Category Archives: wildlife

Aww, so cute!

When looking for a possible short getaway trip, all you need is something to trigger the choice of destination.  How about the birth of a baby elephant (as opposed to a full grown elephant being born!).  Indianapolis Zoo has recently put on display its latest addition to the elephants, a baby called Kalina.  She is still very young and causing quite a level of interest.

So, couple of days in Indy for us then?  Absolutely.  I hadn’t been to Indianapolis itself before.  I had driven through a couple of times and visited friends in one of the northern suburbs but downtown Indy was a new one for me.  Turns out it is really quite a nice spot.  More on the city in another post though.

This is about a baby elephant and so I will cut to the chase.  Kalina is very cute.  She makes a couple of appearances each day and there are plenty of people wanting to see her.  Whether this is noticed by the animals, I don’t know but I did see a neighboring cheetah eying the events closely.  Of course, he could just have been taking a look at a tasty young animal waiting to be felled!

Just like lots of young, Kalina is full of energy and exploration.  She runs around a lot, a little away from mum sometimes but never too far.  A regular run back to nurse can be expected.  She really is quite tiny for an elephant but still a lot larger than most of us.  It was interesting to see her hanging out with the keepers sitting nearby.  Mum didn’t seem bothered either.

Anyway, enough of the chat, here’s the last of the pictures.

Swallows but no Amazons

When trying to be smart and come up with an amusing play on words for a title, I realized I could be on dangerous territory with this one.  Instead, I decided to play it safe but dull!  Back to the topic…

I was sitting on the shore of Lake Michigan recently watching the swallows do their thing.  I find them a fascinating bird to watch since they have a level of agility that is hard to comprehend.  I guess when you eat by catching insects in mid air, you have to be pretty sharp.  Catching a swallow on the wing is a trickier proposition altogether.  They are hard to pan with and they are small so a long lens helps keep them visible but makes the panning so much harder!

Getting them standing on a non-moving surface makes for a far easier time.  Of course, that isn’t so exciting.  There is always the option to keep trying to get a bit closer without scaring them off.

Then again, you can always try and get the flying shot.  These will never be published but they were better than I expected!

Flashing at the birds

While hanging around up in Door County in Wisconsin, I have been taking a bunch of pictures of the local wildlife. Mainly a lot of birds in the vicinity of our hotel and that is always a fun challenge. To add to the challenge, one of the afternoons that we were back at the hotel, the weather closed in and it began to rain. There was a patch of grass outside our balcony that seemed to be a popular spot for some robins so I started taking some shots.

As you are probably aware, robins are quite bold creatures so, with a little patience, you can end up with them coming reasonably close in. However, with the light having faded fast as the weather deteriorated and the natural shade of the area, it was not looking good to get a good shot. I started out by bumping up the ISO but that was only helping so much and, without a tripod, I was still going to get mixed results.

At this point I decided to try something that everyone who shoots wildlife a lot probably does to some extent but that I had not tried before and that was using some flash to boost the excitement. I had no idea how much to use so experimented with a little extra FEC, then zero and ultimately one stop under on FEC. The latter seemed to have the best results judging by the quick view on the back of the camera – always such a reliable indicator!

I was using the flashgun straight with no boost like a Better Beamer (if that is the right name) so it was a bit of a raw experiment but the results seemed to be be pretty pleasing so this is something I will have to think about further in due course.

Scotties on parade

A weekend break has recently taken us up to Door County in Wisconsin. We stayed in a small town called Baileys Harbor. By coincidence, the weekend that we were there, the town was holding a parade of Scottish Terriers. His parade started off with a pipe band walking through the streets followed by about 200 Scotties been walked by their owners.

This might sound like a recipe for disaster. Scotties are hardly known for their calm temperament (I will resist making any comment on their fellow countrymen) so putting 200 of them together and adding some pipes might seem like it was going to end up being a noisy affair. However, it all went off very smoothly. The dogs all trotted along without any complaint – including no complaints about the outfits at some of the owners had decided they should wear just in case we hadn’t noticed they were Scotties. I really don’t think a dog deserves to wear a fake kilt with fake bagpipes for extra effect.

A lot of people turned out to see the parade. A couple of people asked us if we had come specially for it. It was certainly fun to watch but I don’t think I would make a five hour drive each way just to see it! Interestingly, a lot of people brought their dogs to watch the parade. I’m not sure whether they think that their dogs would be interested in something because it was dog centric or not but I don’t think the other dogs were really that bothered.

Hello froggy

Our hotel in Door County Wisconsin had access to the beach across some marshy land. Resident in these marshes was a colony of frogs. You were in no doubt they lived there since most of the time they were trying hard to let you (or more likely every frog of the opposite sex) know that they were there. During the day this blended into the background a little but at night it was a steady sound that actually became quite soothing after a while.

I decided to go and find some of these frogs. This is less straightforward since, while they advertise themselves constantly when you are a distance away, they get awfully shy as you approach. They switch off as soon as you get reasonably close and wait for you to go. Get a distance away again and they are back making whatever noise it is that a frog makes.

Spotting them as they lurk in the water is a little hard at first until you get used to what you are looking for. They head will be just proud of the surface of the water, probably surrounded by weed to he camouflage them. The regularity of the head shape is the giveaway. Once you get too close they disappear under the surface with a plop!

What I don’t know about frogs is whether they are very confident in their ability to get away or whether they are a bit dopey. If you approach slowly, you can actually get very close to them indeed. Maybe they are constantly assessing the threat I pose or maybe they don’t realize I am there until they have an “oh crap” moment and dive for safety. Anyway, whichever it is, I was able to get some good face to face time with a couple of them.

Thankfully not too many people were around or they might have been wondering why I was lying on a wooden walkway across a marsh!

Spring Shows Up!

The Chicago weather has been pretty cool and damp so far and spring was not showing much sign of appearing.  I often forget that we are quite far north here and the spring does not become apparent until a little later than I was used to.  However, we had a day the other day that broke the mold.  After lots of dull days, it was sunny and in the high 80s.  What the hell is that all about?

A nice day and lots of light – time to go wandering in the park.  Lincoln Park is always worth a visit on a nice day – and I was obviously not alone in this conclusion!  There is the zoo but the ponds in the park also have a fair amount of wildlife so there is always something to take a look at.

The bird life is always active so I got a lot of shots of ducks and geese.  At this time of year, romance is in the air so the birds seem to spend half the time fighting with each other!  There were also a few turtles basking in the sun so they were fun to take a look at.  I did walk through the zoo and got a few shots there but mainly it was stuff in the rest of the park.  Here are a few samples.  Need to get some more practice in given how many shots were not as intended but that is the point I guess…

Zoo Time

Brookfield Zoo is a regular haunt for us. It is a great zoo, constantly being improved and an obvious source of photo opportunities. Recently, they sent out an email telling us that the African Wild Dogs had a load of puppies that were now old enough to be on public show. (I wouldn’t be surprised if it wasn’t just their age but also that is was now warm enough for them to handle Chicago!)

We took a ride down to the zoo to see how the pups were looking. As with all animals at the zoo, when we got there to see them, they had decided that taking a nap was more important. I always find that a zoo trip requires a fair bit of patience (which is why I am mystified that so many parents take tiny kids – they always seem to be bored while the parents look like they are obligated to take children to see the animals.)

We wandered around to see some of the other wildlife before heading back. The new bear exhibit at Brookfield is nicely done and well worth the visit so we spent some time watching the bears before heading back. A peacock wandered by in the meantime and suddenly decided to do his display. It was very dramatic, particularly if you are a peahen apparently, as a bunch of them came running over. Certainly and unexpected surprise and a very welcome one.

Back to the African Wild Dogs and a few of them were up and about. They were no longer a huge pile of sleeping pups. They weren’t bounding all over the place but they were a lot more active. It was certainly fun to see them and good to see them before they get too big. They are already half their full size so it won’t be long before you can’t tell them from their parents.

On the way out, it was impossible to avoid taking a peak at the lions. The lion was roaring loudly as we approached and was giving the lioness a fair amount of attention. I wondered whether lots of children were about to have their eyes covered but the lioness obviously had other plans and moved off. I guess spring really is in the air. First the peacock and then the lion!