Tuesday, September 9, 2008

Lac La Peche

My wife and I recently returned from a trip to Lac La Peche which is a resort with Cabins and a reasonable sized lake, close to the town of Blaine Lake, Sask.
This is now the 3rd year in a row we have holidayed there and its always a great place to stay for a few days and relax.
As far as photography and birding goes, this year proved a bit difficult as I only had only one decent day of weather..
A tornado tore through some unfortunate towns further north and we got the tail end of it, with gusting winds and some heavy rain. The power also went down for 6 hrs !
Highlights for this trip included my first ever look at a Great Crested Flycatcher, while other nice species included : Rose-breasted Grosbeak, Purple Finch, Coopers Hawk, Belted Kingfisher, Ruby-throated Hummingbird and Cape May Warbler.

Here are some photos:

Belted Kingfisher - For the first time in years, a pair of these handsome birds were actively fishing along the lake. Getting this photo took a lot of patience as these are extremely flighty when approached :



Yellow-bellied Sapsucker - I was happy to get these two juveniles on the same tree :



Eastern Phoebe - I found 4 of these Flycatchers during our stay :



Warbling Vireo - These respond very well to 'pishing' (imitated bird call). As you can see I didn't need the zoom lens for this one :



Great Crested Flycatcher - I first discovered this bird deep in the woods, but unlike the Vireo I could not get close to it at all. Even so, he was the highlight of the trip for me :

12 comments:

The Birdlady said...

It may have been difficult, but,as usual, you managed to find and photograph some beauties. The warbling vireo is PERFECT! I've never seen one. Looks like we're all having hurricane stories this year.

Nick S said...

Thankyou for the kind words. I thought you would have Warbling Vireos there ?

kjpweb said...

??? A hurricane up there? You're kidding, right? You don't get hurricanes up north in Canada, do you?
Gorgeous images - especially the double Woodpeckers!
Bravo! Cheers, Klaus

Nick S said...

Actually it was a Tornado. I need to look up the differences between the two Klaus :-)
http://news.aol.ca/article/tornado-hits-saskatchewan-6-hurt/324905/

2sweetnsaxy said...

That must have been disappointing but you did get some great shots. The first bird looks like he endured some of that storm. :-D

Redzlan said...

Wabblers are very difficult to shot.
They are small and fast moving, very difficult to focus.
You managed to caputured all of them.
Great Pics!

Nick S said...

Thanks for looking and for the nice comments. Warblers can certainly be a difficult subject to shoot that's for sure!

John Theberge said...

I can always expect to see high quality images when I visit your blog. You never disappoint.

Shelley said...

I loved your vireo too!!

Nick S said...

Thanks very much guys. I appreciate it :-)

Chrissy said...

Your patience paid off, these are beautiful captures!

Nick S said...

Thankyou Chrisss :-)