Boundary Bay Birding

Oct 27/2014 Boundary Bay 64th Ave. Cloudy and sunny breaks.

Afternoon session 1-4.30 p.m.

House Finch (Carpodacus mexicanus)
A common bird at feeders and at fruit trees during the Fall and winter.

The light was fading and even at 1000 ISO the shutter speed was too low to stop the movements of this tiny kinglet. I used a Better Beamer flash diffuser on a Nikon SB800 flash. The flash head was set at 50mm on my 500mm lens with 1.4 converter. The flash was dialled in at -1/3.

Ruby-crowned Kinglet (Regulus calendula)

Yellow-rumped Warbler (Dendroica coronata)

As with the previous shots of the kinglet a little flash brightened up the scene while creating a catchlight in the eye of his dainty warbler.

 The Northern Shrike (Lanius excubiter)

Sometimes referred to as the "Butcher Bird" this juvenile Northern Shrike was hunting the small birds I was photographing. The white background is the out of focus greenhouses at the end of 64th Ave.


It was almost dark when I left for home, a few drops of rain had begun to fall, the remnants of a tropical storm way out in the Pacific was about to batter the BC coastline. Driving home there were Red-tailed Hawks hunting, Snow and Cackling Geese preparing for the deluge while the recently flooded cranberry fields held hundreds of Mallard.
By the time I arrived home it was dark, the wind was whipping up the red and yellow maple leaves in the driveway. It was time for a nice cuppa, a comfy armchair and a good book.  C'est la vie!

"It's never to late to start birding"

John Gordon

Langley/Cloverdale