This young House Finch eating on one of our many bird feeders was born earlier this spring in front of our house. Every year there is a pair of house finches that builds a nest in one of the shrubs near our front entrance, this year they had three young ones that hatched and now flying around on their own. Photo was taken by my finance with the Olympus 70-300mm zoom lens, click on the image above for a large photo.

With the much welcomed unseasonably warm weather this Easter long weekend across Ontario and the Caledon area the wildlife is literally buzzing around everywhere now. While sitting on my deck enjoying a few beers I managed to capture this Red Tailed Hawk flying around over the field behind me, a few times he flew right over top of me. I was able to grab a couple nice pictures of him that show off his feathers quite nicely, click on the photos for larger versions. Photos taken with my Olympus 70-300mm zoom lens, for more info on Red Tailed Hawks click here or two see to previous close up photos I have taken of them click here.

Quite often I see Hawk’s in Caledon, they are territorial and usually stay in certain areas so after a while you know where to find them. However getting good pictures of them even with a big zoom lens is often a challenge. You may see them on the sides of the roads, sitting on power lines or dormant trees looking down into the fields, they for the most part ignore the traffic of cars focusing only on finding their prey. Unfortunately they don’t stay still for long, if you happen to stop for a picture you literally have a second or two at most before they see you and take off. So quite often in order to get a good hawk photo you need to stalk them, sneak up on them when they are looking the other way or like my other close-up photo stop in the middle lane of highway 50 and shoot from inside the car. This particular red-tailed hawk I followed from tree to tree for a few minutes, seeing me as a threat he would keep flying away to another spot but generally would still stay in the same area. Click on the above and below photos for larger pictures.

I have noticed a lot of Blue Jays in the area and around my house lately, they are beautiful birds but elusive to grab a close-up photo. This particular guy was on my deck one morning and I had to shoot the picture through my sliding patio door glass which is obviously not preferable for image quality but the picture still came out quite well.

The Blue Jay (Cyanocitta cristata) is a passerine bird and a member of the family Corvidae native to North America. The Blue Jay is adaptable, aggressive, omnivorous and has been colonizing new habitats for many decades. The Blue Jay can be found from southern Canada through the eastern and central USA south to Florida and northeastern Texas. Blue Jays can make a large variety of sounds and individuals may vary perceptibly in their calling style. Like other corvids, they may learn to mimic human speech. Blue Jays can also copy the cries of local hawks so well that it is sometimes difficult to tell which is which. For more info on Blue Jays, click here.

On a side note, lets hope the Toronto Blue Jays do better next year…

On my way home I caught this Red-tailed Hawk (correct me if I am wrong) just south of Bolton along side Highway 50. He was scanning the ditch below for food and I must have made him nervous as he flew away fairly quickly once he spotted me. I didn’t notice it until after I had loaded up the photos on my computer but this particular hawk is tagged, click on the image for a larger view, if you look closely you will see a red tag on his foot. For more info on Red-tailed Hawks, click here. Picture was taken with my zoom lens sitting in the middle lane of Highway 50 (do not do this, its very busy and dangerous).

Here are two more pictures:

You can also see my previous Hawk post with pictures here from earlier in the year.

They are damm ugly birds but Turkey Vultures are all over Caledon and various parts of Ontario in the summer time. People often confuse them for hawks when they are flying high above due to a long similar wing span but up close they are not similar at all. I took this picture near the Eaton Family estate, there was a few of them sitting on a fence. The photo is a little dark, it was late in the day and I was shooting against the sun so the lighting was not optimal but a few of them came out ok, the above image (click on the image for a larger version) has been adjusted and manipulated with the HDR software Photomatix as well touched up in Photoshop. Photo was taken from sitting in my car with my 70-300mm zoom lens.

Some info about the Turkey Vulture, Cathartes aura, is a bird found throughout most of the Americas. It also known in some North American regions as the Turkey Buzzard (or just “buzzard”), and in some areas of the Caribbean as the John Crow or Carrion Crow. The Turkey Vulture is the most widespread of the New World vultures, ranging from southern Canada to the southernmost tip of South America. It inhabits a variety of open and semi-open areas, including subtropical forests, shrub lands, pastures, and deserts. Its life expectancy in the wild ranges upward of 16 years, with a captive life span of over 20 years being possible. The Turkey Vulture is a scavenger and feeds almost exclusively on carrion. It finds its meals using its keen vision and sense of smell, flying low enough to detect the gasses produced by the beginnings of the process of decay in dead animals. In flight, it uses thermals to move through the air, flapping its wings infrequently. It roosts in large community groups. Lacking a syrinx (the vocal organ of birds) its only vocalizations are grunts or low hisses. It nests in caves, hollow trees, or thickets, each year generally raising two chicks, which it feeds by regurgitation. It has very few natural predators. For more detailed info on Turkey Vultures, click here.

Here are some more photos of the Turkey Vulture:

Just by chance I spotted this Blue Heron out of the corner of my eye on the outskirts of Bolton, Ontario this past week. There was a small little pond and green space near the Caledon Rec centre where he landed, he looked a little more exotic that typical birds you see in the area. He wasn’t too scared, I was able to get fairly close and take some good photos of him although he kept a watchful eye on me the entire time.

Some background info on them, the Great Blue Heron , Ardea herodias, is a wading bird in the heron family Ardeidae, common over most of North and Central America as well as the West Indies and the Galápagos Islands, except for the far north and deserts and high mountains where there is no water for it to feed in. It is an extremely rare vagrant to Europe, with records from Spain, the Azores and England. It is the largest North American heron, with a head-to-tail length of 91–140 cm (36-55 in), a wingspan of 167-201 cm (66-79 in), and a weight of 2–3.6 kg (4.4-8 lbs). For more info on them click here.

Photos were taken with my zoom lens around noon, I processed them all through the program Photomatix to bring out the colour a little more. Click on the images below for larger pictures.

Some more Purple Finch pictures taken in my Caledon backyard by my fiance. See Wikipedia for more info on Purple Finchs. First photo shows a close up of it eating, the second photo is of a male and female purple finch and the third photo is of recent late snow storm in Caledon, Ontario which caught many of the birds off guard. Photos were taken with my zoom lens and other than being re-sized they are original and haven’t been modified or enhanced. Click on the photos for large pictures.

Its definitely starting to look and feel more like spring now and after this past winter it can’t come soon enough. I’m starting to notice lots of birds coming back now, Robins which is a good sign of spring as well as Purple Finch’s (pictured above) which I snapped in my Caledon backyard. The Purple Finch is one of 24 birds in the genus Carpodacus and is included in the finch family, Fringillidae, which is made up of passerine birds found in northern hemisphere and Africa. The Purple Finch was originally described by Johann Friedrich Gmelin in 1789. See Wikipedia for more info on Purple Finchs. This photo was actually taken by my fiance with my cam and zoom lens and was adjusted only slightly in the program Photomatix to bring out more of the colour.

With spring just around the corner the ice is starting to melt on many of the ponds in the area, I caught this Canadian Goose walking along the dangerous ice. Although many geese stay year round now those that did leave appear to be returning, I am seeing more and more of them in the Caledon area as the weather gets warmer. Photo was taken along Highway 50 near the Albion Hills Conservation Area. I used my zoom lens(70-300mm) to take the photo and used the HDR software Photomatix to brighten and enhance it, click on the image above for a larger photo.