Baltimore oriole/Orchard oriole nest

It appears that my esteemed colleagues at the Birmingham News incorrectly ran the photos for today's story concerning a shared nest between Baltimore and Orchard orioles. For those News readers who follow this blog, allow me to post the images that should have accompanied the article:

(Click on the image to enlarge it.)

This is the adult male Baltimore oriole who appears to have usurped the role of male parent from a subadult Orchard oriole. This bird is gleaning and transporting food to dependent nestlings in the nest which wsa evidently woven by  this female Orchard oriole:

(Again, click on the photo to enlarge it.)

The tale is this: a male Baltimore oriole appears to have developed parental instincts toward the younf in the nest of an Orchard oriole in Roebuck Springs, AL. The bird has shoved aside a subadult male Orchard oriole, and is capturing and delivering food regularly to the young in the nest. The female Orchard oriole is also actively involved in supporting the young, while the male Orhard oriole seems to be dominated and confused by the presence of the larger Baltimore oriole. I have been unable to find any citiations in scientific litereature about this interaction between thses species, and wonder if it is unprecedented.

The photo that did run with the published story is not particularly well-reproduced, and the photo of the male Baltimore oriole -- pretty much the reason for the story -- was sadly omitted. I thought I would use this blog space to attempt to clarify by using my original images from the scene.

Hope this helps.

Hot Air Balloons

A trip to Decatur, AL, over the weekend just past, and some time spent with one of my truly favorite photographic subjects -- hot air balloons. I can easily recall how in my earlier days I'd concentrate on balloons in the air.

(Click on the image for a full-screen view.)

But the thing is, it taks effort to avoid redundancy, where all the shots seem to be variations on the same theme -- only the color and the cloud formations change. So I turned back to my photojournalist's training. Set the story up, I thought. Involve the audience in the subject; explain...demonstrate. So I tried some of that, too, the 'splaining thing. And congregations of balloons, too. Lots of colors, shapes, forms...playing with the late-afternoon's directional light.

(Click on the images to enlarge.)

Eventually, it came back to me trying to show just what is is that attracts me to the balloons: I love the interplay of the colors; and I find the shapes and textures fascinating. And then, I love discovering how things work, so I get a huge charge out of looking "under the skirts" as the balloons are being inflated And that I do sincerely love, leaning into the gondola and shooting straight up into the envelope of the balloon. Great stuff.

(Click on the image to enlarge.)

The balloon shots are generally shot off-hand -- no tripod -- in order that I can be mobile, moving from ballooon to balloon, changing angles and lenses rapidly. In this instance I went onto the field with a single camera body -- my Nikon D700, the SB-900 flash to use in opening up shadows and compensating for backlighting situations, and the essential 3-lens kit: 14-24, 24-70, and 70-200, all 2.8 lenses.

The big deal is getting close enough to the subject, or zooming sufficiently, to eliminate distracting elements -- there are, after all, always scads of people wandering around a balloon event, not to mention all the ropes, fans, tanks, and trucks involved in the process.