bird

This is me at Union Bay Natural Area with the Nikkor 400mm F2.8 VR and 2x extender. These lenses are so expensive that it’s WAY cheaper to rent them than buy them. But if I won the lottery I just might have to get one…Despite the comments on my Facebook page about “compensating” for something.

I posted a lot of pictures from the Nisqually Wildlife Refuge yesterday. Today’s pictures are from Seward Park and Union Bay Natural Area (and one from my house) in Seattle. Both parks are close to home and have abundant wildlife, especially birds.

The 400mm F2.8 paired with the 2x extender was a great combo. There was some light degradation, but it worked really well to bring things in close.

I didn’t take this with the rented lens, but I liked the photo a lot anyway. It snows so seldom here, it’s fun to shoot when it does. 20mm Lens.

The reach on this lens was such that I was able to shoot this from roughly 200 yards away.

The light today was great…the grey skies and snow on the ground made it one giant softbox.

As often happens, this eagle snuck up on me. I was only able to snap this one photo of him flying.

He was nice enough to land on a nearby tree and sit there for 20 minutes while I snapped a few dozen pictures of him.

The clarity of this lens is incredible.

I take tons of pictures of cormorants, but hardly ever post them, because they are too far away. This lens let me get up close enough to really see the coloration of his beak and eye.

One of the things I love about the Northwest is how green and lush everything is. The trees in Nisqually are covered in Moss.

This weekend I rented a Nikkor 400mm F2.8 lens and a 2x teleconverter. I decided to make the trek from Seattle to the Nisqually Wildlife Refuge 40 miles to the south to see what the day would bring me.

Nisqually is a haven for all types of birds. I always see bald eagles, hawks, falcons, blue herons and ducks of all kinds. Today, however, I found out that a family of great horned owls lives there. There are apparently two adults (I only saw one today) and three owlets (I saw all three!).

There is almost nothing I like more than photographing nature. I get to hike around outside (the 400mm is not the friendliest lens in the world for that, by the way) and witness all kinds of amazing things. The world is an amazing, brutal and beautiful place. Enjoy the photos below.

The Nisqually Wildlife Refuge is in a tidal flat and has a view of the Olympic Mountains to the West and Mount Rainier to the East.

This is the great horned owl parent that I saw today. He/she sat on this tree with a clear view of the owlets in the nest the entire time I was in the park (over 4 hours).