I bought this new camera recently, and I've been making an effort to use it and get to know its features. It's my first dSLR, a pro-sumer camera with a lot more under the hood than my years-old Kodak point-n-shoot.One of the things I've looked forward to photographing is wildlife. I'm lucky that my rural area is rife with critters, as is my workplace. Every morning as I drive to work, sans camera, I note hawks perched on power lines or winging their way to nearby treetops. At work, where squirrels are already braver than your average rodent due to routine human exposure, squirrels chitter and chase each other over ground, up trees and across limbs, just feet away.
On my days off, when I have time and bring my camera, the route I normally take to work is practically a desert in times of winged wildlife. Even the crows hide from me. Escorting my 300D on a lunchtime stroll, the roads and trails are silent. It is maddening that these clowns of the forest, normally all but climbing into my shirt pocket and juggling acorns, have now vanished. I walk my normal route, and back to the office where I work without spying a single one of these bloody Sierra Nevada rats.
I was just about to give up when I found one. He even did me the favor of posing - in the afternoon heat, heat sprawled on his belly along a split-rail fence. Unfortunately, the sight of a pudgy amateur photographer clumsily stalking him with a small, gray device clutched to his chest was too disturbing for the little guy to remain in his vulnerable position long enough to snap his photo. I got some other shots, and I wish I could post a sample or two here. But, I haven't had time in my busy life to get them onto a computer screen for review. Maybe later... Still, I'm glad I found one, anyway.
3 comments:
Just around the corner from your house is that hill that overlooks the river from Hogan. The updraft there is friendly to buzzards and some fly pretty low, easily within camera range. Study that a few minutes, to determine a likely area, then set the camera on a tripod, aim it at the aforesaid likely area and sit and wait and watch. In the ensuing dead time, scan the immediate area for most any critter. If you conserve both sound and motion, you should be able to see something within a few minutes. Set up before first light, study low light pics and their settings, maybe even use the 300 mm lense, and you should get a few good ones Dad
You have or had wild turkeys on the hills just across from you. Camera on a tripod with the 300 mm lens might catch them. Dawn and dusk are the best times
A lady I travel with frequently snaps pics from afar before or while approaching a critter in case the critter opts for leg bail. You have nothing to lose, and you might be able to blow some of them up.
There's that little stream coming out of Hogan, and if one could get to it, remember critters don't have piped water and must journey to a creek for their water. Almost all do. Again, very early AM (heresy, huh?) or dusk
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