Turkeys in the Shade

It’s been hot today—very hot. The turkeys were all in the shade of the walnut tree at lunchtime. I think I’m going to try and do some studies of feet soon — they have very cool feet, and they’re a size you can actually see.

Red-tailed Hawk

Stood outside waiting for a friend to pick me up for a Thai lunch. The wind is coming in fairly hard out of the north, and this red-tail was wheeling about. They are beautifully proportioned birds.

Mourning Dove Before Hunting Season

White-faced Ibis

Lunchtime: a large flock of ibis in our flooded field, comparatively close to the kitchen window. I got out the prismacolors. I’m quite enjoying sketching, as opposed to drawing, with them — I used only four colors, terra cotta, indigo, apple green, pink.

One bird stood up tall to preen and held the pose for quite a long time, moving only its head. I was able to do a more detailed study of this one…

American Crow

They flooded the field. Lots of crows mooching through the flooded alfalfa. This piece is done with oil pastels, sgraffitoed (scratched through).

Cooper's Hawk

Cooper’s hawks are accipiters, which means their main prey items are birds. Songbirds. Their long tails and short wings are ideal for blasting through wooded thickets, chasing down any passerine foolish enough to linger.

This young one, though, is trying its luck on the ground squirrels. It loses the element of surprise because it has to come out into the open to get them, and they disappear down holes fast (and loudly warn all their companions of the danger.) Empty talons this time…

Barn Swallow

Barn swallows are everywhere around the house these evenings…

UPDATE: This post was kindly featured by Wren for I and the Bird, #83. This was despite any effort on my part whatsoever. I should try and remember to get my stuff in to these carnivals, because some of them are really good.

Yellow-billed Magpie

Young magpies are now flying around in great cacophonous flocks, interested particularly in the newly-mowed alfalfa field. I caught this one out the kitchen window this morning. Their tails are nearly full length and they brandish them like sabers.

Happy to see them, though: we thought they might be very hard hit by West Nile Virus. I wrote a blog post about this in 2003, and notice I was reminding myself to go out and sketch birds. Ha. Here I am.

In that same post I refer to Richard Bell’s Wild West Yorkshire — Richard is the absolute BEST that Britain has to offer in nature sketching, and there are lots of fantastic nature sketchers in Britain. I see following my earlier link that he has finally added an RSS feed to his website. I’m very happy about this. I rely heavily, now, on RSS feeds. Please take a look, but be warned: you may get lost in there.

White-tailed Kite and Two Doodles

Last night, before it was quite dark, a kite landed in the top of a pine tree. These are gorgeous birds and I never feel I do their beauty justice. I’ll just have to do more of them.

At lunch today an Anna’s hummingbird came very close to check me out (I was wearing a red shirt). I mean, so close I was worried about getting an eye injury from that long bill. I drew this from memory, something I find I’m doing a lot of.

I drew this as a doodle; it’s not a particular species. I’m trying to learn how much the bone above the bird’s eye determines its fierce look.

Cooper's Hawk

Squeaking drew my eyes outside; sure enough, a Cooper’s hawk had buzzed the ground squirrels and had landed in a tall eucalyptus. I sketched it quickly.

Then I found out about Brazilian bird artist Frederick Pallinger. He specializes in raptors, and he paints them digitally. His paintings take a long time to do.

I didn’t spend so long — maybe an hour and a half — but I think I’d like to play with this medium a bit more. It’s not as easy as it seems.