Birds of June

June is a great month for bird photography in Santa Barbara, and most other places around the country.  It is the middle of breeding season and many of them are either courting, nesting and being territorial, or tending to recent fledglings.  I haven’t gone out of my way to photograph a variety of birds this month, but the birds seem to be doing a great job of finding me.  Sometimes you’re just in the right place at the right time.  Here are some highlights from the month.

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“The Chase”  –  Great blue heron being chased by red-winged blackbird.

May has come and gone

Wow, I can’t believe we are already well into June.  May was filled with travel and I apologize for not updating the blog in so long.  I don’t think I’ve ever traveled to such a variety of places in such a short period of time.  The month started with a weekend trip up to Big Sur in which the highlights were seeing at least five California Condors, numerous Elephant Seals, Sea Otters, and a trio of Black-tailed Deer.  We even found some fresh Bobcat tracks and scat, but didn’t see any cats… maybe next time.

A couple weeks later we headed further north and ended up in Yellowstone National Park.  If you are a fan of large wildlife, mid-May is the time to be there.  In addition to thousands of Bison with calves and plenty of Elk; we saw Grizzlies with cubs, many Black Bears, Coyotes, Bighorn Sheep, Pronghorn, and my first Wolves.  What an amazing trip!

To cap off the month, I braved the Memorial Day weekend crowds and headed up to Sequoia National Park in the hopes of seeing some Bears.  The trip was spectacularly successful, and I saw eight bears in about 2 hours on Sunday evening.  If you are in California, I highly recommend getting up there soon while the bears are easy to find at the grassy meadows.  They won’t be this concentrated for very long.

Here are a few photo highlights from the month.

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“Elephant Seals”  –  San Simeon, California

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