I like photographing wildlife in my backyard, especially during winter. Fortunately, this season brought some snowy days to Connecticut and I had the opportunity to do some bird photography in the snow around my feeder. After taking lots of photos of birds in white environment, I wanted to photograph them with a little more color as well. In the afternoon, just before the sun sets behind the hills of West Rock (map), we have a beautiful backlight situation in the backyard. I chose a snowless day to spend a few hours in my photo blind, so I can have a brownish-orange background in the pictures (fallen oak leaves on a small hill). One of the most common visitors of my bird feeding platform is the white-breasted nuthatch (Sitta carolinensis). It’s always fun to photograph this fast-moving little bird.

House finches (Haemorhous mexicanus) are also common birds around bird feeders. This male looks beautiful from this profile, however, unfortunately, he has the dreaded eye disease (conjunctivitis) in his left eye, caused by a parasitic bacterium called Mycoplasma gallisepticum. His infection is very severe and his left eye became swollen shut making him half blind, so I didn’t want to post an image of him showing his other side. Otherwise, he looked very healthy, so there’s a small chance that he recovered, but most of the infected birds die from starvation, or predation.

Eastern gray squirrels (Sciurus carolinensis) like to feed on bird feeders too. My main feeders are on a pole with a skirt-type baffle guard, so birds can feed in peace without the fear of squirrels chasing them away. Of course, I like every wildlife, so I occasionally put some food on my self-built platform for the hungry rodents as well, and they always appreciate it.

This afternoon several squirrels came to have a meal, so I was able to take some close portrait shots of them. As always in my backyard photo blind, I used my Canon EOS 5Ds camera and my Canon 500mm F/4 lens on my Gitzo 1340 tripod and a RRS BH-55 ballhead to take these photos.