Lagoon

(January 26th) As it had turned into a cloudy day and I had many great days of photography so far and still a few days remaining, I took a calculated risk. In retrospect, I wish I had gone to photograph the ducks again - the cloudy conditions would have helped with the high range of contrast on these birds. But that was something I only learned after looking over the photos when I got back. My overall strategy for the San Diego trip was to spend my time at locations that would be good for photography - what I call high-percentage places. Today I headed to a location that I knew was great for bird watching, but I suspected would be tough for photographing. In truth it was a great place for wildlife, but as I suspected it was tough to shoot in. San Elijo Lagoon has a wide variety of habitat, but the animals in general were quite shy - or just shy enough to stay out of photographing range. That combined with the flat light left me few pictures.

My week was all-around fantastic, so having one afternoonthat was slow didn't bother me in the least. Instead I was able to watch some great behavior on lots of birds - Black Phoebes, House Finches, Lesser Goldfinches, Anna's Hummingbirds, California Towhees, etc. I learned about their habits just spending a few hours watching them even if I never got the opportunity to photograph much. On a decent day I would have deleted a picture like this one of a Common Yellowthroat. The background and head angle don't work for me. But the second half of today wasn't decent and I kept it - if for no other reason than that it reminds me that the coloration of the Common Yellowthroats down in Southern California is substantially more dramatic than the individuals we have back east. You only need one reason that makes sense to you to keep a photograph.