Snowy Day Snowy Owl

 It was mildly snowy today so my sweetie suggested we to go look for Snowy Owls and as my fantastic Canon D50 is once again back from repairs for the third time I figured yes, I should go capture some winter birds. The fine snow fall beheld a wonderful soft grayish tone which subdued the landscape with a gentle haze.

No sooner had we got off the main highway and headed down a range road when we beheld this wondrous sight. (click on image to enlarge)

Snowy Owl, either a female or young male.

Snowy kindly posed for a few shots then flew off across the field; and did I capture the flight, no, it seems the camera still does not auto focus clearly. The above shot was manual focus. 

Some manual shots came out ok, others as in auto are really, really bad. 

We will go out to a local park tomorrow if its nice and I will see if there is any improvement in the focus.

About an hour later the sky briefly lightened and a raven cawed into the shot, so cool.

We found Hoary Redpoles whom were hard to photograph as they hardly paused and with a flap and much twitter were flight skipping across the fields looking for seeds. The male has a rosy breast. These birds are so beautiful I do wish the image was clearer.

Bohemian Waxwings were sharing berries amongst themselves and serenading the wind. By now the light had a strange cast making it difficult to get good shots. These images are cropped and I lightened them on the computer.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw a woodpecker fly past, fast. Follow that woodpecker sir Gerald, and he did and this gorgeous gal obliged by landing close to the road. Pileated woodpecker.

And finally as we headed home I spotted a harem of deer, so I requested a photo-opp. Well, where we stopped Gerald noticed the deer he was looking at were behind a tall fence and had ear tags. I on the other hand realized we passed wild deer that were on the opposite side of the fence so I started back down the road on foot as I could see the deer still by the roadside, a little wary but still there. Well my sweetie saw the fence and figured who wants shots of tame deer so he proceeded to hoot and whoo and up went tails and other than this shot all I saw was white flags going over a hill. Oh and of course the tame-game deer did not run off so I took a photo of them to show my sweetie the difference between wild and no ear tags, and kept deer with ear tags. I've got to rub it in a little you know, ah its so much fun.

Good night and big hugs!