A pond a little closer to home - 5/5/19

Often I look for new areas to go explore using google maps/earth. Particularly bodies of water and the best way to access them without trespassing. This was how I discovered this little pond tucked away on a walking trail at a nearby park. I found the easiest way to get there was off of my drive home from work. And one day after my shift I stopped by to check it out. I found a good way to get there, a place to park my car and set up right next to the water. So the next Saturday morning I was out at sunrise with my full setup.

I put the Tamron lens on a tripod and brought a folding chair with me. I hunkered down and was out there about half the day all in all. Saw a good bit of wildlife.

But before we get to that, a bit of the landscape.

Canon 5D Mark II w/28-135mm @28 - 1/30 Sec - F4 - ISO 100

The reflection off the still water was very nice. And although now I look back at this image and there’s plenty I would tweak and do differently, at the time this was really the first opportunity I had with a reflection shot.

Canon 5D Mark II w/Tamron 150-600mm @150 - 1/160 Sec - F5 - ISO 250

I also was intrigued by the early morning dew still clinging to the needles on this pine. Enough so to take two different images, one at the short end of the lens range and one at the long end.

Canon 5D Mark II w/Tamron 150-600mm @600 - 1/13 Sec - F6.3 - ISO 100 (Dear past self, why didn’t you use the remote trigger for such a zoom in shot at such a low shutter speed? Sincerely, experienced self)

It wasn’t long until the pond had some visitors. The first of which was actually a fisherman, I assume from the local apartments that were walking distance away. Out in the early AM of this Saturday casting his line on the opposite side of this pond. I say pond as the water was still, I don’t know of a source flow for it but it wasn’t that small. He was probably three or four hundred feet away. Long enough for me to see him with the lens, but as I had no intention of taking pictures of people on this day. I just watched for wildlife and kept an eye on his fishing. He was out for an hour or two, and caught several fish. Releasing all of them.

But my patience was rewarded with another visitor to the pond…

Canon 5D Mark II w/Tamron 150-600mm @600 - 1/250 Sec - F6.3 - ISO 3200

This goose caught my eye, he was by far the largest I’ve seen to date. The picture really doesn’t do it justice because there’s nothing else in frame as a comparison. But what really stood out to me doesn’t come through in the image. That stripe on his head was not the usual white that I’ve seen before. This was a much darker orange color. You can obviously tell it isn’t as white as his hindquarters from the image, but on the day I remember being absolutely floored when I looked through that lens. I had never seen a goose with an orange strip before.

As geese seldom are, this one was not alone. I managed to get a shot of the two of them while the female was doing a bit of a feather ruffling.

Canon 5D Mark II w/Tamron 150-600mm @600 - 1/2000 Sec - F6.3 - ISO 3200

The geese weren’t the only waterfowl at the pond today either. Only there for a few seconds before spotting me, this mallard swam right past at a much closer distance than anything else was getting to me.

Canon 5D Mark II w/Tamron 150-600mm @600 - 1/1600 Sec - F7.1 - ISO 1250

There were other residents of the pond as well. As I was sitting there enjoying the quiet a ripple in the water caught my attention. Unfortunately for me, it was the one thing I was hoping to not run into. A snake was heading straight towards me through the water. Not very large, maybe two feet long. That’s about all I noticed in the split second I looked through the viewfinder. I did take a picture but knowing my phobia, I immediately deleted it when I got home and unloaded the SD card. Even with my rational thinking and proof that they’re more scared of me than I am of it, I do my best to avoid coming across one at all costs. A fool’s hope, I came to realize over time, as I go more and more into their territory. But even still, as I noticed this one and recognized it for what it was I came suddenly to my feet and it swam off in another direction. Probably gave me about 20 or 30 minutes of watching for it and making a lot more noise than I should stomping around and dragging my feet. Hopefully deterring any others that may be about. Eventually I forced myself to think that it would be extremely unlikely for one to come around me and I continued my wildlife watching.

One of the last things I noticed was just how filled with life this pond is, the box turtles were all over. I named the next picture “turtle rock”

Canon 5D Mark II w/Tamron 150-600mm @600 - 1/1600 Sec - F6.3 - ISO 1600

Just in this photo you can see four of them, but there were even more on the other side of the rock, as well as on some other rocks and other dry spots out of the water. There was one bit of wood that stuck up a few feet out of the water in the middle of the pond. I watched as a large turtle climbed up on top of it, only to be harassed by another turtle who was determined to join them. The first turtle already in place was barely able to fit considering their size. I watched for a while until the second turtle upped and shoved the first one off and into the water. I unfortunately didn’t get an image of this happening, as I was focused on another subject.

You see I happened to notice a power line off in the distance, and I had a great vantage point of it. Even if it was a good ways off. I noticed a hawk sitting on the top, watching all around. Probably scoping out an easy meal. Although the pictures of it didn’t come out more than just overall shapes. It really was a long way off. I could make out that it was a hawk sitting there. But inexperienced as I was, all I wanted to do was get a shot of it taking off in flight. So I locked down the tripod, stuck on the remote trigger and waited. Glancing between my phone, because I have a hard time not looking at it, the turtles and the hawk. Eventually I got what I wanted but still basically missed the take off. Just got a very blurry very cropped in with no detail image of a bird of some kind in flight away from the pole. Lesson learned that day for sure.

Spontaneous trip - 4/27/19

A few days, and literally I mean 2, passed from getting the new lens and I was ready to see more birds. But finding places around here is difficult. Too many people. I needed a less populated area. Just like the one I was living at a few years before and my dad still lived in. Small town in North Carolina.

Packed up the photography stuff and woke up really early on a Saturday morning. It was about a 2 hour drive to get there and I knew I wanted to be ready to go when the sun came up. As this was a last minute decision, I had only called the night before to let them know I’d be up sometime in the morning. But sunrise was a bit much, as my dad doesn’t usually get up before say, 11am.

As it turned out, I didn’t wake up as early as I wanted anyway and was still just getting out of the house by the time the sun came up. So 2 hours later and the sunlight is fairly harsh. But that wasn’t going to deter me, as it still wouldn’t. One of the few good pieces of advice I’ve read on the internet is that the best time of day to shoot in the time that you’re out shooting. Goes for the best camera/lens you can use is the one you bring with you. Make the best out of what you can.

I arrived and realized I didn’t actually know where to go. I drove around for a bit but didn’t really find anywhere good to park and walk around. I eventually wound up at a school parking lot, Saturday and all so no one was there. I noticed several birds that were flitting about the parking lot, and as luck would have it, around a birdhouse. I managed to get fairly close to them and take some pictures.

Canon 5D Mark II w/ Tamron 150-600mm @600 - 1/640 Sec - F9 - ISO 500

Canon 5D Mark II w/ Tamron 150-600mm @600 - 1/640 Sec - F9 - ISO 250

Now at the time I thought “what pretty teal birds.” Now that I have more experience I’ve gone back and identified them as Tree Swallows, and uploaded these pictures to the portion of my site where I catalog the birds I photograph.

I moved on from the parking lot to some grassy areas nearby and then just went walking. Lots of bird activity in this area, and I did my best to capture everything that I could.

Canon 5D Mark II w/ Tamron 150-600mm @600 - 1/500 Sec - F9 - ISO 200

Canon 5D Mark II w/ Tamron 150-600mm @600 1/640 Sec - F9 - ISO 500

Canon 5D Mark II w/ Tamron 150-600mm @600 - 1/500 Sec - F9 - ISO 200

Eventually I moved on to just walking around looking at the scenery. Taking pictures of whatever sparked my interest. I actually walked a good bit through some fields and along fences. Turned the corner at one point and came upon an animal I don’t have a lot of experience with, living in the city.

Canon 5D Mark II w/ Tamron 150-600mm @600 - 1/500 Sec - F9 - ISO 400

There was also a hawk I caught eye of and ran to try and get a good picture. But as I didn’t want to trespass and go through people’s yards I stuck to the side of the road and just wasn’t quite close enough to get a good shot. Ah well.

That wraps up the highlights from the wildlife walkabout, I did get a lot of pictures that day but nothing spectacular. I like the tree swallow ones the best, as I could actually get close enough to see some nice detail. As I was coming to learn, the lens had some reach. But it didn’t really give me the detail that I wanted at that full extended range.

Part two of the trip was also completely unexpected. Usually going to my dads involves doing some chores for him, generally helping out things that he’d rather not do or needs another pair of hands for. Or a younger pair of hands. Thankfully I am more than willing to help out. But this trip turned into an actual trip outside for him as well. We went on a long mountain drive until the road ended, then probably hiked more than a mile. Now this was okay for me, not great for him. He does not go on hikes ever and is not conditioned for that. After retirement he tried to get a part time job as something to do, but the standing all day and constantly moving hurt him too much. So him hiking was extremely surprising. But absolutely worth it by the time we got to…

Canon 5D Mark II w/28-135mm @28 - 1/5 Sec - F22 - ISO 100

The waterfalls.

Canon 5D Mark II w/ Tamron 150-600mm @150 - 1/2 Sec - F32 - ISO 100

We had both brought our cameras, as I mentioned in a previous post my dad had taken a photography class and one of his assignments had been moving water. Although that class had been the year before and this was now just for fun. He knew what he was trying to accomplish and the settings to get the right image. We swapped some lenses too so he could try the bigger lens I had carried all the way on this hike. I do not think I absolutely needed to bring that, but the close up on the water is pretty cool.

As he had mentioned doing long exposures of the flowing water, that’s what I tried as well. See the above two images lol.

Canon 5D Mark II w/28-135mm @135 - 1/640 - F5.6 - ISO 400

I also enjoy seeing the water frozen still. As you see from the last image.

A fantastic trip overall. Learned a lot, got to see cool sights and birds. Surprise hiking with my dad which I thought was going to end at any of the points we stopped for him to catch his breath. We kept finding spots where the water would drop a bit, but nothing like the image we had seen online. Finally he said he couldn’t go any further and I ran on ahead to see if there was a nicer spot. Which is what you saw in the pictures, right at the end of the trail is that area with multiple drop points that create a lovely little water display. Couldn’t ask for much better.

A new lens has appeared! - 4/25/19

A decision was made, and a large purchase was ordered. I had been scoping out wildlife lenses for a bit by this point. Checking pricing, comparing what I wanted to what I actually could afford. I wanted more range from my 75-300. And since I was finding I liked taking wildlife photography I wanted to keep exploring that. I knew a really good lens would cost me an arm and a leg, so I was really looking at the low end first. I found the Tamron 150-600mm f/5-6.3 Di VC USD. Not the G2 version that went for even more money. So I added it to an Amazon wishlist and started keeping an eye on the going prices for used ones. Checking only, probably 5-10 times a day. Once I’ve done all my research and I feel confident that I will be making a purchase, it’s just a matter of time until I pull the trigger. Usually because of finances and trying to figure out a way to afford something with very little expendable income.

But after enough waiting one appeared on the Amazon listing that had a good description from a credible seller in a price point I was okay justifying. $719.99 later…

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If you do a search for “Tamron 150-600mm f/5-6.3 Di VC USD”

You’ll probably find a picture so you know what it looks like. I’m not taking the risk by using someone else’s photo here.

—-

This thing is a beast. Both in physical size and the zoom capabilities. It was a significant upgrade to me and I was extremely pleased. For a time. Spoiler alert, I upgraded to another lens in the near future. While great, as it turns out the sharpness really goes down after you go past 300mm. But that’s for another time, to a beginner this was a fantastic starter lens that gave me a lot of good experiences.

So although it arrived on a weekday and I typically have a routine of fixing dinner after work and watching some streaming content, I instead went outside to try out the new lens. Just outside the apartment, I figured just for a little while. The geese were out in the grass as they usually are during the spring and summer.

Side note, real quick I just noticed these pictures were under the same folder dated 4/25 but actually they are from a few days before I got the new lens. I just went out and took pictures of the goslings.

Canon 5D Mark II w/75-300mm @300 - 1/250 Sec - F5.6 - ISO 800

Now it’s almost a week later and I’ve got a bigger lens and went back out to see the geese.

Canon 5D Mark II w/ Tamron 150-600mm @600mm - 1/500 Sec - F9 - ISO 1600

Canon 5D Mark II w/ Tamron 150-600mm @150 - 1/160 Sec - F5 - ISO 320

I believe there were 6 fully grown geese in total. Pairs of 2 but only one pair had goslings. This particular goose causing trouble with the loudest and picking fights with the others. This one did not have any goslings.

Canon 5D Mark II w/ Tamron 150-600mm @600 - 1/500 Sec - F9 - ISO 3200

I love this shot. That goose tongue is an amazing detail I never would have noticed if I hadn’t been able to capture this moment.

I eventually moved to the backside of the apartment complex and into the woods that were there. Not before having my one caution come true. As I walked around one of my neighbors stopped me to comment on how crazy big the lens was and how expensive it must have been. For this exact reason I usually avoid shooting around my apartment. Even though there is usually a good amount of birds I try to go elsewhere. I know it only takes one person to think I’m trying to peer into people’s windows and there would be trouble. Plus I’d rather not have anyone know exactly where I live with my crazy big and expensive lens.

But as the rest of this evening unfolds, I will say I was given pretty damn good reason to be out there. As I went further into the woods between apartment buildings I did manage to get a picture of a robin, and I think the backside of an Eastern Towhee

Canon 5D Mark II w/ Tamron 150-600mm @600 - 1/320 Sec - F7.1 - ISO 3200

Canon 5D Mark II w/ Tamron 150-600mm @600 - 1/100 Sec - F6.3 - ISO 3200

It was after I was sitting out in the woods watching the birds flit around from branch to branch that I noticed this guy walking along.

Canon 5D Mark II w/ Tamron 150-600mm @600 - 1/40 Sex - F6.3 - ISO 3200

At first I didn’t think anything about it. I’ve definitely seen cats around this apartment complex, like every other one I’ve ever lived in. Unfortunate for the birds. But after sitting and watching, taking some pictures for a bit, he ducked into that dark area behind him. Which turned out to be a storm drain pipe. And it dawned on me that this cat currently had signs with his picture up all over the complex that he was missing. The owners did. I don’t think the cat put them up himself.

Now he wasn’t coming anywhere near me, after he ducked into the pipe I never actually saw him again. But I’m happy to say this story worked out in the end, almost right after I took this picture it started to rain a bit, drizzle mostly. But I expect that kept the cat inside the pipe where it was mostly dry. I don’t think it actually connected to a working drain anymore, as it was dry on the inside as well.

But I contacted the owners, told them exactly where I had seen him and that I was watching it for as long as I could to see if he came out. I put out treats and called for a while but no luck. Eventually that night I heard that the owners had been able to get him back and he was out there in the same place.

So as I mentioned, in a way if I hadn’t of received my lens on that particular day and decided to go outside that night. The cat would likely have been missing for a longer period of time.