A few small birds from around the house

Maestro

and neighborhood.

The finches are nesting in the front yard in a Live Oak.

Male


He never would turn around for me.

Female


The scissortailed flycatchers are now officially all over the place.

"I have an itch."




"My what a long tail you have!"




Eastern Phoebe near local stream. These are not great shots but I haven't seen a Phoebe since last summer.

Dern branches...


Then it flew to the ground, typical of Phoebes when water is near I hear.

And if anyone ever wondered why Red Tailed Hawks are called such, behold. :rofl


I leave you with Texas' state bird, the mockingbird, that was being none too nice to the finches in the Live Oak. I wish the leaves weren't in the way and I don't like the steep viewing angle but in the heat of the moment, I just wanted to get the shot before it took off. I was happy with the exposure though.

Look one way...


then the other.

ShepsMom

You've been doing very nicely with your little birds. Great set!

Maestro

Thanks, but I guess the RTH is all that small.

dbaker1221

terrific series Maestro.. mockingbird is best for me, the leaves just add to it because they are still good clean sharp head shots...well done

pathfinder

Very nice set of small birds.

If you did all these with a 100-400 I am even more impressed - small birds can be hard to capture.

raptorcaptor

Excellent set Maestro!

Maestro

pathfinder wrote:

Very nice set of small birds.

If you did all these with a 100-400 I am even more impressed - small birds can be hard to capture.

All done with my trusty 100mm-400mm with IS enabled. I really need to get a tripod. All my shots are hand-held. Call me crazy.

Ric Grupe

I like 'em all...but, you saved the best for last.

BigAl

Very nice set! The Mockingbirds are really super sharp

Maestro

Thanks Dave, Ric, Al and Glenn. On that mockingbird, I had decided to shoot the bird in the vertical for better comp. I also had gotten tired of having some of shots come out a tad soft so I believe I shot these in manual or in shutter priority mode but with manual focus. I think I need to leave the focusing to me instead of the AF. It gets distracted by something else all too often.

Harryb

Excellent set, good colors and details.