodness for Chickadees (especially in grey and frigid February). I saw this fellow last year too. He was about 20 feet off the Little Miami trail washed in a blaze of autumn color. Temps were just starting to drop, and he was working hard to gather food for the winter.

Well...this painting does not carry with it Matty's seal of approval. We love the background and the soft warmth of the autumn color, but unfortunately Matty wasn't in the kitchen when I was painting this one, and I added a bit too much detail to the bird, and what on earth was I thinking when I added the "floating" branch? I could go back and paint over it and make it cool, but I'll let it stand as is and move on to the next painting. I already have painting 42 finished and have 43 and 44 in the works. I've got to keep moving if I want to finish the 100 Paintings in a Year Challenge by December 31, 2010!

Matty taught me a lot about freedom with paint in this series. He has a creative eye. Matty, thanks for helping me grow as an artist!

Juvenile Tricolored Heron at the Ibis Pond Rookery

Birding Hilton Head Island and Pinckney Island NWR, SC
In June, Matty, Rick and I spent a week on Hilton Head Island in South Carolina. While Matty skimboarded and Rick played tennis, I headed to Pinckney Island to bird. I was there almost every day and have so many cool photos. This first series is of a juvenile Tricolored Heron waiting patiently for his mama or papa to bring him some lunch. He was the first bird I saw when I parked my bike and walked toward the Ibis Pond Rookery. I was shocked because he was on "our" side...not across the alligator mote on the unreachable island in the middle of Ibis Pond. Last year all the nests in the rookery were confined to the tiny island (click here for last year's 15 Pinckney Island posts), but this year, several Tricolored Heron families, Snowy Egret families, and Little Blue Heron families were nesting together in their own little colony on our side of the mote in the small trees near the water. The rookery had expanded...

This juvenile Tricolored Heron had already left the nest, but he was not old enough to fly out to the feeding grounds to find his own meal and still relied on his parents for regurgitated food.

Two of his siblings were hanging out in the treetops with him (they were about 20 feet off the ground, and their empty nest was about 7 feet off the ground). This fellow was getting very excited because he could see his mama or papa approaching...

Food!! Thank goodness...

He wanted more, but mama had other babies to feed...

...and other designs in mind. She seemed to be trying to get him to fly, and she stayed with him for a while, while he flapped his wings.

...eventually she took off and flew over to the other sibling.

In part 2 of this series, a sibling takes flight.

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A Female American Kestrel in the grasses and goldenrod...

Along with the Common Buckeye butterflies and the sweet Savannah Sparrows in the high meadow at VOA Park a few weeks ago, an American Kestrel was about, hovering and hunting for prey in the tall, golden grasses. When I first caught sight of her, she was hovering high in the sky, a beautiful sight as she hung in the same place, her wings fluttering to keep her motionless. It was a very windy day, and I watched her hovering in the sky over and over. At one point, however, while I was very still and listening for the chip of a Savannah Sparrow, I saw her perched at a distance on a rusty post. Her coloring matched the tall goldenrod and teasel stalks surrounding her, and she blended in to almost nothing, but the bright white on her face and the two two black bars by her eyes gave her away as the dramatic contrast caught my eye among the golds and browns covering most of the autumn field.

Using one of her preferred methods of hunting, the American Kestrel sat patiently on the old fence post, vigilant to movement, and watched for grasshoppers or small rodents. The field was thick with grasshoppers, so when she suddenly would swoop down into the overgrowth, I assume she was nabbing a grasshopper.

Our smallest falcon, the American Kestrel is beautiful and colorful. It is always a special day for me when I spot one. Every now and then a kestrel tears through our side yard--those gorgeous kestrel colors a flash in the sky as he or she whips past our kitchen window.

It was a windy day, and she used the wind velocity to fuel another of her favorite hunting methods--the hover! Looking like a giant hummingbird, she would hang in the sky for minutes scanning the field below for food.

I saw her hovering six or seven times--each time in a different spot. She covered territory across all four corners of the high meadow. The American Kestrel doesn't hover like a hummingbird, instead, it flies into the wind at the same speed of the wind, the result being stabilized hovering. (Click here for an older post that describes how a hummingbird uses a figure-8 wing motion to hover.)

Electronic Bird Art - ElectroBirds!

...when you have fun with the Glowing Edges filter in Photoshop, our favorite feathered friends take on a new, hip, hot, and electrified image! I can dig it, baby...

Chestnut-sided Warbler made hip with glowing edges.

American Goldfinch--Vegas style!

A juvenile American Bald Eagle leaps to his nest. Truly, though, it's electrifying seeing him even without the glowing edges!

A Red-shouldered Hawk is beautiful in neon...

...the same Red-shouldered Hawk on his return flight is just as striking.

Even a Brown Pelican becomes cool when he's powered on...

...but a sweet little Sanderling seems a little out of place in his hipster garb!

A Common Buckeye Butterfly (Junonia coenia) nectaring on goldenrod

Common Buckeyes were abundant in the high meadow at VOA Park last weekend. I've never seen so many in one place. They spent most of their time nectaring on the bright yellow flower clusters on plumes of goldenrod.

A Common Buckeye Butterfly (Junonia coenia) nectaring on autumn-blooming goldenrod.

...the nectar from the goldenrod must have been especially sweet because the buckeyes were incredibly obliging, keeping their wings open for photographing.

...a little bee gets in on the nectar action...

American Dagger Moth Caterpillar, Acronicta americana

As I was walking on the Little Miami Trail earlier this week, I saw this fuzzy yellow caterpillar with black tufts hustling across the pavement. I knew what it was right away--a young American Dagger Moth Caterpillar. The early instars of this caterpillar are bright yellow like this one, but the later instars get paler and paler, until they can be almost white. American Dagger Moth caterpillars are so fuzzy, cute and cuddly you just want to pick them up and let them crawl on you...but don't! I know this from experience. When Matty was about 2 years old, we were on the back deck when a big, beautiful white Dagger Moth caterpillar crawled in his path. He let the caterpillar climb up his arm and on his leg, and he was laughing...and loving the little thing, but I wasn't too keen on it, so I walked Matty to a tree and let the caterpillar climb onto a leaf. Good thing I did because wherever those fuzzy little hairs had touched his delicate baby skin a huge red welt appeared. I can't remember if the welts appeared within hours or the next day, but when I took him to the pediatrician, she knew right away what had happened to him. "Has Matty been playing with a fuzzy white or yellow caterpillar?" D'oh! When I got home, I looked up the caterpillar and learned all about him. A week later, an article appeared in the newspaper advising people to beware the cute, fuzzy white caterpillars roaming about. A week too late for us, but we always do tend to learn things the hard way...

A young American Dagger Moth Caterpillar (Acronicta americana) looking dapper in his bright yellow and black bristly hairs (setae).

...he is soft, he is fuzzy, but don't touch! Those silky looking hairs and tufts can leave stinging welts!

The American Dagger Moth caterpillar doesn't sting like a wasp or bee. It doesn't have a stinger at all. The fuzzy hairs (setae) are hollow, and when they touch the skin, they break away releasing toxins from poison glands to which they are attached. (Click here for details on "stinging" caterpillars.)

The toxin-wielding setae make me think of deadly little straws...like something out of James Bond...sort of. It's not like these caterpillars are "attack" caterpillars. They don't release their toxins on purpose. The toxins just spill out when the hair is broken.

...not all species of dagger moths have "stinging" setae or spines, but do you want to risk it? :-) Move along little caterpillar. Hope to see you again some day as a moth!