Tag Archives: mnwr

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Wildlife

Blue Goose Among The White

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Blue Goose Among The White
A solitary “blue goose” in a flock of white (mostly) Ross’s geese

Blue Goose Among The White. © Copyright 2018 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A solitary “blue goose” in a flock of white (mostly) Ross’s geese

A “blue goose” was something I had heard of but didn’t understand — like the “blue moon.” (Yes, I do now know what that is, too!) A few years ago I ran into a wildlife refuge employee while photographing and we got to talking. He remembered that he had seen an unusual bird earlier that day, and he offered to take me to see the “blue goose.”

That sounded crazy. I had never seen or heard of a goose that was blue in color. (That said, in the right light, the whitest geese can appear to be blue in photographs. I’ll explain some other time…) We came to a large flock of the usual white geese and he pointed into the mob of birds and said, “There it is!” At first I couldn’t spot it but eventually I saw that one of the geese was considerably darker than the rest of the flock. I photographed the goose in this photograph on a different occasion — you should be able to spot the anomalously darker blue goose in the middle of the scene. For the record, the “blue goose” is not a separate type of goose — it is one of the common types, but in an unusual color “morph.”

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G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books and Amazon.
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All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Wildlife

Snow Goose Variations

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Snow Goose Variations
A group of snow geese exhibiting variations in coloration

Snow Goose Variations. © Copyright 2018 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A group of snow geese exhibiting variations in coloration

Upon a first experience with these birds they seem to be nearly identical in every way — the initial impression is of white birds (with a pattern of black wing markings when in flight) and a certain uniformity of their calls. Surprisingly, perhaps, I was first alerted to the differences by a friend who has learned to detect the type of flock by subtleties in their cries. I hadn’t noticed, but once he pointed it out I started to pay a lot more attention… and I can hear this, too.

I soon realized that there is more than one type of “white goose,” and I began to consult various guides to understand how to identify them. Some of the cues are pretty obvious once you learn about them, but the guides also reveal that things are not as regular as you might think. For example, the supposedly white types of geese are most certainly not always white! The birds in this photograph are all the same type… but there is actually quite a range in coloration.

See top of this page for Articles, Sales and Licensing, my Sierra Nevada Fall Color book, Contact Information and more.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books and Amazon.
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All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Wildlife

Within The Flock

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Within The Flock
Inside the tumultuous take-off of a flock of migratory geese

Within The Flock. © Copyright 2018 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Inside the tumultuous take-off of a flock of migratory geese

When I first started photographing migratory birds, I was astounded by the sheer numbers of them and how the flocks behave. I still am. While individuals and smaller groups are sometimes spotted, it is the very large flocks that seem the most remarkable. Sometimes they assemble slowly, a few birds at a time, until there are thousands or tens of thousands of birds. Sometimes they disperse the same way. On other occasions whole flocks move at once, and the visual and auditory experience is astonishing when it happens.

This group took off as a group, in response to some stimulus that escaped my attention. This sort of photograph is a “type” among bird photographers — a long lens photograph that tries to get inside the environment of the flock and what appears to be wild tumult as the birds move all at once.

See top of this page for Articles, Sales and Licensing, my Sierra Nevada Fall Color book, Contact Information and more.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books and Amazon.
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All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Wildlife

Three Ross’s Geese In Flight

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Three Ross's Geese In Flight
Three Ross’s Geese in flight against cloudy winter sky

Three Ross’s Geese In Flight. © Copyright 2018 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Three Ross’s Geese in flight against cloudy winter sky

Quite a few years ago, the first migratory birds that caught my interest in the wild were geese. I specifically recall the occasion or, more correctly, two occasions. (They may or may not have occurred on the same trip — I no longer recall for sure.) The first was on the long drive north from the San Francisco Bay Area. I had departed late in the day, planning to get a motel in the southern Oregon and then complete the drive the next day. Far up the Sacramento Valley at sunset and then on into dusk I began to see huge flocks of the birds over this agricultural landscape. I really didn’t understand what I was seeing, but I was impressed and it planted a seed.

Then, perhaps on the same trip or possibly on another Seattle visit at about this time, I drove up to the Skagit Valley area. As I drove I saw the remarkable trumpeter swans that are found there, and eventually I pulled over on a curve near some old buildings by fields. Far off in the distant sky I started to see strings of birds, and a few minutes later snow geese began landing right next to me… and they kept coming, until the entire field was filled with the white birds. You can imagine how impressed I was — I had not seen something like this before! I made the photograph shared here much later and in a different place.

See top of this page for Articles, Sales and Licensing, my Sierra Nevada Fall Color book, Contact Information and more.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books and Amazon.
Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | LinkedIn | Email

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.