I finished colouring my Pine Warblers! My favourite is perched on pine needles. His tongue is visible between his mandibles and he even has a little black insect chopsticked there. All the warblers are males in breeding plumage. Females are mostly different tones of warm grey with a few patches of muted yellow. If you […]
Happy World Migratory Bird Day and a belated Happy Draw-a-Bird Day! Did you see any new migratory birds today? I went out for a couple of hours and saw 24 different bird species, two of which were new migrants – a Palm Warbler and a Clay-coloured Sparrow. I also got caught in two short but […]
Happy Draw-a-Bird-Day! I mentioned in my last post that I had started the Cornell Lab Bird Academy Nature Journaling and Field Sketching course and had completed two lessons. Two months later, I’m on lesson 3, which has 3 little assignments, and I’m on the third, which involves comparing two similar entities that I observe in […]
I thought about posting these drawings last month but somehow the time never presented itself. So here they are now! Inktober and the cooler fall weather inspired me to draw more in October, about 3 to 5 days a week, and I kept up this frequency in November. Halfway through November, I started the Cornell […]
I had planned to post a different drawing, but the photo was mired in blue shadows that I couldn’t whisk away with Photoshop. So, I’m going with my ink drawing from Day 7 of Inktober. The drawing is already on my Instagram page, so to add a little newness to this post, I messed around […]
Happy Draw-a-Bird Day! I drew this hummingbird (based on a Golden-tailed Sapphire) with birds of paradise flowers back in February, when Edmonton had a week of -30 degree Celcius weather. Walking outside didn’t feel good, but the light for drawing was lovely: bright and crisp. I fudged the beak lines and my white gel pen […]
In the summer of 2018, I had the good fortune of watching a female Yellow Warbler build a nest, incubate her eggs and feed her nestlings. I’ve posted photos of her nest-building and nest-sitting, and now it’s time for photos of her itty-bitty hatchlings! After June 30th, I visited the nest two more times without […]
Happy draw-a-bird day! It has been a while since I posted. I’ve been feeling unwordy. I did get around to posting a few photos on Instagram. J and I moved to Burlington, Ontario from Edmonton, Alberta in early July. The birds, the vegetation and the humidity are quite different here! Burlington is near Toronto, on […]
Happy Draw a Bird Day! To celebrate, I present, my first tyrant flycatcher drawing! The Cuban Pewee, or Crescent-eyed Pewee, Contopus caribaeus, resides in Cuba and The Bahamas, and is occasionally sighted on the southeast coast of Florida. Keith Salvesen recently posted some lovely photos on his blog Rolling Harbour Abaco and he was cool […]
I live a 10 minute walk from the north end of Mill Creek Ravine Park, so when I need some urban forest trails, that is where I usually go. Occasionally, I see a lone coyote and sometimes I see a pair. Coyotes here are not fond of human gazes. When they see me, and I […]
I drew these Black-throated tits, a.k.a. Black-throated bushtits, a.k.a. Aegithalos concinnus, a.k.a. Mésange à tête rousse, from a photo on Pinterest because they are cute, strikingly patterned and resemble chickadees. I couldn’t find any information on the photographer. The last drawing I posted was of a Black-capped chickadee and drawing it reminded me of a […]
When I returned to the yellow warbler nest two days later, on June 25th, it was empty. But the next day, Mrs. Yellow was sitting on her nest! I found a new “viewing tunnel” to take this photo, from an intersecting trail. When I visited on June 28th, Mrs. Yellow was doing some […]
