The Zen of Bird Watching, Part I

Some background ...

I started feeding birds in my retirement several years back.

Some deeper background ... which most of my avid(?) followers already know ... so they (you) can skip ...

I'm 73. I retired right after acute kidney a few days short of ten years ago which put me at 63. I was 64 that October, and I will be 74 this October ... and that's why this is titled "The Zen of ... ".

I grew up—until the end of the eighth grade—in and around Duluth, Minnesota. Summers there bring birds. And that's when I first started watching them. But I haven't watched them seriously, like taking it to a deeper level of understanding, until now.

Back to the first level of background ...

When I started feeding birds—again—several years back, I started paying attention to what I was doing, and not just let it flitter through my brain cells freely, like when I was a blond, blue-eyed boy running through our cows' grazing meadows on our small dairy farm thirty miles north of Duluth. This time I started learning some things, or let's say, remembering some of the things I was doing. Like if I put out a seed feeder for any length of time I would be overrun by house sparrows at the feeder above ground and doves (pigeons) on the ground below where the seeds would fall from the frantic feeding of the sparrows.

I discovered that I didn't have that problem with a suet feeder. I stored that information in the back of my mind and when spring came this year, along with the return of Goldfinches, I started—but not right away, it took awhile—putting out my suet bird feeder. It wasn't like I had planned it. It was more like acknowledging that I enjoyed working with birds. It got me out of bed one morning and I began my newest odyssey.

Anyway, to cut to the chase ... I am learning more about local birds, internet support for bird watching, and how to write about in my blog.

And I am working on improving the quality of my pictures, bit by bit and step by step. Here I am testing the difference between a bmp and jpg files (please note that captions are below the photos):

This is a bmp file. The birds are House Sparrows, with the more colorful one being the male.

This is the same picture except it is a jpg file.

Bird watching, continued

I can see how bird watching can become an obsession.

When I reviewed the video I had just shot and saw the red crest of the bird pecking the suet in the bird feeder, I felt a jolt of adrenalin. It was the excitement of winning a prize big enough to be exciting.

Red-bellied Woodpecker (melanerpes carolinus). (Male, I believe.) 

I asked what it was via my Facebook page and a friend came back with the answer.

Please note: I had tried to look it up on the web and wasn't successful, but I made an even greater find in the search. I discovered The Cornell Lab of Ornithology's website allaboutbirds.org. It appears to be a superior resource for bird watchers, but as a naiveté, I have to add, "Time will tell." However with a name like "Cornell," it's got to be great. Right? I have joined the website as a citizen scientist. Once again my "handle" (aka "User ID") is "hglindquist". And I am clicking my way through it in-between typing this, following whatever catches my eye, like "YardMap". It is great! -hgl

Another "scene" that has caught my attention is when the bird looks directly into the video camera. Here, a Bluejay is looking into the camera. I have more shots of birds looking directly at the lens. There's a small, but bright, flashing blue light on the front of the Toshiba Camelio B10's that I use, and it may be attracting the birds attention.

Please note: I am not focused on the quality of the photography ... yet. I am focused on developing the setting for bird watching in the yard by testing the different types of bird feeders, where to put and how to arrange them, and so forth. I want to be able to take both stills and video, as well as watch the birds with my binoculars, and possibly up close with a blind. -hgl

Male (on top) and female House Sparrows.


Male Great-tailed Grackles (I believe ... )


Male Northern Cardinal


Female House Sparrow with a male Northern Cardinal.

Please note: I am preparing some videos to put up on my account on Vimeo.com. I'll announce them here and on my Facebook page if and when. -hgl

Bluejay feeding in backyard - June 23, 2012

Caught this clip today, June 23, 2012,and I just had to put it up on my blog ... even though I am working on my lighting ... (I was working on my camera positioning.)

It captures the progression of my creative activity in video bird watching in a controlled setting. And my daughter told me about a family of bluejays in her backyard that got me even more excited when I saw what I had captured on video ... and about the possibilities for future bird watching.

You can view it in my YouTube account (ncswede) in a separate tab at:

http://youtu.be/006fdZOPVRQ

Note: I added titles, transitions, and voice over. This is pulling me into something that I believe will "get me up in the morning!" And that is something we all need, especially as older adults.



You can link to my vimeo.com channel:



Or watch the video in a separate tab:

https://vimeo.com/44586505

Birds feeding in backyard - June 19, 2012

You can link to my vimeo.com channel:



Or watch the video in a separate tab:

https://vimeo.com/44565699

My videos of birds feeding in the backyard of where I live in Maplewood, New Jersey are taking on whole new dimensions. The first is finding a subject for my videos that is interesting enough to draw me into it. Birdwatching here in Maplewood is. We have cardinals, bluejays, catbirds, and others that I will be looking up in my bird guides.

The second dimension is getting deeper into shooting, processing, and publishing to the internet.

The video in this post is the "before" video of my journey. We'll see how far I can get. Obviously, I have a lot to learn.

Hopefully by putting it out for all to see, I will encourage other older adults in "creative retirement" to begin their own challenging and motivating journey in pursuit of some activity that adds meaning to lives through learning and doing something creative ... no matter what it is ... an activity that gets us "out of bed in the morning."

And show that the first steps in whatever we do are always baby steps ... for all of us.

You see, I had successful quadruple bypass open heart surgery on April 10th of this year. My doctors then told me my repaired ticker would last another 20-25 years. It was in pretty good condition except for the clogged arteries to begin with. I hadn't had a heart attack yet, and they operated when the afib and angina led to a cardiac catheterization (heart cath) that signaled I was due for one.

Faced with another active "phase" for my life, I am exploring my options. Bird videos are definitely in the running. I am already hooked on doing something with video. I'll let you know how it goes.