The most frustrating thing about being a nature photographer is nature. Planning, scheming, preparing and even investing time and energy mean nothing at all if nature doesn’t cooperate, and I can tell you from years of experience that cooperation is denied as often as it is granted.
This is especially true at the intensely interesting, yet diabolically brief, beginnings and endings of spring and fall. Nature provides a short window of opportunity, but then luck enters the picture and opportunity can evaporate in front of your eyes.
I have just endured yet another one of these special times during the last two weeks of March. This is a very short period of days when the ice on lakes and ponds starts to open up, and the ducks that have been anxiously waiting for the doorway to the north to open start to flood into fresh habitats. The magical element of this process is the fact that lakes and ponds don’t melt all at once. There is always a small patch of open water that opens first, and it is in this patch of water that all of the ducks will be forced to congregate. This is an opportunity to see some amazing birds.
But, it should stand to reason that the location of that little oasis of open water is what makes the difference. Close to shore is good, far away is painful. Even more important is close to shore and also close to a point of access. Close gives you unusual looks at unusual species. Far gives you frustrating looks at dots of different sizes. You know that they are ducks, but what kind of ducks they might be remains a mystery. Close gives you oohs and ahhs, whereas far gives you whimpers and the occasional, spontaneous bout of gentle sobbing.
Such was my experience this past March. There is a lake that I pass by every day on my way home from work, and in that lake, a patch of open water always opens up quite close to the road. The problem is that I pass this lake at 50 mph, which only allows me to scan the area quickly. If I see something interesting, I make a mental note and start my planning for heading back with my camera on the weekend.
At this speed, birds can be divided into three categories: geese, ducks and microducks. That last category is one of my own invention, but my fellow birders will know exactly what I am talking about.
Birds in the “ducks” category are usually mallards; beautiful, but a dime a dozen in these parts. The other mallard-sized ducks include American black ducks, northern pintails and common mergansers. All are beautiful and fairly easy to identify. It’s when you spot something that is noticeably smaller than a mallard (a microduck) that you really start to get interested. The microducks include species like hooded mergansers, green-winged teal, ring-necked ducks, common goldeneyes and (my personal favorites) buffleheads.
Well, things couldn’t have started out more perfectly this year. The patch of water opened up, the ducks arrived and about half of them were microducks. I saw the bright white bodies of males that could have been goldeneyes or buffleheads, as well as the darker bodies of ducks that I could only speculate about.
Everything seemed perfect except for one problem: all of this happened on a Monday. The patch of water was larger on Tuesday, and by Wednesday there were more than 100 birds toodling around the surface of that magical opening in the ice, but time was against me.
The ice was disappearing quickly and by Friday evening, the ducks were no longer confined to areas close to shore. Yet, there still seemed to be hope because there were simply so many ducks out there. Surely I would be able to exploit the situation on Saturday, right? Wrong!
Saturday arrived and the weather turned against me. Relatively warm and sunny gave way to cold, raw, rainy and windy. I arrived at the lake to find very few birds around, and those that were present were all more than 100 yards from shore. Had I ditched work earlier in the week I might have had a chance, but as things stand now, I’ll have to wait another year and hope to get lucky.
Everything is happening quickly now. The tree swallows arrived on March 30 and the American woodcocks have been singing for about two weeks. Some lucky friends of mine have heard eastern phoebes, but I was deprived of much birding opportunity by bad weather and failed to detect any phoebes in my yard. I’ve even heard a few tentative songs of peepers, which is always a welcome sound on spring evenings.
The weekends are going to be especially precious for those of us who like the outdoors, so cross your fingers for warm and sunny weather, and make sure to get out and enjoy if the nature cooperates. Otherwise, you’ll have to wait until next year.
Bill Danielson has been a professional writer and nature photographer for 21 years. He has worked for the National Park Service, the U.S. Forest Service and Massachusetts State Parks and currently teaches high school biology and physics. Visit speakingofnature.com for more information, or go to Speaking of Nature on Facebook.