Anne Elliott's photos with the keyword: photographers

Yet another day of Flickr not working properly. Will be so glad when they fix the map issue, for a start! Uploading this morning was fast. As you can tell, I have finally managed to get back to sorting and editing a few more (15 + 11) photos taken on our 13-day birding trip to South Texas, 19-31 March 2019. Apart from yesterday, the last photos from this holiday were posted om 20 May, three weeks ago. These photos look so drab in comparison to the colourful local birds I have been posting recently. Actually, I think Day 8 and Day 9 are going to be similar, but then Day 10 will have more colourful Texas birds. Despite the lack of close, colourful birds, Day 8 was an interesting day, spent at the Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge in South Texas. The forest was so different from anything I had ever seen, with Spanish Moss hanging from all the branches. It was quite a strange feeling to walk the trails, "Established in 1943 for the protection of migratory birds, Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge happens to be positioned along an east-west and north-south juncture of two major migratory routes for many species of birds. It is also at the northern-most point for many species whose range extends south into Central and South America. The refuge is right in the middle of all this biological diversity, which is what makes this 2,088 acre parcel the ‘jewel of the National Wildlife Refuge System.’ Though small in size, Santa Ana offers visitors an opportunity to see birds, butterflies and many other species not found anywhere else in the United States beyond deep South Texas." From link below. www.fws.gov/refuge/Santa_Ana/map.html

On 23 June 2018, I had the wonderful chance to return to two of my favourite places in the mountains - Bow Lake and Peyto Lake. This was thanks to the annual Bus Trip for Nature Calgary, with each year being to a different location in Alberta. These two Lakes are too far for me to drive (roughly two and a half hours), but mainly because they are way out of my driving comfort zone. I think I have only ever been to Peyto Lake twice before, the first time being something like 38 years ago, and the second time being in August 2013. Almost 40 years ago, I fell in love with Bow Lake, my absolute favourite place. I have been lucky enough to visit it a handful of times in recent years. Unfortunately, we couldn't capture the beautiful, really deep turquoise colour that Peyto lake is so well known for. Too many low clouds and an overcast, damp day, but you can still see the beauty of this lake and its gorgeous surroundings. The forecast that I had seen for this whole area had been for snow-rain showers, with a high temperature of 12C and a low of 1C. Though the day started off with rain, we were lucky that we only had a few raindrops while we were out walking. It was really dreary weather, though, which was not good as far as photography was concerned. Our first stop was at Peyto Lake, where we walked the short distance to the wooden Lookout deck. From there, we hiked a loop through the forest, finding a few wildflowers and some beautiful Orange Peel Fungus. On the way back to the Lookout, you really need to be very careful to take a path that leads back to the correct parking lot! The last few people took the wrong path and ended up waiting for a bus that never came for them. So easily done. They were eventually found, but after a long delay. "Peyto Lake (pea-toe) is a glacier-fed lake located in Banff National Park in the Canadian Rockies. The lake itself is easily accessed from the Icefields Parkway. It was named for Ebenezer William Peyto, an early trail guide and trapper in the Banff area. The lake is formed in a valley of the Waputik Range, between Caldron Peak, Peyto Peak and Mount Jimmy Simpson, at an elevation of 1,860 m (6,100 ft). During the summer, significant amounts of glacial rock flour flow into the lake, and these suspended rock particles give the lake a bright, turquoise color. Because of its bright color, photos of the lake often appear in illustrated books, and area around the lake is a popular sightseeing spot for tourists in the park. The lake is best seen from Bow Summit, the highest point on the Icefield Parkway. The lake is fed by the Peyto Creek, which drains water from the Caldron Lake and Peyto Glacier (part of the Wapta Icefield), and flows into the Mistaya River." wikimapia.org/655560/Peyto-lake From Peyto Lake, we drove to the nearby Bow Lake, which just takes my breath away. I had told a couple of friends how beautiful it is, but that the best kind of day to visit is a sunny day with absolutely calm lake water so that reflections are seen. Well, that was definitely not the kind of day we had, but one makes the best of what one gets. We spent time there, walking part way along the edge of the lake, looking for any bird and wildflower species, and simply soaking up the amazing beauty of our surroundings. www.travelalberta.com/ca/listings/bow-lake-1997/ On the way back to Calgary, we were very lucky to notice a handful of cars that had pulled over on the side of the road. This always makes one wonder if a bear has been sighted. Sure enough, our bus driver slowed down and stopped for a short while to allow us to take a few photos. After a few minutes, I heard our organizer tell someone (or more than one person) to stop using flash, as it was stressing out the bear. Tell me, just WHY would anyone think it was OK to use flash on a wild animal that was just a few feet away from our bus!!! An animal that was busy feeding on dandelions and had been taking no notice of us. So maddening when photographers don't have respect for wildlife and just don't think! I happened to be sitting on the 'wrong' side of the bus and had two or three rows of people who were sitting or standing up, all trying to get their shots in between the people in front of them. So, my photos are not good, but serve as a record of having had the privilege of seeing such a beautiful creature. A final, short stop on the way home was near Castle Mountain, which is a very impressive sight. It also has an interesting history, which I will add when I eventually post a photo taken there. Many thanks, Penny, for organizing our trip to such perfect places! I know a huge amount of work goes into making all the plans - thanks, too, to John for helping out with this. A very successful and most enjoyable outing. Shirley and Pam - I greatly appreciated your driving to meeting places here in the city!

The water level of Lake Erie fluctuates, so sometimes there is less or more of The Tip actually showing. This is the most southern part of Canada. So easy to forget that this is not the ocean, but an enormous lake. "Point Pelee National Park has long been recognized as a world-class birding site with more than 390 species recorded in the park's birding area. Bird migration was the reason Point Pelee became a national park in 1918 and has since garnered international recognition as an “Important Bird Area” and a UNESCO designated “Wetland of International Significance”. While significant breeding birds call the park home, Point Pelee's greatest importance is to migratory species moving through in spring and fall." From Parks Canada. www.pc.gc.ca/en/pn-np/on/pelee/activ/oiseaux-birds Four friends (four of the six friends with whom I went to Trinidad & Tobago in March 2017) and I left Calgary airport on 6 May 2018 and flew to Toronto, Ontario, Canada. There, we rented a van and did the long drive to Point Pelee for four whole days of birding. We stayed at the Best Western Hotel in Leamington, which is close to Point Pelee National Park. It fills up very quickly (with birders) and our rooms were booked months ago. Our four days walking at Point Pelee were interesting and I, for sure, saw various things I had never seen before, including my very first Raccoon : ) Various friends had told me that the Warblers at Pelee were fantastic - so many and numerous species, and so close. Have to disagree with the "closeness" when we were there! I don't have binoculars as cameras are enough for me to carry around, so I know I missed all sorts of birds. Though my Warbler count was lower than my friends' counts, I was happy to at least get a few distant photos of some species. So many of my shots are awful, but I will still post some of them, just for the record of seeing them. Some photos are so bad that I doubt anyone can ID them. We covered several different trails at Pelee, and also drove to a few places somewhat further afield, such as Hillman Marsh. If you are unfamiliar with this Conservation Area, just wait till you see a photo of the old barn that was there. I couldn't believe my eyes! I was in so much pain that I wasn't sure if I would be able to walk across a grassy area to take a few photos. However, it was so unusual and beautiful, that I reckoned I could try and move forward inch by inch - and crawl (ha, ha) if necessary. Another place we enjoyed was Rondeau National Park. One amazing and totally unexpected sighting just outside Pelee was a very distant male Snowy Owl sitting in a fieldl!! We walked every single day that we were at Pelee and the areas mentioned above, seeing not just birds, but a frog/toad, snakes that we suspect were mating, several Painted turtles, a few plants (including both white and red Triliums, that I had never seen growing wild before, and a couple of Jack in the Pulpit plants). The Friends of Point Pelee have food available at lunch time that one can buy. They also have a shuttle bus that one can take from the Visitor Centre all the way to the southern tip of Pelee, which is the most southern part of Canada. They also have birding walks with a guide each day (there is a charge). On 9 May, we spent the morning from 6:00 am to 11:00 am on a birding walk at Pelee with guide, Tom Hince, whom we had contacted while we were still in Calgary. At the end of our stay at Point Pelee, we had to drive all the way back to Toronto, from where we flew to Quebec airport. From there, we had a four-hour drive to Tadoussac on the coast of the St. Lawrence Seaway. This is such a delightful, small place and in a beautiful setting. One of our friends, Anne B, and her husband have a summer cabin further along the cliff from the few stores and port. She had invited the four of us to go with her from Pelee to spend a week at her beautiful home. What an absolute treat this was! We were able to meet some of her relatives, too, who also have built cabins out there. We were looked after so well, and we were able to see and photograph all sorts of birds and other things. We made several trips to see different places, including the Cap Tourmente National Wildlife Area, where we were able to see endless thousands of Snow Geese. Breathtaking! We also had two boat trips from Tadoussac - one was a whaling trip, where we saw very, very distant Beluga and Minke Whales. The Belugas looked almost like the white wave crests - but they were Belugas. The other boat trip was to Brandy Pot Island, inhabited by thousands of Razorbills and Common Murres, which were new birds for me, and Double-crested Cormorants that were nesting in tree tops. That long boat trip (in a tiny boat named Juno, piloted by Greg) started off in the rain and dark clouds and it was soooo cold! Thermal underwear, layers of fleece and toque and gloves were needed. This day was arranged through a contact of Anne's and it was so much enjoyed! Of course, we anchored a distance away from the island and sat there and ate our sandwiches and took endless photos. It is forbidden to land on the island at nesting time. Think I had better stop typing! As I add more photos, I can add bits of extra information. We only arrived home fairly early evening on 19 May. Still so tired, especially as I was up at any time from 4:45 am to 6:00 am each morning, many hours earlier than I usually get up, being such a dreadful night owl! Anne, I can't thank you enough for organizing this holiday for us all and for inviting us to spend a week at your cabin. You worked so hard and it was so much appreciated by each and every one of us. Thank you for doing all the many hours of driving, too! Janet and Anne, thank you so much for compiling the lists of birds seen each day at various locations, and posted to ebird. These entries will be a huge help while I try and sort out where we were and when, and what species we saw. Miss your cookies and muffins, Janet, that you kindly made for us in Tadoussac, to go along with the wonderful meals that Anne planned and made for us : )

Last night, I decided that I would try and start posting the occasional photo taken during a 10-day trip to Trinidad & Tobago with six birding.photographer friends. My scattered photos will at least be together in my three albums from this holiday. I have already posted photos taken on the hike down to the cave. This outing was one of the highlights of the trip to Trinidad.& Tobago in March 2017. One that I wasn't sure I'd be able to manage, after reading endless accounts and descriptions of how difficult the trail was. In the end, I decided I would go, as I was sure we would see things on the way, even if I wasn't able to do the whole hike. As it turned out, the hike could have been a lot more difficult, so I was really glad that I went after all. It was too challenging to get a decent shot of the Oilbirds in their cave. No camera flash is allowed, but the Guide allows two people at a time to join her, and she shines her flashlight very briefly on the birds. I keep forgetting how large these birds are. Link below for a short video (just over 2 minutes) from WildExplorer (Toledo Zoo), taken at the Oilbird's cave. My friends and I did not go into the cave itself: youtu.be/5Lm5YEsUreY "The oilbird (Steatornis caripensis), locally known as the guácharo, is a bird species found in the northern areas of South America including the island of Trinidad. It is the only species in the genus Steatornis and the family Steatornithidae. Nesting in colonies in caves, oilbirds are nocturnal feeders on the fruits of the oil palm and tropical laurels. They are the only nocturnal flying fruit-eating birds in the world (the kakapo is flightless). They forage at night, with specially adapted eyesight. However they navigate by echolocation in the same way as bats, and are one of the few kinds of birds known to do so. They produce a high-pitched clicking sound of around 2 kHz that is audible to humans. This is a large, slim bird at 40–49 cm (16–19 in), with a wing span of 95 cm (37 in). It has a flattened, powerfully hooked, bill surrounded by deep chestnut rictal bristles up to 5 centimetres (2.0 in) long. The adult weighs 350–475 g (12.3–16.8 oz) but the chicks can weigh considerably more, at up to 600 grams (21 oz), when their parents feed them a good deal of fruit before they fly. The feathers of the oilbird are soft like those of many nightbirds, but not as soft as those of owls or nightjars, as they do not need to be silent like predatory species. The oilbird is mainly reddish-brown with white spots on the nape and wings. Lower parts are cinnamon-buff with white diamond-shaped spots edged in black, these spots start small towards the throat and get larger towards the back. The stiff tail feathers are a rich brown spotted with white on either side. The feet are small and almost useless, other than for clinging to vertical surfaces. The long wings have evolved to make it capable of hovering and twisting flight, which enables it to navigate through restricted areas of its caves. For example the wings have deep wingtip slotting, like New World vultures, to reduce the stalling speed, and the wings have a low aspect ratio and low wing-loading, all to make the oilbird capable of flying at low speeds. The eyes of oilbirds are highly adapted to nocturnal foraging. The eyes are small, but the pupils are relatively large, allowing the highest light-gathering capacity of any bird (f-number of 1.07).[8] The retina is dominated by rod cells, 1,000,000 per rods mm2, the highest density of any vertebrate eye, which are organised in layers, an arrangement unique among birds but shared by deep-sea fish. They have low numbers of cone cells, and the whole arrangement would allow them to capture more light in low light conditions but probably have poor vision in daylight. Although they have specially adapted vision to forage by sight, they are among the few birds known to supplement sight by echolocation in sufficiently poor light conditions, using a series of sharp audible clicks for this purpose. The only other birds known to do this are some species of swift." From Wikipedia. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oilbird Information about Oilbirds from Asa Wright Nature Centre: asawright.org/about-oilbirds/

Early hours of the morning, on 4 April 2017, and I have just posted a whole pile of photos so that I can put them into my Trinidad & Tobago albums. I think I have pretty well finished Day 2 of our trip, apart from a handful of remaining images. There are several photos that are just about as bad as they could possibly be - posting them just for the record of what birds I saw. Will post two more when I have had some sleep, and they will be my main photos for today. No need to comment on the few dozen shots I've just added. I don't know how other people edit and upload all their holiday photos in such a short time - it's taking me forever : ) And now I must get to bed - it's 2:30 am! On 14 March, our second day on Tobago, we were taken to the Main Ridge Forest Reserve via the Roxborough-Parlatuvier Rd. This is the oldest rainforest reserve in the western hemisphere, set up in 1776 under British rule. There are various trails here, with Gilpin Trace being the best known. It had been arranged that a man would be there with the back of his truck full of rubber boots that we could rent - and how grateful we were that we now had what turned out to be much-needed footwear. He was a real entrepreneur. Our guide was Gladwyn James, whose father, Adolphus James, is a renowned ornithologist on the island. Unfortunately, he is now retired. One of the roads we drove along was named "James Path" in honour of his father - I posted a photo of Gladwyn standing by the road sign. Actually, I sent the photo to our main naturalist here, as he had done a similar outing with Gladwyn's father, back on 2nd March 1978! Bear with me, everyone, as I think I am going to have to post 5 photos (I posted 6 the first two days) from my trip each day, otherwise it will take me many months (years?) to get them on to Flickr. Obviously, no comments expected, unless you happen to notice that I have given the wrong ID for something or maybe if you like one photo in particular. Actually, I am so disappointed with my photos - never have so many (bird) photos come out blurry, many totally blurry and no use at all. I'm not sure why, though the light was often really bad and maybe the humidity had some effect. For some species, I will be posting awful shots, just for the record. I might even post a pile of photos at a time some evenings, when far fewer people are on Flickr, and then post a few better images the following morning. Won't even stop and add descriptions, etc., just so that I can get my photos added to my albums. It will take me forever to do much of a write-up about this trip, but I hope to add an extra bit of information about each photo to the very simple, basic description. Right now, I'm still working out just where I was and when, lol! We arrived back in Calgary in the evening of 21 March 2017, and I have to get myself somewhat organized and should be seeing to all sorts of important things. Instead, of course, I have been stuck in front of my computer all day, each day : ) Totally dead beat after such a busy time away, dealing with extremely early mornings and hot, humid weather. Those of you who know me well, know that I am a dreadful night-owl, so getting up around 5:15 am was an absolute killer. Also, heat and humidity don't agree with my body, so each trip out was quite exhausting - but a thrill, of course! In the morning of 21 March, we had to get up around 2:00 am, as we had such an early flight (5 and a half hours) from Trinidad to Toronto - followed by a four-hour flight back to Calgary. On our very first day, we had three flights in a row, as we flew from Calgary to Toronto, then Toronto to Port of Spain on Trinidad, from where we had a short flight to the island of Tobago. Still can't believe I've actually had this trip! This adventure was only the second holiday (or was it actually my third?) of any kind, anywhere, that I have had in something like 30 or 35 years! The other holiday was a wonderful, one-week holiday with my great friends from England, Linda and Tony, when we went down south to Yellowstone National Park and the Grand Tetons in September 2012. I have had maybe half a dozen weekends away, including to Waterton National Park, which have helped keep me going. Six birding/photographer friends and I decided that we would take this exciting trip together (from 12-21 March 2017), spending the first two or three days on the island of Tobago and then the rest of the time at the Asa Wright Nature Centre on the nearby, much larger island of Trinidad. We decided to take a complete package, so everything was included - flights (we were so very lucky to get Black Friday prices, which were 50% off!), accommodation at both places, all our food, and the various walks and day trips that we could chose from. Two of my friends, Anne B. and Brenda, saw to all the planning of flights and accommodations, which was so very much appreciated by the rest of us. I could never have done all this myself! What a time we had, seeing so many beautiful and interesting things - and, of course, everything was a lifer for me. Some of these friends had visited Costa Rica before, so were familiar with quite a few of the birds. There was a lot more to see on Trinidad, so we were glad that we chose Tobago to visit first and then spend a longer time at Asa Wright. It was wonderful to be right by the sea, though, at the Blue Waters Inn on the island of Tobago. The Asa Wright Nature Centre, on the much larger island of Trinidad, is such an amazing place! We stayed in cabins up or down hill from the main building. Really, one doesn't need to travel away from the Centre for birding, as so many different species visit the Hummingbird feeders that are right by the huge, open veranda, and the trees of the rain forest high up a mountainous road. The drive up and down this narrow, twisting, pot-holed road was an adventure in itself! Never would I ever do this drive myself - we had a guide who drove us everywhere in a van/small bus. I had read many accounts of this road, lol! There was just enough room for two vehicles to squeeze past each other, and the honking of horns was almost continuous - either to warn any vehicle that might be coming fast around the next bend or as a sign that drivers knew each other. The drive along this road took just over an hour each way. I'm already missing the great food that was provided every single day at Asa Wright and the Rum Punch that appeared each evening. I never drink at all, so I wasn't sure if I would even try the Punch - glad I did, though, as it was delicious and refreshing. Breakfast, lunch and dinner were all served buffet-style, with a great variety of dishes from which to choose. To me, pure luxury. So very, very grateful to have been invited to be part of this amazing adventure.