Making my backyard bird habitat

I said in a recent blog that a backyard bird habitat was going to be one of my future projects. I decided that it would be a good idea to include photos of this from start to finish.

So in this series of photos I will walk you all through what was involved. I decided the best place to set this habitat was at the corner of our yard by one of our lilac trees for a few different reasons they are I needed an area of the yard that tends to go udisturbed by our dog and children.

This area of the yard is off limits due to the garden being there so it should be safe. Another reason is as the sun sets I felt this was a fairly well lit part of the yard in the afternoon.

And of course we do have a frequent visitor that I know the song birds will appreciate the lilac tree as shelter from if he/she decides to pay a visit and that would be a hawk that I have seen from time to time.

In the first three photos you see I dug a shallow hole "I sure wish I was in a part of the state that had sandy soil rather than clay" this did not seem to be as difficult when I was a child digging holes all over my parents lawn. Well what this hole is going to be is a shallow pond for the birds to bath and drink. I could just use a store bought bird bath but what I hope to acheive is as natural looking photos as possible so the birds appear to be in the wild with no enticement.


In this next photo you see the lilac which I hope that the song birds see as a great perching area I think it would be a great prop in my photos but I will have to see. I am also going to do some much needed pruning.

Well I must admit when I got going on this project there was no stopping. So unfortunately I did not photograph as much of the details that I hoped to. I will explain it as best I can. After I had dug the hole I went to the local hardware store and picked up a roll of 10' x 25' 4 mil black plastic ( didn't have shorter length rolls ) it came to just under $20. I then cut it about twice the length of the hole and lined it with the plastic. Then in the last three photos it shows how I placed rocks, logs, branches, and other natural materials along the edges of the pond. Then filled it with water I would say not much more than 6-8 inches deep. Sadly I have been unable to get out in my ground blind to photograph the many birds that have given their approval of this water feature I have built. I hope to get out in the near future and post photos of these birds soon.

A few things on the horizon

Wow it has been a very long time since I have posted anything. Well spring is well on it's way and I have a few things going on right now.
I am attempting to start flowers and veggies by seed this year for gardening so I hope to photograph the progress of that and share as the season progresses.
Also I have gained inspiration from a fellow wildlife photographer thanks Mike for your very informative blog on your backyard wildlife set up
I am going to be working on my own setup in our backyard to photograph birds that decide to make an appearance. It should be lots of fun and challenging again with this I plan on photographing and sharing on setup and hopefully possitive results as well wish me luck and hope to get blogging again real soon.

My niece's first game of 2009

Well I am very excited to be shooting soccer again. Hard to believe it has been a whole year already. Well my son unfortunately did not want to play this year however my niece decided to play and of course I agreed to shoot her games as photographing sports I have found is becoming very addictive.

This is one of my favorites from the game although it is the back of my niece. Her oponents facial expression displaying her determination is priceless.

And this is also a favorite of mine alot of action in this shot and the intensity on the faces says it all.

And had to get in a sportrait as well

I have been fortunate enough to get a few of her face but she plays defense and her back was to me alot more than not. ( if I only had that 300mm or 400mm with an extender for when she is on the other end of the field) OH Well all in good time

Thanks for looking

Chad

Thousand Islands Enviromental Center

Well I met up with three other photographers at Thousand Islands Enviromental Center. I really enjoyed spending time with them and seeing just how much work a portrait photographer has to do. Well I did not take part in trying to get a handle on portrait photography although this seemed to be a place that offered great scenes for it. I instead stuck with my comfort zone and photographed wildlife.

Here I took a shot of some of the terrain Mike and myself had endured to get much closer to the wildlife than the board walk would allow.

I must say out of the entire day this is my most favorite I just love how the sun is shining in and highlighting the tree and the outline of this doe.

And here is another doe she was accompanied by her two fawn which you will see in the other three photos after this one.

I honestly can say I have never been this close to deer before it was unbelievable how they just accepted the fact that we were there and just went about there buisiness as if we were not even there.

Thanks for looking

Chad

Softball

This week I had the pleasure of photographing my first softball game. I made a few mistakes but over all I am very happy with the way my pictures tuned out. In the first three images only the first one was taken during the game. The other two were taken in between innings while they were warming up.

And here is where my mistakes took place. One of the most important things in sports photography is capturing the faces showing the intensity of the athelete. And as you can see I did not do this in these last two shots. She was playing first base when playing the field so I positioned myself just passed the dugout on the third base side. Now I read MANY times that for shooting batters if they are right handed you should be in the same area as I was for shooting her in the field only I should have been on the first base side of the field. Now I will definately remember this for the next time.

Thanks for looking

Chad