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Post by cats4jan on Apr 29, 2021 17:00:36 GMT
Clive's photos make me smile, so. I love these guys. So I had to share mine. These are my shots - the "focus" (haha - a photography pun) is not the photos, but the layouts - but still - I managed to capture some fun shots. Almost all the shots in these three layouts are mine, but there may be one or two that are not. Sorry, can't remember which is which. All of my photos are taken from my backyard - some with a p&s camera and some with my phone. I have switched, primarily, to my phone for photography. I do however, take out the camera if I want to take a series of shots. With my new phone and older camera, there isn't that much of a difference in quality between the two cameras so I use them interchangeably. I was wrong when I said 2015 was my first sighting, one of the layouts was done in 2014, so that must've been my first sighting. As I mentioned before, these are my favorite birds and always a treat when they come to visit our background retention pond.
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pontiac1940
CE Members
Posts: 6,360
Open to constructive criticism of photos: Yes
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Post by pontiac1940 on Apr 29, 2021 18:18:40 GMT
Thanks Janice. Good information and nice posters. Pelicans are entertaining to watch, especially when feeding. It amazes people just how far north these birds go to breed. Most American white pelicans actually breed in the very far north of the Great Plains including Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba. There are a couple of rookeries near where we live, but most breed several hundred miles north of us. I know where one rookery is on an island on a large lake; however, it is highly protected and off limits. Hope you don't mind me posting this map from All About Birds. (Their version actually does not show my house! HA. )
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Post by cats4jan on Apr 29, 2021 20:05:10 GMT
Love seeing the map. It was truly amazing that the White Pelicans came to Central Florida just to hang out. Our storm water retention ponds were stocked with fish when they first were made, but not since. The Pelicans leave when they eat all the fish. They must leave some fish because they come back the next year and they stay for varying lengths of times, so the fish have got to be still propagating, but the numbers of Pelicans and their length of stay varies from year to year. Gotta be due to the number of fish available. For those not familiar with the way Florida handles storm water in subdivisions --There has to be somewhere for the runoff during our heavy rainstorms because in digging up the land to put in a subdivision, there is no place for the water to soak in - so they have to build something to handle the water. There are two types of run off areas. One is just a depression where the storm sewers end up. It fills with rain water and then drains into the soil/sand. The other way is to create decorative ponds by lining the man-made depressions so the water does not drain. We call these our “lakes” and they are meant to be an asset to have in your backyard.
I’m happy we chose to buy on a “lake” - it has been so much fun watching the wildlife. Although familiar with brown pelicans, I never knew there were white pelicans until I saw them hanging around in the backyard.________________________ An even bigger thrill - these guys seldom visit the US - but they were in the backyard for a few years, but I haven't seen them lately Photo is mine - unfortunately, the quality is not very good - the closer I got, the more flighty they become - and I didn't have equipment that was good enough to take photos from far (excuse the quality - it's a screenshot. I lost the original layout in my messy files)
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Post by hmca on Apr 29, 2021 20:15:33 GMT
Clive and Janice.....your posts are perfect compliments to each other! Liked reading the info and seeing the pictures.
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