Nature Photography

Well, I don’t have the 500mm rental lens much longer. Alongside the Invasion of the Juncos, there were a number of other overwintering birds…Finches. The House Finch spends the whole year in my yard. I really love their song….happy, lilting, even “curious” at times (yes, I think the House Finch is quite a vocally curious little bird! Always with the curious-sounding “Vweet? Vweet!? Vweet…?”) Anyway, I’m really bummed I have to return the 500mm lens. The quality of the photos produced by that thing are just unbelievable. Sharp, clear, excellent color quality, everything about it is amazing. I’d never really “seen” a finch until I saw the photos of them taken with that lens. Beautiful little birds, especially the males…that red is something else!

This winter, an “orange morph”, or what is sometimes called the “yellow variant”, also showed up. Still a House Finch, just orange-yellow rather than red. There is one that seems to be quite a bully…I think he is younger, probably still juvenile…but boy, he loves to hog the see tray! He chases off everything, finches, sparrows, juncos…its definitely HIS seed tray!