MATUTINAL FEEDING

[Shortsighted]

 My backyard feeder is mostly neglected by birds when it sways forlorn in disturbed air enduring the banality of mid-day overcast, but at the emergence of dawn, when the breeze still sleeps, birds begin to appear to feed by the dint and allowance of struggling daylight.
 
 
 At such a time my camera’s ISO adjustment is enjoined to taste the dreck of its forbidden upper limits. If it could spit I’m sure that it would, much like the residents of Dog River at the mention of Wolverton. Just to trip the shutter fast enough for sound masking to occur, so that it presents as a single flappy slap instead of a double report, demands a heady four-digit ISO.
 
 
 First-generation image stabilization needs help under those squalid conditions and even then almost all shots emerge somewhat smeared, like lipstick after a dalliance. With a shutter burst played-out there might be a single sharp capture to retain, but then the burden of noise is so formidable that even Photoshop protests when assigned the task of unloading it.     
 
 
 By about eight-o’clock in the morning there is enough light for shooting, or when IS can handle the conditions with the aid of burst assistance and when ISO is pushed to 6400 – over 12,000 on my camera. I feel a twinge of nausea whenever the wheel is turned that far into forbidden territory. Some say that discomfort builds character but it sounds to me like an unpleasant construction. I prefer the smooth lines and simplicity of facility.
 
 
 In the brightening gloom I could hear the weak squeak of a sparrow with uncertainty on its mind. Then the haunting call of the White-throated sparrow repeated three times. It was so clear and so very close. The sound was coming from a small juniper bush beside the wooden arbour in the backyard. I couldn’t see the source of the call but I had goose-bumps. Then the bird poked its head out to verify the sparrow as proclaimed. Catching it in profile gave my centre-weighted AF something to lock on to. A moment later, after a few frames, it hopped out in full view still clinging to the bush and nipping at the needles, leaving crystals of vanilla ice on its beak. It was indeed a White-throated sparrow. Perhaps the same bird that visited a few days ago. Not long ago there were two of them but partnerships seldom last long these days.



ISO 6400, f6.3 1/200 sec






Considerable noise-reduction with Photoshop


 This time there was only one such sparrow but two  American tree sparrows also soon arrived. The tree sparrows were more inclined to perch on my courtesy branches than the white-throat. It preferred the bush, or sometimes the arbour when not exploring the grounded snow along with the company of the three amigo juncos that do little else worth reporting but leave a dense stippling on the snow from incessant foot-work.
 
 

 
 

[Shortsighted]

[Ally]

Lovely pictures. I don't see a lot of white throated this winter.

[Shortsighted]

 There have recently been numerous reports of sparrows on ebird, mostly of Song sparrows and White-throated sparrows. They are popping up everywhere, including a few reports of vanguard Red-winged blackbirds. As I previously reported, I have had a pair of WT sparrows in the back yard, on and off, for quite some time now, although I haven’t as yet seen a single Song sparrow. You watch, by tomorrow I’ll probably see one, a fine specimen that is even now wending it way to my backyard, in a desperate haste to show up on time to accompany the other crepuscular feeders. Currently I’m still only hanging the single feeder filled with niger seed and it is as popular as my sunflower seed/peanut pieces/dried current concoction previously offered. Less trouble with squirrels and starlings with only supplying niger.