It was just a stroll (ye, with the 20kg bird photographing gears) at Maplewood Flats, no specific subject. I try not using tele-converter this time, and obviously the quality of images are way better.

Red Crossbill

Northern Flicker

It was really confusing when this bird been id’ed as a Red-winged Blackbird, which I took at Reifel Bird Sanctuary a couple days ago. The plumage of the Red-winged Blackbirds at Hatch Year were quite different, their lesser coverts are orangish, orange-red or yellow mixed with variable amounts of black. This bird I took is going through a prebasic molt and may not even have his red lesser coverts. When it go through its prealternate molt, the bright red lesser coverts appear and that’s how they used to be seen.

Hatch Year Male

Adult Male

It was another gorgeous weekend I spent my Sunday morning at Reifel Bird Sanctuary. I didn’t have any interested subjects this time but still found a Killdeer, which I have never seen before. I am still getting use to my new 600mm lens, which is very heavy but gives me the crisp image quality.

Went to where the ospreys nesting to try my new 600mm lens with 2x tele-converter on because I was just wondering if I can get even closer. Obviously, the image quality degraded a bit as most bird photographers’ advice. Perhaps 1.4x tele-converter is long enough if I want to retain the image quality.