A white heron-like bird wading through the shallows of the LA River, its hair blowing in the breeze, backlit by the early morning sun.

The Dawning of a Good Hair Day

Snowy Egret at Los Angeles River, Los Angeles, CA

#birds 🪶 #wildlife #photography #fujifilm

A medium sized black bird against an almost white, overexposed background. It has a patch of bright red on its shoulders, and a smaller patch of orange just below that.

Red Winged Blackbird at Sepulveda Wildlife Reserve, LA, CA

I had to overexpose this photo considerably to capture the details in the feathers. I thought it was too blown out to be usable, but it made a good high key edit.

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A backlit white Snowy Egret against a dark background.

A Snowy Egret preening itself, backlit by the early morning sun. Sepulveda Wildlife Reserve, Los Angeles, CA.

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A white seagull-like bird with a black cap on its head and a pointed, red beak. The sky behind is blue with a light, high haze.

Caspian Tern at Sepulveda Wildlife Reserve, Los Angeles.

Terns are not common this far from the coast; this was a lone visitor, snacking off the fish in the lake. It would fly around slowly and then occasionally drop like a stone onto its prey.

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A full size Adult Coyote, padding along a river side trail. The early morning sun is lighting the Coyote up as it walks through a patch of warm, golden light from the left.

Early morning, an adult Coyote approaching the Los Angeles River. They often walk this route, crossing the river where it’s shallow, to take their prey to the den. This is an unfortunate rabbit, though I’ve seen them with many different small to medium mammals.

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These White faced Ibises are wonderfully iridescent - although they look drab dark brown until the light hits them.

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An orange and white butterfly, its wings folded back, is perched on a rose-hip (the seed pod remaining on a rose stalk once its petals have fallen. Clearly there is no nectar for it to feed on any more. It is placed to left of the frame, to the right is the leaves and stalks of the wild rose bush.

This was late in the summer in L.A., when all the wild roses had turned to rose-hips. I imagine this Gulf Fritillary butterfly flitting from hip to hip singing “Where have all the flowers gone.” (Pete Seeger 1955)

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Excellent! Great and challenging idea, wonderfully executed!

The Grackle in the picture is a medium sized black bird, against the backdrop of a pure blue Southern California sky. Much of the bird’s size is its long tail feathers that get larger towards their end. The black plumage is wonderfully iridescent, with green and magenta highlights where the sun hits it.

It’s been miserable rain here in Los Angeles this past week, and we have another week to go it seems. So here’s a Great Tailed Grackle against the blue summer sky to think about instead.

Taken this summer at Sepulveda Wildlife Reserve, Los Angeles.

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Wonderful photo! I love these guys - always so dynamic and full of character.

Wide portrait of a rather wet humming bird, brown and bedraggled, sitting on a branch warming itself in the early morning sun. The sky behind is blue, and there is some out of focus, mottled foliage in the background.

A rather bedraggled hummingbird - it was perched in the sun, drying and preening itself from the moisture of the earlier heavy dew and fog.

Fall morning at Sepulveda Wildlife Reserve, Los Angeles.

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This picture depicts a white butterfly with black spots taking off from a small yellow flower. The brown background is slightly out of focus

A Checkered White butterfly in flight at Sepulveda Wildlife Reserve, Los Angeles.

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Two Turkey Vultures flying towards the camera, one with wings up and the other with them down; flying together in opposite sync. The background is a wide blue sky, with some foreground foliage, out of focus, at the bottom. In the top right are some faint clouds.

A pair of Turkey Vultures in opposite sync at Sepulveda Wildlife Reserve, Los Angeles.

A warm late summer day and these two were cruising around the reserve, looking for food or a thermal to ride.

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A small blue, white and brown bird with a long, sharp beak. The bird is perched on a lone stick and viewed through the woodland foliage.

I spied this Belted Kingfisher through a small opening in the foliage, just enough to shoot through. They are nervous, skittish and fast, so this was a welcome natural blind. Sepulveda Wildlife Reserve, Los Angeles.

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Wonderful photo! Great Blue Herons make such captivating subjects. And this black and white edit is beautiful!

A portrait of a sleek falcon, beautiful brown back to the camera, but looking back over its shoulder. It’s perched on the branch of a dead tree, surrounded by the white high-key background. To the right of the picture a far tree can just be seen in the haze.

A mature Peregrine Falcon at Sepulveda Wildlife Reserve. An overcast but bright day plus the falcon on a conveniently low perch provided a great opportunity for a high key photo.

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A reddish brown beetle with small lighter spots and a round body like a large lady bug sits face-on to the camera on the edge of a deep green leaf. Other leaves surround the beetle in the background.

Typically these beetles prefer to scuttle to safely under a leaf rather than pose for the camera. This one was much more obliging and I was able to get this shot.

Dotted Paropsine Leaf Beetle; Los Angeles River at Studio City, L.A.

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A Red Tailed Hawk, wings outstretched, almost-hovering over the slope of the Los Angeles River bank. The grass and trees in the background are washed out by the rising L.A. sun, but the Red Tail, lit from behind, glows as the sun filters through its feathhers. The color of the red tail is especially deep and bright.

A Red Tailed Hawk, momentarily hovering over the edge of the L.A. River - no doubt looking for voles along the bank.

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A single slim branch with two Monarch butterflies hanging from it, facing away from each other. They have their wings closed, displaying the yellow underside of the wing, covering their joined abdomens as they mate. The background is a bright Bokeh of greens and blues as the sunlight filters through the trees.

A little bit of sexy-time in the trees; two Monarch butterflies linked together at the abdomen, mating. Nice to know they’re making more Monarchs for the future.
Taken at Sepulveda Wildlife Reserve, Los Angeles.

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A large white and black fish eagle against a blue sky. The wings are fully spread and we see the underside of body and wings as it turns to drop onto a fish in Haskel Lake, Sepulveda Basin.

An Osprey wheeling around to dive on potential lunch - my contribution to #raptor #birdoftheday. Taken at Sepulveda Wildlife Reserve, Los Angeles.

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A large light brown bird, a little smaller than a crow, with a long brown tail, strutting right to left with its foot lifted to take its next step. The background, just out of focus, is of bright yellow mustard blooms.

A female Great Tailed Grackle strutting her stuff on a concrete bench at Sepulveda Wildlife Reserve, Los Angeles, CA.

As active, noisy and impressive as the male grackles are I think it’s these that are really in charge!

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Beautiful!

They turn up around here now and again and are stunning! Thanks for posting those pictures. 👍

I may be wrong but that looks to me like a Red Shouldered Hawk. Either way those are wonderful pictures of a beautiful hawk!

A bright blue Dragonfly with green eyes perched on a bare stick at the edge of Haskell Lake. The background foliage is blurred and the golden hue suggests that this is early morning sunlight.

In between zipping around at up to 30mph (apparently) you might get lucky and have a dragonfly perch up close on a convenient twig. I got lucky.

Taken at Sepulveda Wildlife Reserve, Los Angeles.

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A larg-ish light brown and gray flycatcher with a slight crest and distinctive rust red wings and tail. I had not seen this bird before this summer and it took me a while to figure out what it was. It was larger than I expected for a flycatcher but handsome nonetheless.

Ash Throated Flycatcher at the Sepulveda Wildlife Reserve, Los Angeles.

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Black and White version. A Great Blue Heron standing on a boulder in the L.A. River - hunched up in its full breeding plumage, looking grumpy. This old GBH is king of its patch and fiercely defends this area of the river from any threats. At this time there were four other GBHs sitting a ways away on the rail atop the dam, far above the river, waiting for it to leave so they could come back and fish. (I hadn’t seen that many GBHs there at one time - it reminded me of the holding patterns waiting to land at LAX on a busy day.)

Color version. A Great Blue Heron standing on a boulder in the L.A. River - hunched up in its full breeding plumage, looking grumpy. This old GBH is king of its patch and fiercely defends this area of the river from any threats. At this time there were four other GBHs sitting a ways away on the rail atop the dam, far above the river, waiting for it to leave so they could come back and fish. (I hadn’t seen that many GBHs there at one time - it reminded me of the holding patterns waiting to land at LAX on a busy day.)

Great Blue Heron early morning at the Los Angeles River near the Sepulveda Dam, L.A.

(As usual, more info in ALT text.)

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Wonderful! - I’m looking forward to seeing more. 🤗

A lean, full size young Coyote, paddling through the L.A. River at a shallow part. The early morning sun is lighting the Coyote up as it walks through a patch of warm, golden light from the left. Despite sitting low behind the scrub the Coyote was well aware of me, likely even before I saw it. It kept an eye on me as it went past, but didn’t seem too intimidated by my presence. I had earlier that morning photographed the Mom on the same route carrying prey - going home to feed the latest brood no doubt.

A young Coyote crossing the Los Angeles River at Sepulveda Dam, L.A.

This is one of the juvenile Coyotes from the family that maintain their territory around this part of the river.

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This is a pretty big grasshopper - about as big as my thumb, and took 10 frames of focus bracket to get any decent depth of field. This was the first time I attempted such a large stack - made all the more complicated by being completely manual. I haven’t got the steadiest hands, so it took a lot of fiddling around to align all the frames to be able to do the stacking. I’m very pleased with the result in the end though. Fujifilm X-T5 Laowa 65mm f/2.8 2x Macro Godox V350 + AK Diffuser 1/125 sec - f/10 - iso 800 ACR + Photoshop

Gray Bird Grasshopper; Los Angeles river at Studio City, LA.

(Photography info in alt text)

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