3. Yosemite
  4. Yosemite Birds and Wildlife

Yosemite Birds

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Merganser, Yosemite. Copyright © 2008 James McGrew.
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Merganser, Yosemite. Copyright © 2008 James McGrew.

merganser

  • An adult male Peregrine falcon soaring in front of El Capitan, Yosemite Valley. Copyright, 2015.
  • Adult Peregrine Falcon Takes Flight above Yosemite Valley. Copyright, 2015.
  • Adult Peregrine Falcon dives in a spectacular stoop pursuing prey in Yosemite Valley far below. Peregrines may soar over 2,000 feet above the ground and can spot prey up to a mile away. They fold back their wings and dive down at speeds over 200 miles per hour to capture unsuspecting prey birds in mid flight. Copyright, 2015.
  • Adult Peregrine Falcon searching for prey high above Yosemite Valley.
  • Female Violet-green Swallow (Tachycineta thalassina) in Yosemite Valley. ©2012 James McGrew<br /> I've always loved swallows for their beauty and acrobatics while pursuing insects in the air (and of course for migrating while apparently carrying coconuts which we use for making horse-hoof sounds). However, I've never been so close to one that perched. I was painting sunrise near Tunnelview and as the air warmed and insects began flying, so did the swallows and swifts. At one point this individual seemed curious about me, standing alone for a couple hours in the same location on the rocks above the swallows' nests. She flew up to this rock as if to check me out for a moment. I had a Canon 400 f4 DO on my 1DmkII, ready to capture fast moving wildlife at any moment. I discretely picked up the camera lying at my feet and snapped a few quick frames before this bird zipped off to capture more insects.
  • Clark's Nutcracker eating seeds from a Whitebark Pine cone. Vogelsang High Sierra Camp, Yosemite, CA. The Clark's Nutcracker's obnoxious yet melodic calls fill the High Sierra air in summer: a comforting sound to anyone who has spent much time in the upper elevations. These corvids, exhibiting ashtonishing intelligence like their cousins (ravens, crows, jays), ultimately provide the foundation for the Whitebark pine subalpine ecosystems. Unlike most pine cones which open to reveal winged seeds that disperse on the wind, the whitebark cones remain sealed until the seeds typically die. Instead, the massive, nutritious seeds remain cemented into massive cones shielded by pitch and tannins. During the month of August, the cones ripen and the nutcrackers blast the cones with powerful long bills and delicately remove each seed for consumption or storage in a sublingual pouch. The nutcrackers fly off, bury the seeds for later harvest as their primary food supply throughout the year. Through triangulation, visual cues and memory, the birds recover as many as thirty thousand seed caches over the course of a year. However, they leave some seeds buried which ultimately germinate and start new pines. <br /> <br /> Without the nutcrackers, whitebark pines cannot reproduce. Without the trees, the nutcrackers can't survive. As a result of the perfect symbiosis, an entire ecosystem thrives. Yosemite's beauty blossoms out of the most complex interrelationships. Copyright, © 2008, James McGrew
  • White-throated Swift in flight. ©2012 James McGrew<br /> These little rockets are the most difficult birds I've tried to photograph in flight. They zip through the air with amazing speed, feathers literally making a loud zipping sound (and have reportedly maneuvered Peregrine Falcons, the fastest bird in North America), chasing insects and playing with each other while rapidly changing direction and speed.
  • White-throated Swift in flight. ©2012 James McGrew<br /> These little rockets are the most difficult birds I've tried to photograph in flight. They zip through the air with amazing speed (and have reportedly outrun/maneuvered Peregrine Falcons), chasing insects and playing with each other while rapidly changing direction and speed. I shot this with a Canon 400mm f4 DO and 1DmkII. I don't know that I could have captured it with many other combinations.
  • Common Raven on Sentinel Dome (Half Dome in the background). Scientists continually produce new studies expounding on the remarkable intelligence of these fascinating birds. In terms of solving problems and creating tools, adult ravens typically score about the same as an average six-year old human child. Copyright © 2008 James McGrew.
  • Acorn Woodpecker. Yosemite Valley, CA. Copyright, ©1995, James McGrew.
  • Mergansers fighting over a large crayfish in the Merced River, Yosemite Valley. Copyright, James McGrew ©2011.<br /> <br /> As I worked on a commissioned painting of half dome, I found a private location on the Merced River. During my painting session, numerous wild animals went on with their usual routines and managed to get surprisingly close, apparently unconcerned of my presence because I was relatively stationary as I stood at my painting. Most entertaining were these mergansers who hunted for crayfish. Every so often one of them would emerge with a crayfish in its mouth and immediately run away, hotly pursued by the other.
  • Steller's Jay on the Upper Yosemite Fall trail. ©2012 James McGrew
  • Steller's Jay perches on a rock and looks over my shoulder at the painting on which I worked depicting Upper Yosemite Fall. ©2012, James McGrew<br /> <br /> Members of the Corvidae, these birds also share some remarkable intelligence of their larger black colored relatives, crows and ravens. Steller's jays also exhibit beautiful plummage. However, the blue is not really pigment (a molecule that absorbs certain wavelengths and reflects other wavelengths). Instead the feathers refract blue wavelengths in certain directions. This is why you can pick up a blue feather and it appears blue in one direction but as you rotate the feather, it may change from brown to dark gray.
  • Red winged black bird takes flight. ©2012 James McGrew
  • Steller's Jay ©2012 James McGrew I sat down on some rocks to paint a view of Upper Yosemite Falls when this Steller's Jay flew nearby foraging in the trees and momentarily perching on a rock as if to look over my shoulder and inspect the painting in progress.
  • Red-winged black bird calling. Copyright ©2011, James McGrew.
  • Great Blue Heron Takes Flight. Merced River/Yosemite Valley. Copyright © 2006 James McGrew.
  • Merganser, Yosemite. Copyright © 2008 James McGrew.
  • What are you lookin at? (Clark's Nutcracker). Copyright © 2004 James McGrew.
  • Great Egret Mirrors Wapama Falls, Hetch Hetchy. ©2010, James McGrew
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