Another Saturday morning. Another morning at Stumpy Lake. The leaves were really starting to look like Autumn. The birds were still not there in big numbers.
When I first arrived, I went over to the kayak launch and noticed a lot of small birds in the trees behind me. I turned my attention to them and did my best trying to locate them with my Nikon 800mm PF lens that was attached to my Nikon Z9.
[Read More]I spent another Saturday morning at Stumpy Lake Natural Area in Virginia Beach. The colors were just starting to change. Still not a lot of birds but there were a few that were in photographic range.
The water level is a bit higher than normal due to the nor’easter we just had, but it didn’t stop this Great Blue Heron from still wading in the water in search of breakfast.
I went over to Stumpy Lake Natural Area in Virginia Beach on Saturday morning to see and shoot some wildlife. And by wildlife, I mean birds. I know it’s still about three or four weeks before they start to show up in large numbers. But I still need to get some practice with my Nikon 800mm PF lens.
We had a nor’easter approaching but it wasn’t going to be here until later in the day. But the clouds really made for some good landscape photography.
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On Saturday, December 7th, I got up early and took a cold drive down to Pea Island NWR on the Outer Banks of North Carolina. It was 19°F when I left and my heat was not working too good in my Jeep. I definitely need to take that in and get it looked at! In fact, it was still about 26°F when I started crossing the Wright Memorial Bridge to get over to the Outer Banks. But once I crossed, it was 36°F on the island and my heat started pumping a little more hot air.
I went out to Stumpy Lake Nature Area on Sunday morning to look for some birds to photograph. It’s been a bit slow this Fall. Actually, it’s been a bit slow for me since I’ve hardly done any bird photography. But the 40 days of no rain wasn’t helping either. Stumpy Lake was actually a puddle. But we did manage to finally get some rain last Friday. I brought along my Nikon Z9 and Nikkor Z 180-600mm f/5.6-6.3 VR lens.
I decided to venture out to Pleasure House Point Natural Area in Virginia Beach on Sunday morning. I hadn’t been there since late May. I figured the ospreys have moved on but I was hoping some of the migrating birds would have started arriving by now. The first bird I was spotted was a Great Blue Heron who was roosting in a pine tree.
I then walked all the way to the Brock Center without spotting any more birds. It had just been high tide about an hour before I was there, so that was definitely going to limit the bird action. I was happy to see they built the bridge near the Brock Center. When I first started coming here 5 years ago, there was a cinder block that you had to step on to cross a very small runoff between the larger part of the creek and a little pond. You could literally step over it and didn’t even really need the cinder block. But over the course of five years, this had turned into a pretty big ditch between the two. They have built a really nice bridge for walking over the water now. It has grown to be about 20 feet wide and about 2 feet deep in just 5 years.