Monday, March 23, 2009

Tracking the Timberdoodle

Monday, March 23, 2009
9 comments
Can't find the woodcock in this photo? It's not there. This was a test shot.

It's the time of year when the male American woodcocks perform their sky-dance courtship displays on our southeast Ohio ridge top. Some nights when it's cold or rainy or both, I wonder how they muster the energy. Lately we've had two or three displaying males each night on various clearings on our farm.

The woodcock is a shorebird that lives in wet woods. One of the folk names of the American woodcock is timberdoodle. 'Timber' is clearly a reference to the species' preferred woodland habitat. And 'doodle?' Perhaps that's a reference to the bird's method of foraging by walking slowly, probing the soil for earthworms. Or maybe it refers to the woodcock's slow, wing-twittering flight? Or maybe it just sounds good to put 'doodle' on the end of 'timber?'

Anyway...

The star performer of our displaying males is a bird who uses the upper portion of our middle meadow path. He starts his display by calling from deep in the woods below the house, down along the spring trail. Peent! Peent! And as soon as he feels the ambient lighting of dusk has reached the preferred number of foot-candles, he flies slowly up out of the woods, taking the stage at a favorite spot in the meadow path.

I'd been watching this dude's show for a few nights when I decided to try to take his photograph. It would be no use trying to sit in the weeds along the path and wait for him. He'd see me and seek a safer stage elsewhere. I'd tried that a few year ago, wanting to get some video of the performance. It was a miserable failure. The woodcocks, with their huge eyes perfectly adapted for seeing well at night, could see me clear as a bell. I could not see them at all, which is a problem when you're trying to videotape something.

But now I had a new stealth-increasing weapon. My Doghouse photo blind, which would (I hoped) permit me to be close to the birds without seeming like a threat to them. I set my blind up in the afternoon, near by the male timberdoodle's favorite peenting spot. That evening, when I heard the male start his warm-ups in the woods, I hurried out to the blind and took up my position.

Now, I know next to nothing about the techniques of good nature photography. I know how to turn my camera on and what peephole to look through—but that's about it. I fiddle with Manual and A/V settings but it's mostly just guesswork. The Auto-Everything setting is my default. Clearly what I need to do it to take a nature photography course.

Anyway, I took a few test photos, prefocusing on the woodcock's favorite spot. I felt ready.

Soon I heard the wing whistle of a flying woodcock and the male settled down on the path. But he was 25 feet farther up the path, not at his favorite spot. The presence of the blind probably made him a bit wary. Craning my body to the left out the blind's shooting hole, I struggled to find the woodcock in my viewfinder. This was manual focus territory and I could not see ANYTHING in the viewfinder. In desperation I pushed the shutter button. Here's what I got:

The ghost of woodcock present.

Then the male took off. He returned, peented, and flew a few more times in the normal course of his evening show, each time taking off before I could managed to take a single frame. I was having a really hard time finding the bird and focusing.

Now the male woodcock was landing and calling from a spot much closer. You'd THINK I'd be able to find the bird and get a decent photo, but the daylight was mostly gone now. It was as if the woodcock knew this and thus felt safer in coming closer to the noisy, cursing human in the dark camo structure tucked off to the side of the path. Finally the camera clicked and I got a few more ridiculously bad images.

If Monet painted an American woodcock, it might look like this.


If I were photographing sasquatch or an ivory-billed woodpecker, the photo would look like this.

And then, for a single frame, it all came together. I have no idea how or why. It must have been the photo gods reaching down to tap me on the head (and tweak my camera settings). He is the result: the only photo I took that night that is worth keeping.

Sweet mystery of life, at last I've found you! American woodcock male, between peents.

I'm leaving the photo blind up so the woodcock can get used to it. And I am not touching a single button, dial, or switch on my camera until I get another session with the timberdoodle. Who knows? Next time I might even get two keeper images!

9 comments:

On March 23, 2009 at 10:36 AM Julie Zickefoose said...

sweet work, William. That's a photo to be proud of.

On March 23, 2009 at 11:22 AM Rondeau Ric said...

TWO clear photos. Greedy, greedy.

word verification startled me at first glance

scuck

On March 23, 2009 at 3:18 PM Trixie said...

Excellent! I cannot wait to see more of your adventures with the timberdoodle and your camera.

On March 23, 2009 at 6:49 PM Heather said...

Suh-weet! I hope you get some more cool timberdoodle pictures! I just learned about a Woodcock Watch taking place at Conkles Hollow this Friday evening. Since I've never heard or seen this bird in action, I'm hoping to attend.

On March 24, 2009 at 6:31 AM KatDoc said...

Thanks! Both for the excellent final photo and for displaying all the bad ones, which is what 99% of my "bird photography" looks like.

I'd love to catch my timberdoodles in action, but I know that will never happen.

~K

On March 24, 2009 at 9:13 AM rmharvey said...

I once got a decent shot of a woodcock with my point and shoot. It was sitting in the road one morning in the local state forest. I drove past it, backed up again, rolled down the window, and took a few shots.

If your expertise is at the level described, I suggest taking a basic photography course before taking one on nature photography. Nature photography, as you well know, is extremely demanding, advanced stuff. Would a class on sorting long and short-billed dowitchers be the place for a beginner who hadn't yet learned that you can adjust the focus between the two sides of their binocular? The good news might be that a basics class might be available locally, perhaps at a local community college. When you take the advanced class you will get the most out of it.

On March 25, 2009 at 12:19 PM Peg said...

I don't know which I appreciate more, the great photo or the wonderful tale of the photo.
Thnx for the good read-

On March 25, 2009 at 3:01 PM hoperu said...

The link to the doghouse blind is the same as the one for foot candles! Darn it - I wanted to see this blind!

On March 25, 2009 at 3:34 PM Bill of the Birds said...

Sorry for the broken link to my post about the Doghouse blind. The correct one is in there now.


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