{"id":55066,"date":"2017-12-25T04:44:54","date_gmt":"2017-12-25T11:44:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.featheredphotography.com\/blog\/?p=55066"},"modified":"2017-12-25T04:44:54","modified_gmt":"2017-12-25T11:44:54","slug":"a-christmas-morning-tradition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/2017\/12\/25\/a-christmas-morning-tradition\/","title":{"rendered":"A Christmas Morning Tradition"},"content":{"rendered":"

I guess Mia and I are just oddballs. Our respective\u00a0families live far away in other states, we no longer believe in Santa\u00a0Claus (at\u00a0least I don’t think Mia does but I’ve never really\u00a0pressed her on the subject), virtually everyone else around here stays home on Christmas morning to open their presents and\/or sleep in or be with family, we both detest crowds and we’re seriously addicted to bird photography.<\/p>\n

So, given those parameters what would you<\/em> do on Christmas Morning?<\/p>\n

Yup, we go out looking for birds.This time of year it’s always a long shot for decent light because of cloudy weather, fog\u00a0or storms\u00a0and more often than not we don’t get any photos to be particularly proud of. But we usually have our favorite places to ourselves (even most of the duck hunters stay home in case there’s a new shotgun under the tree) and occasionally we get lucky with birds. But even if we don’t the experience of being “out there” in the quiet and\u00a0solitude is\u00a0always memorable because we’re blessedly alone with nature and whatever\u00a0she might present to us, good photos or not.<\/p>\n

And there’s something about the sound of tires squeaking on fresh virgin snow in wild and quiet\u00a0places\u00a0in the early morning that stirs our souls.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

1\/1600, f\/6.3, ISO 640, Canon 7D Mark II, Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM + EF 1.4 III Extender, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n

We found this Barn Own sleeping in the phrags\u00a0at Farmington on Christmas\u00a02015. The refuge was\u00a0slightly socked in with fog that morning\u00a0so even with fresh snow on the ground to reflect any light available it was pretty gloomy for photography.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

1\/1250, f\/5.6, ISO 1600, Canon 7D Mark II, Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM + EF 1.4 III Extender, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n

We also found this male American Kestrel cleaning his toes after an apparent meal. There were a few other birds that Yuletide morning but the dismal\u00a0lighting conditions made quality bird photography close to impossible. But we were out there and enjoying ourselves in the relative solitude so that’s what really mattered.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Other Christmas mornings are nothing short of glorious.\u00a0This was Bear River MBR early Christmas morning 2012. It was cold, crisp and clear and the snow-covered\u00a0Promontory Mountains in the background set off the refuge spectacularly. Except where water was running briskly the canals and most of the ponds were frozen solid\u00a0so birds were relatively scarce but the experience was still delightful.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

1\/2500, f\/7.1, ISO 500, Canon 7D, Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM + EF 1.4 III Extender, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n

We did find this near-adult Bald Eagle on the ice and it was close enough for decent photos. Here it had raised its wings in anticipation of takeoff but the bird changed its mind and settled back down\u00a0on the ice again. We soon left it in peace.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

As I type this in the dark at 3:38 AM Christmas morning\u00a0there’s fresh snow on the ground that fell during the night but it’s still cloudy. The usually deeply buried optimist in me just checked the weather radar and it looks like we could have clearing soon after dawn so I imagine in a few hours we’ll head out and see what we might find regarding light and birds. We may be bird-skunked but we’re likely to enjoy ourselves anyway and that’s what really matters. Besides there’s a tradition to maintain…<\/p>\n

But I’ll admit something. I always find it ironic that I spend my Christmas mornings in pursuit of nature and the birds I love and then come home and\u00a0chow down on\u00a0a Christmas bird for my holiday dinner. Go figure…<\/p>\n

Whatever you do for your Christmas tradition I hope it brings you great joy and you’re among loving family and friends if that’s your preference. I know that a few of my readers are struggling right now with some of the trials of life but I sincerely\u00a0hope Christmas\u00a0brings you at least a brief respite from your challenges.<\/p>\n

Merry Christmas everyone!<\/p>\n

Ron<\/p>\n

Note: Occasionally I include a landscape image in my posts that’s significantly larger than my other photos (1200 pixels on the long side instead of 900) as I’ve done here with the Bear River landscape. I do that for the extra detail it provides on larger screens\u00a0but doing so may cause issues for readers on smaller viewing devices. If that’s the case I won’t do it in the future. Please let me know if it causes you problems.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I guess Mia and I are just oddballs.<\/p>\n

Continue reading<\/span><\/i><\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":55067,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[340,355,344,338,334,2782],"tags":[28,43,45,49,3768,1008,2524,311],"class_list":["post-55066","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-american-kestrels","category-bald-eagles","category-barn-owls","category-bear-river-migratory-bird-refuge-favorite-locations","category-birds","category-farmington-bay-waterfowl-management-area","tag-american-kestrel","tag-bald-eagle","tag-barn-owl","tag-bear-river-migratory-bird-refuge","tag-christmas-tradition","tag-farmington-bay-waterfowl-management-area","tag-promontory-mountains","tag-utah-2"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/bald-eagle-9229-ron-dudley.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1zzJh-eka","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55066","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55066"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55066\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/55067"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55066"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55066"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55066"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}