Whatbird.com

congrats!  I'm a BW subscriber, so I look forward to seeing it in the magazine.

Thanks, cairnstone. I'd only seen photos of this before that frankly didn't look ''real'' to me (looked like a photoshop job, the color and brightness looked so unreal). Now I know that his helmet & gorget truly is that iridescent when the light strikes it just right.

Yesterday I visited one of my local birding spots and got the first full gorget helmet display of a male Anna's hummingbird. (I used to have one my yard, but he seems to have gone elsewhere, so this was a nice compensation.) Nice emerald body, but no gorget display:  Then, he turned his head and caught the light just ...

Thanks, cairnstone. I feel fortunate to have gotten any images, since he's such an infrequent visitor.

Wissa, yours might be a juvenile - at least that pose matches the juvie pose in my Kaufman guide. Your blue heron image looks quite a bit like the black-crowned because it's in the ''hunched pose'', but the adult great blue doesn't look much like the black-crowned once it extends its considerable neck: Black-crowned night heron (breeding ...

One of my favorites, those markings look ''painted on'' to me. It's also the only bird I have seen in my yard travel always in flocks.    

I use this feeder: http://www.acehardware.com/product/index.jsp?productId=1995340&cp=2568444.2598669.2602627&fbc=1&cp=2568444.2598669&fr=StorePrice%2FACE%2F00002501%2F00005000&categoryId=2602627&fbn=StorePrice%7C%2425.01+-+%2450.00&pg=3&parentPage=search&searchId=39937034144 It has two size feeder openings you ...

geminiluna: thanks. I use a Canon 40D, and either 300L f/4 IS + 1.4x or 500L f/4.5 + non-reporting 1.4x (so it maintains AF) for birding photos, usually. (Both these lenses were bought used; the 500L is ancient - out of production for years). On a handful of shots in my galleries, I used my 70-200L (the downy let me get so close and the 70-200 is ...

I've only seen this thrush twice in my yard - both times in winter, both times on this bench. It's the only bird in over 15 months of observing I've seen perch on this bench - strange that it has its own ''spot'' in my yard as such an infrequent visitor.    

Thanks, sandylee & Raptor. I keep looking for him again - so far, no luck. I was hoping the suet feeder would be a magnet.