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ALLAN BOVEE - PHOTOGRAPHY ADVENTURES IN NATURE PHOTOGRAPHY AUGUST 2007
Unfortunately, I didn't do very well, but I
learned a great deal about the area and will most likely return next season
instead of going to the Upper Peninsula as I had planned. I started in the
Grayling bog, a beautiful area where I have photographed orchids and gentians
before, and spent a lot of time trying to find a northern waterthrush nest which
I am sure was very close. The birds would appear continuously with food but I
just couldn't locate their well hidden nest for my photography. However, upon
returning to my parked van, I did find a nest I have long looked for; a
white-throated sparrow. These birds were feeding young at a ground nest that was
very well hidden and I decided to return that weekend to photograph them. I have
looked for this bird's nest for many years and have been close in the Upper
Peninsula and northern Ontario a few times but now I had an actual nest. I drove
up Friday night and when I came back early Saturday morning to photograph the
nest all was well, the young seemed active but I thought I could get some
photos. I rushed getting set up as the sun began to rise bringing the stifling
heat we were experiencing. But after nearly completing my setup, having the
blind in place, the flash tripods all set, and even having the strobes turned
on, the young suddenly bolted from the nest. I have seen this many times. It can
be caused by them becoming overcome with fear but these birds had gotten used to
me and I think it was just their time to go. Nevertheless, any photography
possibilities were finished and I was mad at myself for not bringing my blind
and flashes on Wednesday when I found the nest. This was a rare find for me, and
I may never find another one. But, no use in crying over spilled milk or
scattered young, it was all over. I packed everything up and returned to the
M-93 area to look for more nests.
One thing I learned about this area was to find my way around. I am always worried about getting lost, especially in the Upper Peninsula, where you can be in areas that are ten or twenty miles from a road. Getting turned around in there could be very difficult to get out of. But in this area I found that trails and old logging roads had definite directions and with my GPS, I soon found sections which were lost proof where I could wander and always compass out. These places I refer to as "I own it", that is I don't have to worry about getting lost if I always walk in a straight line by compass, I will emerge on a road somewhere. For example, when I used to be standing by the Grayling bog I always felt it was very remote and tucked away. There is a path to it from the road, but I have always hesitated venturing off it (chasing after northern waterthrushes for example). I have now found two other places to access it from. That is now I can wander off the path and using my GPS, go back to the van or over to another road about 1/2 mile away or take another direction and end up on another trail which takes me to even another road. So now, I can wander about and never get lost which allows me to spend more time looking for birds and not which direction I am walking in. Anyway, while I was hiking about and learning all this, I heard a vireo scolding a blue jay. All birds dislike blue jays since they are threats to their nests. This vireo was really giving the blue jay the business and I approached closer and began to watch with my binoculars. The blue jay was flying about and landing in the pines acting like it was just pursuing food. The vireo kept dive bombing the jay causing it to fly and keeping it moving on. When I finally got a good look at the vireo, I was happy to see it was the blue-headed vireo. This was a bird I made an intense search for last year in the Hiawatha National Forest in the Upper Peninsula. For three days I followed this bird as it sang and gathered food, hoping it would lead me to its nest. Only too late did I discover it was feeding fledged birds, the nest had been left for some time. I have always wanted to photograph this species which I consider to be the most beautiful of the vireos. I have learned the difference between the blue-headed vireo song and the much more common red-eyed vireo. Though very similar, the song of the blue-headed has a richer quality and a very distinctive upward slur in one of its phrases which immediately tells me it is the blue-headed. I still call it the solitary vireo, which was its name for many years until they recently changed it to the blue-headed vireo. I knew a lot about its nesting habits from the research I have done, and began to look in the smaller trees under the towering pines in the area I was working. It was just a short time and I discovered a vireo nest, they are a distinctive pendulous weave hanging between a fork in a branch and the male soon landed on the nest, and just as I had read they do, he began to sing while it was sitting on the nest. The nest was about twelve feet up and so I returned to the van and got a long pole and mirror to peek into the nest and discovered three eggs. All around the nest on the ground were growing pink lady's slippers which I photographed. I calculated when the nest would hatch and figured out the scaffolding to bring and returned to the area about a week later. Unfortunately, the nest was empty when I returned, taken by a predator, probably the blue jay. Although I was discouraged, I decided to spent the day searching for more nests. I found more blue-headed vireos singing in areas further along. I didn't find a nest but now feel much more confident in learning a lot of the birds behavior, and next year I will be looking forward to returning to this area. I still have the consolation prize of the empty nest for my collection and will be able to display it with the empty white-throated sparrow nest.
Goshawks are members of the Accipiter genus
of hawks, these include the sharp-shin, a bird about the size of a mourning dove
and the Cooper's hawk, about the size of a crow. The goshawk is the largest, as
big as a red-tail hawk. All the accipiter hawks feed on birds which they catch
by out-flying them. Our falcons depend on a power dive to overtake prey and buteo hawks like the red-tail are built with larger, wider wings and shorter
tail, making it just too difficult for them to overtake a flying bird. The Accipiters have
a long tail to guide them through the trees and short stocky wings to give them
immediate speed. Cooper's hawks have long been hunting in our backyards for
birds at our feeders and the sharpshins are very common during their migration
south and can be spotted in the fall in our woods looking for birds to hunt
while on their way. The goshawks are never found far from wilderness and are
just not common enough to be seen on migration with regularity. I really don't
fear these hawks despite the literature saying otherwise. Hawks could do a great
deal of damage if they were to land on you and knead with their talons and peck
with their beaks. The birds just don't do this. I have seen hawks captured by
grabbing their feet so they don't claw you and holding them, they simply don't
bite with their beaks as people think they would. The birds just have never
developed an attack to do damage mode. Still, caution must be taken
near their nests, a famous British photographer, Eric Hosking, lost an eye to an
owl but it appeared to be more of an accident when I read the account. As I had wandered quite far from my path, I knew the only back would be to compass out. I estimated the angle to take and stuck to it checking the compass every 100 yards or so. In a short time I reached my path and wrote down all the information so I could find the nest again. Oddly enough, right where the path and my line crossed I found a broad-winged hawk nest with the bird brooding young on it. I watched the bird as I walked under the nest and she never moved until I turned back to look at her with my binoculars. Then she flew off and began to scold me with the high squeal these hawks make. I am familiar with this buteo hawk, having photographed one in the woods behind my house only a couple of hundred feet from my back door. I have also found other nests of this bird up north. But these birds are not frightful at all, and they didn't come near me like the goshawk. A week later, I came back with my camera to see if I could get some photos. I just turned left at the broad-winged hawk nest and soon found the nest of the goshawk with no problem but the light in the deep woods was terrible and the birds were too active to get any shots. So my find up north is a very special event for me. But after some very harrowing experiences photographing hawks from high platforms (like falling asleep and almost falling off), I gave up hawks and since have been basically photographing ground nesting birds. Since the goshawks usually return to last years nest site, and this nest was successful for the birds so there is no reason why they wouldn't want to use the nest again if they come back to the area in the spring, well maybe it might be a possibility. At least I have all winter to think about it. And not to worry about my failures this year in my nest photography. Return to PHOTOGRAPHY JOURNAL main page. Date this page was edited: August 29, 2007.
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This year I worked in the Grayling, Michigan
area for my annual photography of bird nests. The area is along the Lewiston
Grade Road which is really a snowmobile lane where only one car can drive
at a time, but with patience I can work my van down the wonderful road through
alder swamps and small lakes and across one lane bridges over the East branch of
the Au Sable river. The area goes all the way to M-93 and the Hartwick Pines State
Park and I am never sure if I am in the State Park lands or the National forest
there. I have explored the area many times in the past, but this year I spent a
lot more time there. 
Once when I was hot on a blue-headed vireo
trail, I was intensely concentrating on watching the bird and listening to its
song when out of nowhere came a screeching goshawk which flew very close to me
and landed nearby continuing to scream and flap its wings. I have never seen a
goshawk in the wild, my photo here is of a captive bird I photographed years
ago. But to be in the deep woods and to see this bird in its own element was
incredible. I immediately began to look for its nest but didn't see anything and
was wondering if maybe this bird had a fledged young nearby it was protecting and its nest
was not near. I
left the area but a few hours later was north of that spot about a half a mile
and again became very engaged in pursuing a blue-headed vireo. This bird had
food in its mouth and I began to follow, hoping it would lead me to its nest.
Not paying attention to where I was going in the area (you can do this if you "own it"),
unexpectedly the goshawk showed up again, this time even more intensely. I began to
search for a nest walking in widening circles, trying to let the bird think I
was moving away. But then, suddenly, I found the nest, located about fifty feet up in a
white pine that was probably 150 feet tall. A huge nest, likely used for many
years as the birds usually return every year to use the same nest. Sitting in
the nest were two young birds which were looking down at me rather curiously.
The adult goshawk was going to take no more, and her (the female is the larger
of the birds) dives at me where getting closer and closer. I have read a lot
about this bird and they are considered to be the most ferocious birds in the
world at defending their young. Knowing this, and really not feeling any fear
but instead a great respect at seeing such a magnificent bird so close, I just
couldn't leave. This is a huge hawk and watching the bird circle around me
and fly right through the thickest pine braches by folding up her wings,
plunging through, and then quickly reopening them at the
last second, all the time watching me, her young, with the
trees around her at her high speed made me believe there was no
bird that can out maneuver this species. As she flew through the tree tops she
would suddenly drop down to near ground level, and at this elevation all the
braches from the tall trees have long died and fallen and so the path from
ground level to about ten or twelve feet is fairly clear, and here she would
come full bore at me, only flaring off at the last second after I had ducked or
dropped to the ground to avoid what appeared to be certain impact. I couldn't
believe how fast she could fly at me. Her vocalizing echoed throughout the woods
and added to the drama I was experiencing. I felt if I was in the presence of
the most magnificent bird in the world. I
decided right then, that this bird would be my favorite for a long time to come.
