Advice, a Sparrow, and a Hawk

Today I didn't see any birds because I was at school.  Normally, there are some interesting birds, as my school is in a very natural area, but today I didn't see many.  I thought I saw a lark sparrow, but I'm not sure.


Advice

When photographing a bird, take as many photos as you can as quickly as you can, no matter if the bird keeps moving around.  It isn't wise to wait for a perfect pose, because the bird might only be staying in that spot for a few minutes or even seconds, so you might not get any photo.  Also, quite often between preening or eating, a bird will stick its head up, a great opportunity for a photo.  If you're clicking away on your camera, you're more likely to get a photo or two than if you're waiting for a pose, because if you're waiting, you might not be prepared.  Birds seldom stay in the same pose for very long.

 

Another tip for bird photography is that before you start your super-fast clicking, make sure your camera is focused on the bird, not the plants behind it.  Very often, I've thought that I was focusing on the bird but I actually wasn't, and took a lot of photos, but every single one of them was blurry.  So make sure to focus, and then click! click! click!

 

 

Although I didn't see any birds today, I saw some yesterday after I posted my "Six Lovely Birds" post, besides the exciting merlin.

 

I got my first good photograph of a white-crowned sparrow.  The birds just don't seem to ever hold still!  I was very lucky to get this photo below.  They are very common, but very nice-looking sparrows.  They summer in the northern United States and Canada, and winter down in the middle and southern United States (like my area) and Mexico.  They have a very nice song, and sing very often.  The one below was singing.

White-crowned Sparrow

 

On the same walk that I saw the merlin, I saw a red-shouldered hawk sitting down low on a metal fence, a very unusual spot for that kind of large hawk.  They're very beautiful hawks with bright reddish heads and bodies and black and white wings and tails with red shoulders.  They eat nearly everything; reptiles, amphibians, small mammals, and birds are all on their menu.  They're related to red-tailed hawks, both being buteos, but they're smaller.  The one below didn't seem to mind people looking at it too much, because other walkers stopped to look.

Red-shouldered Hawk