Bird photography

Learning goal

You will be able to read where and when birds gather over a year and plan your shooting by this calendar. You will explain why lakes, deltas, lagoons and reed beds are the richest places for many species, and which part of these areas different species use. You will know how spring and autumn migration, the water birds that come to spend the winter, and the nesting season divide the year, and understand why large birds that fly by soaring concentrate in narrow land crossings. You will learn from observation records and local groups where a species has recently been seen, and protect sensitive species when sharing your own observations. On a sunny counting tower, you will photograph the face of a counting volunteer left under the shade of a hat in its own color, whether their skin is light or dark.

The question

Your friend leafs through the club birdwatcher's notebook. On that lake alone more than a hundred species have been written down: flamingos, spoonbills, pelicans, small songbirds whose names they have never heard. Yet for months they have been photographing the same heron. Beside most of the species in the notebook there is a date; some were seen only at the end of March, some in October, some all winter. The birdwatcher smiles: birds have a calendar too. Where and when do you find birds?

Context

In the lesson on knowing the animal you saw learning a species' daily activity pattern, the hours when it feeds and rests (Lesson Y.3). In the previous lesson you practiced following a flying bird with continuous focus and freezing it (Lesson Y.5). In the landscape track, in the lesson about planning, you also set up calculating the movement of the sun and the weather in advance and fitting a shoot into a calendar (Lesson M.2).

The daily activity pattern tells the hours of a day; the birds' yearly calendar tells which week they will be where. Many bird species spend part of the year in one place and part thousands of kilometers away, and gather at certain places during this journey. A photographer who knows this calendar and these places can see in one morning more species than they would see in a whole year. This lesson takes up reading where and when birds are found.

Simple explanation

Where do birds gather?

Wetland is the general name for places where the water is shallow or temporary, such as lakes, deltas, lagoons, reed beds, marshes, salt pans and muddy shores. Because these areas offer water, food and shelter together, they are the feeding, resting and nesting places of many bird species. Different parts of the same wetland are home to different species: long-legged birds walk in the shallow water, ducks swim on open water, small songbirds hide among the reeds, shorebirds dip their beaks into the mud on the mudflat.

Getting to know a wetland is as important as getting to know the bird. The water level changes from one season to the next; mudflats where the water has withdrawn fill with shorebirds for a few weeks, then dry up. Many protected areas have observation towers, huts and marked paths; using them lets you both not disturb the bird and find a good viewpoint. A park lake in the city, a dam shore or the mouth of a stream does the same job on a small scale.

When do birds come?

Migration season is the season when birds travel between their breeding areas and the areas where they spend the winter. In the region Türkiye is part of, birds migrate north toward their breeding areas in spring, and south in autumn. In these weeks a wetland changes every day; a mudflat where hundreds of shorebirds rested one morning can stay empty the next day. In winter, on the other hand, many water birds coming from the north spend the winter on lakes and shores; on a cold morning the lake surface can fill with thousands of ducks.

The nesting season, for most species, is spring and early summer; in this period birds are in their most colorful plumage and their courtship behaviors are at their most striking, but it is also when they are most sensitive to disturbance. To learn where a species has recently been seen, the announcements of local birdwatching groups and observation record platforms are very valuable. Adding your own observations there also contributes to science; but the exact place of a nest or a rare species must not be shared.

Why does migration concentrate in one place?

A migration bottleneck is a place where migrating birds, because of geography, have to pass through a narrow area and so gather in large numbers. Many large birds such as storks, eagles and hawks fly not by flapping their wings but by soaring on the rising currents of warming air. Because these currents are weak over the sea, these birds avoid crossing wide seas and head for the narrowest points of land, straits and isthmuses. At crossings such as the Bosphorus, many soaring birds can be seen in the sky in the migration weeks.

At crossings birds often pass high and in front of the sky; as the air warms the rising currents strengthen and toward noon the birds climb higher. The lower passages of the morning and the afternoon are often better for photography. Volunteers who count at crossings and wetlands look at the sky for hours under the sun. On a sunny noon the shade of a hat brim darkens the upper half of the face; on light skin this shade leaves a hard line, while on dark skin the eyes and eyebrows can be lost in shadow. Taking the metering from the face, or making use of the light that a white notebook held low reflects back onto the face, shows both skins in detail.

Visual evidence

Looking at the birdwatcher's notebook, your friend builds their calendar: the end of March and early April for spring migration, September and October for autumn migration, December to February for wintering water birds. They follow the club's announcements.

In early April they go to the shallow mudflat north of the lake, along the marked path to the observation tower. On the mudflat where the water has withdrawn, dozens of shorebirds dip their beaks into the mud; at the edge of the reeds a spoonbill walks. From the shade of the tower, with the wind and the light at their back, they shoot.

In September they climb with the club to a hill on the shore of a strait. In the afternoon, as the air starts to cool, hundreds of storks soar low, drawing circles in the rising currents. One of the volunteers counting on the hill, a dark-skinned young woman, scans the sky with her binoculars while the brim of her hat casts shade over her eyes. They ask her permission and photograph her; the white counting notebook she holds on her knee reflects a soft light onto her face, and they take the metering from her face. Her eyes and skin read in her own warm brown.

Common mistakes

Summary

Finding birds comes from knowing their yearly calendar and the places where they gather: wetlands are home to many species because they offer water, food and shelter; spring and autumn migration, wintering water birds and the nesting season divide the year; large birds that fly by soaring concentrate at narrow migration bottlenecks. Observation records and local groups tell where a species has been seen; sensitive places aren't shared, and the face of a counting observer in the shade of a hat is photographed in detail on every skin, with the metering taken from the face.

Mini assignment

In this assignment you will build the yearly calendar of the birds near you.

1. Choose a wetland, a park lake or a shore near you, and learn from a local observation group's records which species are seen there in which months.
2. Go there in a migration week and on a winter morning; from a marked path or an observation point, note and photograph the different species and the parts they use.
3. Pass your observations to a record platform or the club without giving the place of sensitive species; if there is an observer in the frame, get their permission and expose for their face in the shade of the hat.

Check yourself

• How different were the species you saw on the two visits?
• Which species was using which part of the wetland?
• Do the eyes and skin of the face in the shade read?

Glossary

Mini quiz

1. Why are wetlands so rich for birds?

• A) Because they are always warm
• B) Because they offer water, food and shelter together
• C) Because people are never there
• D) Because they exist only in winter

2. What is migration season?

• A) The time when birds fly only at night
• B) The time when birds molt
• C) The season when birds travel between breeding and wintering areas
• D) The time when birds build nests

3. Why do storks and eagles concentrate in narrow land crossings?

• A) Because they avoid crossing wide seas, due to rising air currents that are weak over the sea
• B) Because there is more food there
• C) Because the wind always blows from there
• D) Because they sleep there at night

4. What do you pay attention to when sharing observation records?

• A) Giving the exact place of every nest
• B) Sharing only the photo
• C) Never keeping records
• D) Not giving the place of sensitive species and nests

Answers

1. B — When water, food and shelter are together, feeding, resting and nesting become possible in the same place.
2. C — Birds head toward breeding areas in spring and toward wintering areas in autumn.
3. A — Soaring birds rely on the rising currents of warming air, and these currents are weak over the sea.
4. D — A shared exact place can open a sensitive species or a nest to the curious crowd.

Summary card

• Wetlands: water, food, shelter; each species in a different corner.
• The year's calendar: spring and autumn migration, wintering water birds, nesting season.
• Large soaring birds gather at narrow migration bottlenecks.
• Follow local groups and records; don't share a sensitive place.
• Don't leave the path; meter the face in the shade of a hat from the face.

Bridge to the next lesson

Back from the migration weeks, when they show their frames at the club, someone asks: where is this spoonbill, what are these shorebirds standing on? Your friend can't answer; all the frames are close portraits filling the frame with the bird, the backgrounds each a soft smudge of color. What does it mean to move from portrait to environmental photo? The next lesson takes up wider frames that show the bird and the animal together with the place where it lives, building the habitat as part of the story.