Tag Archives: north carolina birding adventures

By: Sally Siko, Admin-Birdwatching NC

A few days ago I took the opportunity to go bird watching at Harris Lake Park in New Hill, N.C. It was quite lovely outside with temps in the mid 60’s and cloudy skies which made for easy photography & video conditions.

Since the park was mostly empty at the time, I decided to capture a video of my trip. Here is the video below…

Along the way I spotted some nice looking birds most of which I was able to photograph. If you’d like to get a closer look at the birds featured in the video, here’s a collection of the pics below.

This is my eBird list from my visit! Not bad for a short walk.

If you would like to visit Harris Lake Park for yourself, it is an easy drive from just about anywhere in North Carolina. The park is just a couple of miles off of route 1 and is usually uncrowded once you get away from the parking lot and playground areas. There are quite a few trails that wind through the property that surrounds the lake with numerous opportunities for finding birds and other wildlife.

Here is a map of the area…

Happy birding!

-Sally

Photos and video captured with my mighty Canon 5DS. If you are interested in getting shots like these with this 50 MP beast of a camera, please check out the link below to Canon USA.

Birdwatching NC is sponsored by Canon USA and I am proud to be a Canon shooter. After 13 years of trusting my professional photography business to Canon’s line of products, I cannot recommend this company strongly enough. If you have have any questions about my gear, shoot me a message!

Birdwatching NC is also sponsored by Zenfolio. Zenfolio is a photography website gallery and hosting company. I’ve been using Zenfolio to show and sell my images for over a decade and actually recommend this company to other photographers over WordPress!

You can check out Zenfolio for free by clicking the link below.

With custom galleries, online storage, the ability to sell prints and digital downloads, a powerful blog with seamless SEO tools, Zenfolio provides everything a professional photographer would need to run their photography business online.

Lastly, in addition to running things around here at Birdwatching NC, plus operating a North Carolina outdoor wedding photography company, I also provide website SEO and building services for photographers who need a solution to showing and selling their work online through my company Websites for Photographers. In a nutshell, I design kickass websites on the Zenfolio platform built from the ground up with a sound foundation of SEO principles in place so that my clients get found by more customers on the web.

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If you are a wildlife or bird photographer who is in need of a solid website please check out my company Websites for Photographers by clicking the photo link below.

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Field Notes, Out There with the Expert, The Adventures of your bird watching Admin

Hooded mergansers have returned to Umstead Park

December 10, 2019 admin

By: Sally Siko, Admin Birdwatching N.C.

Absolutely thrilled to see Hooded Mergansers during a recent trip Umstead Park!
Such a cool looking bird 🙂
These diving ducks sport a distinctive fan-like hood on the back of their heads. An unmistakable sight when picking them out in a mixed flock.
A year round resident of North Carolina, Hooded Mergansers are found on freshwater lakes, wooded wetlands and tidal shallows throughout the Tarheel State.

Mergansers take off by running across the water’s surface while flapping its wings. In flight, they hold their bill, head, body and tail straight. I photographed these lovely ducks on the wing as they raced to the northern end of Umstead Park Lake.
They moved fast on rapid wingbeats and were gone in a blink of an eye.

Photos by @sally_siko of @birdwatchingnc
Canon 5Ds

Field Notes, Out There with the Expert, The Adventures of your bird watching Admin

Photographing Bald eagles at Jordan Lake, Apex, N.C.

November 8, 2019 admin

Spent the morning photographing 3 juvenile Bald Eagles and an Osprey at the Observation Deck at Jordan Lake in Apex, N.C.
It was windy and a bit chilly but not a bad way to start the day 🙂

Bald Eagles are a year round resident of Jordan Lake and are thriving in this environment.
The lake hosts the largest population of nesting Eagles on the east coast. This makes them pretty easy to find throughout the year, especially in the Jordan Dam and Martha’s Chapel Rd. area.

It wasn’t always this good though!
Before being reintroduced by the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission in 1982, there were no known pairs of nesting bald eagles in the state. Since then, eagle populations have steadily increased — up to 250 nesting pairs are spread out in the state across the coastal, piedmont and mountain regions.
Truly a great success in conservation efforts!

I’m sooo looking forward to photographing breeding season this February.
Btw, I may have some interesting personal news to share with you on my eagle endeavors in mid December.

Photo by: Sally Siko

Field Notes, Out There with the Expert, The Adventures of your bird watching Admin

Why do Vultures have a bare head

August 9, 2019 admin

They look this way for a reason…

Went exploring this morning at Jordan Lake dam in New Hill, NC and found this Black Vulture sitting in the grass overlooking the water. What a fascinating bird to see up close!
Most vultures have bare skin on their heads. One of the reasons why is this keeps the blood from their meals from matting into their feathers.
Another possibility is that this bare skin helps cool the bird down on hot days, depending on how far out they extend their neck’s.
By changing their posture to expose more or less of the bare skin on their heads and necks, vultures could cut their heat loss by half in cold conditions and increase their heat loss by almost a quarter in certain hot conditions, like those which are found around here in North Carolina during the summer. 🙂
Photo by @sally_siko .

Field Notes, Instagram Birding, Out There with the Expert, The Adventures of your bird watching Admin

welcome to bird watching nc

July 10, 2019 admin

Welcome to North Carolina’s home for birding in the Tarheel state! Click on the menu above to explore all of the cool resources found here on this website site such as news, touring information, North Carolina bird watching clubs, species ID and more.