Bucket List - Burrowing Owls, Check!

I never thought I would see burrowing owls without having to drive to the West coast of Florida. When I heard that there was a burrowing owl family on Joe Overstreet  I just had to check it out. Even though it seems to be late in the season for birding and not to mention how hot it was, I thought it was worth driving out there. The first trip out was on Saturday morning arriving around 8:30 a.m. That is late for photographers since the light is a little harsh. Unlike other owls, burrowing owls are active during daylight hours. When they have young they are hunting to feed their family. The owls build their nests on the ground using a wide range of materials including mammal dung. It is believed that the dung helps to control the microclimate and attract insects which they can eat. They are known to sit on fence posts along the pastures so that is where my friend spotted the first burrowing owl. From there watching it fly out into the field we saw the rest of the family. They have three babies currently. It was very exciting to watch the owls and take photos of course.

Along the drive, we also spotted numerous meadowlarks, loggerhead shrikes, red shouldered hawk, doves, mocking birds, turkeys, and a bob white. The road ends at Lake Kissimmee where we also spotted sand hill cranes, limpkins, white egrets, cattle egrets, stilt, and moorhens. The second day out there there was a bald eagle near the lake and a juvenile eagle about 15 feet away from him. A kildeer was sitting on a nest in the gravel near the building protected by some carefully placed clay pots.

I am still struggling with getting a proper exposure when I have a dark bird against the bright sky background. This is something I will have to work on and not depend on software to open up the shadows. On the second trip out I had to stand on the edge of the car to get up high enough to get the blurred out green grass background. It was more successful than having the sky in the background.

After the second trip out to Joe Overstreet, we stopped for breakfast at a local favorite, the Koffee Kup, in St. Cloud. It's a great little breakfast spot, one that I will stop at again.

Bob White at Joe Overstreet

More Equestrian Events

First time shooting horse jumping. The first challenge is understanding the course and which way they will jump. Next is timing to get the horse and rider in mid air as they clear the barricades. The third challenge is finding a spot with no distractions in the background.

Fog at the Track

Southern Oaks Training Center was socked in with fog this morning. It always makes for some interesting, moody photography. The downside is that the light is lower and for action, the ISO must be bumped up making for grainier photos. I am sure it was easier for us to take these foggy photos, than for the horsemen driving their horses.

 

Perfect Day for Polo

Polo at The Villages

The Polo season is underway at The Villages, in North Central Florida. The grounds and the clubhouse is pristine and the weather was near perfect. The day started off cloudy for the first consolation match but then cleared to bright and sunny for the main and final match up. It is always great fun to not only watch the matches but to take action photos. All the images were made with the Nikon 80-400 mm lens and a Nikon D7100. With changing light conditions I had to adjust the ISO to keep the shutter speed high enough to stop the action and get sharp, in focus shots. For one chukker (what they call the periods in polo) I worked on panning. Since they change direction frequently it is challenging to get consistent results. It is worth it to keep trying until I succeed and get the shots I visualize. After half time we moved to the end zone for a different perspective. Although I don't believe they want you down there, no one protested. I try to stay out of the way and not be distractive. There are more photo ops with the horses, riders changing horses, the cool downs and the gear.

Horses are cooled down and seem to love the water!

Trotters and Matinee Day

I was finally going to make it up to Spring Garden Ranch for "Matinee Day to photograph actual harness races. Previously I have only seen training and warm ups. I thought is was good to get there early and watch and photograph the warm ups before the event started. Unfortunately the track was too wet due to the rains that came through on Friday. So, Matinee Day was again cancelled. We took photos of the warm ups and concentrated on doing pan shots. After awhile it was time to go and find a breakfast spot and figure out what next. After a great breakfast in Deland at the Potato Patch, we decided to check out another track, Southern Oaks Standardbred Training Center in Sorrento. Talk about making lemonade out of lemons. This is a gorgeous track and facility. And, not to mention that it was a beautiful day as well.



Panning shots at Spring Garden Ranch, Deleon Springs

 

Sunrise, Rewind

The sun should rise directly east during the Vernal Equinox I wanted to get the sunrise in line with the Cocoa Beach pier so we made a return trip. The drive over was mostly in dense fog. I had hoped for the fog to thin out enough to let the sun show through. Sometimes we don't get what we had hoped for. The sea fog was just too dense and the sun didn't show itself until too late. The shots of the pier with long exposures had a moody look, but not what I wanted. When the landscapes don't work out, look for something different to shoot. In this case, there were several surfers out early. Plan B was put into action. The lighting was still not the best but good practice.

Birds, babies and sunrise!

Bird and bird nesting season is in full swing in Florida. The temperatures are rising close to late spring time temperatures. Some of the best places for birding close to Orlando are Viera Wetlands, Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge and not to be overlooked, Gatorland. I managed to hit two of them this past weekend. The trip to MINWR was not planned but made sense to visit there on the way home from Cocoa Beach where we shot the sunrise. The Cocoa Beach pier is a favorite place of mine for sunrise and now with the sun rising directly east, it seemed like a good time to visit. The sunrise was not spectacular but you can't always have gorgeous skies. Unfortunately the forgotten item of the day was my camera remote for shooting long exposures. I just settled for nothing longer than 30 seconds. One more lesson learned, don't stand close to or under the pier while the maintenance people are blowing the sand off. Before I knew it, myself and my camera had sand on it. Looks like I will be cleaning it good before I shoot again.

After breakfast, we headed off to MINWR and to Bio Lab Road to see what was going on over there. It started out slow in spotting birds, but as we drove south on the road the masses of white pelicans revealed themselves. There were too many to even count. Among the pelicans were also roseate spoonbills, great white egrets, snowy egrets, ibis, glossy ibis and probably some other species. It was fun watching as they one by one took off and moved to the south. This was a good thing, as they were now positioned much closer to where we were. I worked on shooting mostly flight shots, but couldn't resist getting some shots of the large group.