Silvereye Season Roundup

On a happier note, here are some of the highlights from this year's silvereye season. This year, there seemed to be fewer birds around (I counted something like only 2-3 distinct birds, two of whom started coming as a pair later in the season).

Initially, I feared that this year's photos were not going to turn out too great, as the bush had grown even further away from the window over the past year, and was looking quite "flat" (i.e. there weren't that many flower heads that stuck out over the top of the bush, making it harder to get any clean shots with a plain background and a birdie standing on the lone flower).

Find the birdie...

However, once the blooms really started, it became clear that this year's setup may have been a good thing after all, as it meant that I could get a lot of shots where the birdie is surrounded by a whole enveloping forest of pretty pink flowers instead!

Another type of novel shot I played around with a bit this year was trying to catch the in flight, or with their wings outstretched. While catching a silvereye dining on a flowerhead is "easy" once you've got them used to your presence (to the point where you can snap away for 5 minutes at close range (like the birdie is 5cm from the window, and you're on the other side snapping away) and they'll just be completely fine with that and/or basically oblivious to your presence, taking "flying" shots turns out to be a much harder proposition, as 1) they don't actually open their wings that much, 2) when they do fly, they tend to dart and hop REALLY fast - even a moment of microsleep is enough to completely miss them in flight!

 Preparing for a jump...

Jumping for it

I'll take you under my wing...

Of course, there were heaps of the more "traditional shots":

And a few nice "pair" shots (taken one evening just as we were about to head out for dinner.... they're quite sneaky that way ;)

Wassup Doc?