Photo Of The Day and Natural History Commentary

Check out our Guide to Photographing Pelicans in La Jolla.

It looked beautiful out my front window this morning, so I headed off to La Jolla hoping for some sharp brown pelican (Pelecanus occidentalis) flight shots. Not to be. The clouds had built up around Mt. Soledad by the time I got down there. I tried to salvage the morning with some blurred flight shots and got a couple of marginal keepers but the color of the light was weird (see shots below). What saved the morning from being a total loss was a small group of gregarious sea lions. Having been hauled out for a while most of them were a nice shade of blond (and dumb?).

Brown pelican in flight, blurred due to long exposure before sunrise. La Jolla, California, USA. Image: 20119   Species: Pelecanus occidentalis, Pelecanus occidentalis californicus Location: La Jolla, California, USA

Brown pelican in flight, blurred due to long exposure before sunrise. La Jolla, California, USA. Image: 20120   Species: Pelecanus occidentalis, Pelecanus occidentalis californicus Location: La Jolla, California, USA

California sea lions hauled out on rocks beside the ocean. La Jolla, California, USA. Image: 20130   Species: Zalophus californianus Location: La Jolla, California, USA

Brown pelican head throw, blurred due to long exposure before sunrise. During a bill throw, the pelican arches its neck back, lifting its large bill upward and stretching its throat pouch. La Jolla, California, USA. Image: 20121   Species: Pelecanus occidentalis, Pelecanus occidentalis californicus Location: La Jolla, California, USA

I got down to La Jolla again this morning. It looked clear when I left the house but when I checked the surf at Ponto it was bumpy so I decided no go on surf photos and went with the backup plan of birds for the second day in a row. I should have opened the car window, then I would have known how windy it was. Anyway, I get down to La Jolla, hop out of the car and my hair goes swirly, its really windy. I go to my favorite spot and watch all the birds looping around, riding the gusts and figuring out where to land. As the morning went on I saw Mike Wilson (whom I met a couple times last winter) as well as John Pelafigue again. I managed to get a few more good flight shots by handholding the 300. I ran into three more people who mentioned they had seen my blog comments on pelicans in La Jolla and found them helpful. So I’ve added a few more comments and and published them as a PDF file. Here it is:

Guide to Photographing Pelicans in La Jolla.

California brown pelican in flight, soaring over the ocean with its huge wings outstretched. The wingspan of the brown pelican can be over 7 feet wide. The California race of the brown pelican holds endangered species status. La Jolla, California, USA. Image: 20080   Species: Pelecanus occidentalis, Pelecanus occidentalis californicus Location: La Jolla, California, USA

California brown pelican in flight, soaring over the ocean with its huge wings outstretched. The wingspan of the brown pelican can be over 7 feet wide. The California race of the brown pelican holds endangered species status. La Jolla, California, USA. Image: 20083   Species: Pelecanus occidentalis, Pelecanus occidentalis californicus Location: La Jolla, California, USA

See our Guide to Photographing Pelicans in La Jolla.

I met photographer John Pelafigue this morning, a great guy from Humbolt whose website has some really fine images. I also bumped into Garry McCarthy whom I had not seen since bumping into him in La Jolla shooting birds a year ago. Like myself, Garry is an underwater photographer who has also taken up the curious habit of shooting photos on land. Its sad, really, when one gives up real photography for the less savory and more mundane terrestrial pursuit(cue: laugh). As far as my photography went, I had too much lens and my flight shots were pretty weak. I did get a couple pre-sunrise shots of of brown pelicans (Pelecanus occidentalis) about 7am, some 30 minutes before the sun tops Mt. Soledad and lights the birds:

Brown pelican, winter adult breeding plumage. This large seabird has a wingspan over 7 feet wide. The California race of the brown pelican holds endangered species status, due largely to predation in the early 1900s and to decades of poor reproduction caused by DDT poisoning. In winter months, breeding males assume a dramatic plumage with brown neck, yellow and white head and bright red-orange throat pouch. La Jolla, California, USA. Image: 20074   Species: Pelecanus occidentalis, Pelecanus occidentalis californicus Location: La Jolla, California, USA

Brown pelican, non-breeding winter plumage. This large seabird has a wingspan over 7 feet wide. The California race of the brown pelican holds endangered species status, due largely to predation in the early 1900s and to decades of poor reproduction caused by DDT poisoning. La Jolla, California, USA. Image: 20078   Species: Pelecanus occidentalis, Pelecanus occidentalis californicus Location: La Jolla, California, USA

Photographer, Floridian, traveller and blogger Bill Lockhart was kind enough to take an interest in my photography and interview me recently. Bill is building a collection of fine interviews focusing on a diverse collection of photographers. I am fortunate to be considered among them. Thanks very much, Bill!

See our Guide to Photographing Pelicans in La Jolla.

Here are my two favorites from this morning. First is a brown pelican (Pelecanus occidentalis) in sweet morning light, taken just as the sun rose high enough to clear Mt. Soledad and throw light on the pelicans on the cliff. Second is a shot showing the Scripps Institute of Oceanography research pier in the background. When I was in grad school at UCSD, I used to work in the Norpax building on the SIO campus (upper right in the photo), overlooking the ocean.

Brown pelican in flight. The wingspan of the brown pelican is over 7 feet wide. The California race of the brown pelican holds endangered species status. In winter months, breeding males assume a dramatic plumage. La Jolla, California, USA. Image: 20051   Species: Pelecanus occidentalis, Pelecanus occidentalis californicus Location: La Jolla, California, USA

Brown pelican in flight. The wingspan of the brown pelican is over 7 feet wide. The California race of the brown pelican holds endangered species status. In winter months, breeding males assume a dramatic plumage. La Jolla, California, USA. Image: 20053   Species: Pelecanus occidentalis, Pelecanus occidentalis californicus Location: La Jolla, California, USA

While down at the cliffs this morning I bumped into John Obenaus, with whom I had recently been exchanging email but had not yet had the pleasure of meeting, as well as old friend and diving buddy Randy Morse. I’m envious of John, who is on a year-long hiatus travelling and shooting all over the country and who has been in La Jolla for a few days. Randy was shooting with the wildlife photographers dream combo, the new Nikon D3 and a 200-400 lens.

See our Guide to Photographing Pelicans in La Jolla.

Another shot of a California brown pelican in flight (Pelecanus occidentalis).

California brown pelican in flight, soaring over the ocean with its huge wings outstretched. The wingspan of the brown pelican can be over 7 feet wide. The California race of the brown pelican holds endangered species status. La Jolla, California, USA. Image: 20012   Species: Pelecanus occidentalis, Pelecanus occidentalis californicus Location: La Jolla, California, USA

See: brown pelican photos.

See our Guide to Photographing Pelicans in La Jolla.

A portrait of a California brown pelican in flight (Pelecanus occidentalis). I shot quite a few sharp, crisp pelican shots by handholding the 500mm recently. Normally I just use it on a Wimberley gimbel head since the lens and camera are so heavy, but that combination is sometimes awkward when tracking flying birds. It can be hard to swing the lens through a large arc and keep the focus spot on the subject while following a fast-flying bird. I have heard other photographers insisting they can shoot tack sharp images of birds in flight by handholding the 500mm so I decided to give it a shot, and surprised myself with how many of the images were razor. I’ll be handholding more often in the future I think.

Brown pelican spreads its enormous wings to slow before landing on seaside cliffs. Brown pelicans appear awkward but in fact are superb and efficient fliers, ranging far over the ocean in search of fish to dive upon. They typically nest on offshore islands and inaccessible ocean cliffs. The California race of the brown pelican holds endangered species status. In winter months, breeding males assume a dramatic plumage. La Jolla, California, USA. Image: 20017   Species: Pelecanus occidentalis, Pelecanus occidentalis californicus Location: La Jolla, California, USA

See: brown pelican photos.

See our Guide to Photographing Pelicans in La Jolla.

Here is a shot of a juvenile California brown pelican (Pelecanus occidentalis). Pelicans tend to be ugly, and juveniles with their plain brown coloration and skinny frame are really ugly. It is hard to get a photograph of one of these prepubescent pelicans where the bird actually looks handsome. This is as close as I have come so far.

Juvenile California brown pelican in flight. Note its drab brown colors, it is not mature enough to assume the more colorful plumage of adults. The wingspan of the brown pelican is over 7 feet wide. The California race of the brown pelican holds endangered species status. La Jolla, California, USA. Image: 20046   Species: Pelecanus occidentalis, Pelecanus occidentalis californicus Location: La Jolla, California, USA

See: brown pelican photos.

Yesterday a copy of the new book, The Coronados Islands, Their History and Environment (Las Islas Coronados, una Historia y un Entorno Natural) arrived in our mailbox. It is very well done, the best treatment of the Coronado Islands (Las Islas Coronados) I have yet seen. Although I was contacted by the editors of the book for images related to the ecology and animal life at the Coronado Islands a couple of years ago, yesterday was the first time I had a chance to actually see the publication, which is printed in both Spanish and English with high quality printing and binding.

The book has some history. In 2003, Chevron proposed installing a $650 million liquified natural gas receiving terminal near the Coronado Islands, which are only about 8.5 miles from the Tijuana coast and just a 1-2 hour boat ride from San Diego. The book is derived from a large body of data that was collected during the permit process and includes interesting material about the history and ecology of the islands along with many photographs. Chevron received approval for the project but ultimately withdrew for economic reasons. Fortunately, the book was still produced and is now a publicly accessible distillation of all that research data. It is being distributed at no cost to many educational institutions in Mexico.

Check out the cover. The top photo showing all three islands was made by Alfonso Caraveo Castro, who contributed most of the images in the book. The middle photo, of fishes swimming in a kelp forest, and bottom photo, of a huge blue whale raising its fluke out of the water before diving, are mine.

Skip recently spent several days with Bob and Rosie photographing sandhill cranes (Grus canadensis) and snow geese (Chen caerulescens) at Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge in New Mexico. I had hoped to join them but my schedule just did not allow for it. He got some super shots, I’m pretty envious, way to go Skip! Here are two that I thought were especially nice:

Click the images above to see more of the photos that Skip scored. I have to get out there next year.

I used to do an awful lot of diving at San Clemente Island, primarily to spend my time hovering in the middle of the water column amidst a thick forest of kelp. San Clemente Island combines the most magnificent kelp forests (Macrocystis pyrifera) in the world with pretty clean water. The clean water is the key for good photography. Kelp forests flourish in temperate water which is often loaded with plankton, nutrients and other bio-miscellanea, good things for fostering life but a detriment to making photographs. I found that San Clemente Island had consistently cleaner, bluer water than any other kelp forest location I ever dove, including the Channel Islands further north. I would spend many weekends diving from the Boat Horizon at San Clemente Island, shooting wide photos while swimming through the kelp, looking for the perfect kelp forest photograph. Contrary to the saying Perfect is the enemy of Good, I never did find that perfect kelp forest photo but I did manage to make quite a few pretty good ones in the process.

Kelp forest. San Clemente Island, California, USA. Image: 02409   Species: Macrocystis pyrifera Location: San Clemente Island, California, USA

See our Guide to Photographing Pelicans in La Jolla.

This California brown pelican (Pelecanus occidentalis californicus) is rising off the ocean to land on nearby sea cliffs after a morning foraging for food, primarily small fish that it takes by diving.

Brown pelican with wings spread during flight. The large wings of an adult brown pelican can reach over 7 feet from end to end. La Jolla, California, USA. Image: 19926   Species: Pelecanus occidentalis, Pelecanus occidentalis californicus Location: La Jolla, California, USA

See our Guide to Photographing Pelicans in La Jolla.

This is California brown pelican (Pelecanus occidentalis californicus). It is seen here preening, pulling preen oil from its uropygial gland onto its beak, which it will spread onto its feathers to help keep them water resistant and clean.

A brown pelican preening, reaching with its beak to the uropygial gland (preen gland) near the base of its tail. Preen oil from the uropygial gland is spread by the pelican’s beak and back of its head to all other feathers on the pelican, helping to keep them water resistant and dry. La Jolla, California, USA. Image: 19946   Species: Pelecanus occidentalis, Pelecanus occidentalis californicus Location: La Jolla, California, USA

These kelp fronds are at the tip of a stalk of giant kelp (Macrocystis pyrifera) which is anchored to the ocean bottom and grows up toward the ocean surface. New growth such as this occurs at the tip of the stalk. Gas filled pneumatocysts provide bouyancy to the kelp plant, lifting it off the bottom and into the water column where it provides a home to many sea creatures. A veritable undersea forest.

Kelp frond showing pneumatocysts (air bladders). San Clemente Island, California, USA. Image: 03410   Species: Macrocystis pyrifera Location: San Clemente Island, California, USA

These two juvenile double-crested cormorants (Phalacrocorax auritus) are fighting by clicking their beaks against each another. A tempest in a teapot.

Juvenile double-crested cormorants sparring with beaks. La Jolla, California, USA. Image: 19932   Species: Phalacrocorax auritus Location: La Jolla, California, USA

Here is a snap of my good friend Mike Johnson swimming through a forest of kelp (Macrocystis pyrifera) at San Clemente Island. Most underwater photographers like to spend their time diving alone, pursuing their own particular subjects and angles and not wanting to be bothered with keeping track of a buddy. Mike and I are no exceptions and would rarely see one another underwater. Once in a blue moon we do modeling duty, each allowing the other to get a few frames with a diver in it, but it wouldn’t last long and within minutes we would scatter in opposite directions and set about trying to find our own stuff to photograph.

Diver amidst kelp forest. San Clemente Island, California, USA. Image: 03420   Species: Macrocystis pyrifera Location: San Clemente Island, California, USA

This bull elk (Cervus candensis) had a fine harem of females along the Madison River. He was bugling often and loudly, raising his head and lowering his antler rack behind him as he did so. Note how the bull’s upper lip is curled back. This is an example of the flehmen response (from German flehmen, meaning to “curl the upper lip"). The flehmen response is a particular type of curling of the upper lip in ungulates, felids, and many other mammals, which facilitates the transfer of pheromones and other scents into the vomeronasal organ, also called Jacobson’s Organ. In the flehmen response, animals draw back their lips , particularly the upper lip which curls towards the nostrils. The action, which is used when examining scents left by other animals, helps to expose the vomeronasal organ and draws scent molecules back toward it. This behavior allows animals to detect scents, for example from urine, of other members of their species or clues to the presence of prey. The flehmen response also allows the animals to determine, among other things, the presence or absence of estrus, the physiological state of the animal, and how long ago the animal passed by.

Male elk bugling during the fall rut. Large male elk are known as bulls. Male elk have large antlers which are shed each year. Males engage in competitive mating behaviors during the rut, including posturing, antler wrestling and bugling, a loud series of screams which is intended to establishe dominance over other males and attract females. Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming, USA. Image: 19708   Species: Cervus canadensis Location: Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming, USA

The surf is big today, just as expected. Its big, and continuing to build with projected peak later today, but … it’s NOT CLEAN. I mean that literally (lagoons are still flushing their biohazards from the rain runoff of last weekend) and figuratively (the swell is not groomed right for picturesque surf). Oh well. Maybe it will clean up tomorrow and go glass? Here is what I am hoping for, from the “big wednesday” swell of two years ago:

Salt Creek surf, pretty big day, winter, morning. Salt Creek, Laguna Niguel, California, USA. Image: 14852   Location: Salt Creek, Laguna Niguel, California, USA

This year’s edition of the Tidelines calendar is especially nice because one of our photos appears on the cover (duh). Can you guess where it was shot? Hint: it rhymes with “ledge” and lots of bones are broken there. Order your Tidelines calendar now so you too can time all your ocean functions to take maximum advantage of the tide. By the way, a big swell arrives tomorrow, if you have a Tidelines calendar on your wall you’ll know when to go.

Another example of a humpback whale (Megaptera novaeangliae) peforming a peduncle throw. In this case, rather than flicking the fluke sideways, the whale has lifted its fluke and peduncle vertically, slinging water in all directions. Notice the rake marks on the underside of the whales fluke, which are almost certainly caused by attacks by orca (killer whales).

North Pacific humpback whale, peduncle throw. Maui, Hawaii, USA. Image: 00443   Species: Megaptera novaeangliae Location: Maui, Hawaii, USA See usage restrictions

This photograph was taken during Hawaii Whale Research Foundation research activities conducted under provisions of NOAA / NMFS and State of Hawaii scientific research permits.

Here we see a humpback whale (Megaptera novaeangliae) peforming a tail throw, also known as a peduncle throw or tail lob. While at the surface, the whale pivots around its long pectoral fins, suddenly flicking its powerful fluke and peducle out of the water while dipping its rostrum. This behaviour typically occurs among groups of surface active humpback whales in which males are socializing and (presumably) competing for access to a female in their midst. Often the female whale is the one performing tail throws, but it is seen in primary and challenging escorts as well.

Humpback whale performing a peduncle throw at the surface, swinging its fluke (tail) sideways and flinging water all over. Maui, Hawaii, USA. Image: 00182   Species: Megaptera novaeangliae Location: Maui, Hawaii, USA See usage restrictions

This photograph was taken during Hawaii Whale Research Foundation research activities conducted under provisions of NOAA / NMFS and State of Hawaii scientific research permits.

Ok, here is the last photo of the bull elk (Cervus candensis) that I photographed just outside Mammoth Hot Springs.

Bull elk in sage brush with large rack of antlers during the fall rut (mating season). This bull elk has sparred with other bulls to establish his harem of females with which he hopes to mate. Mammoth Hot Springs, Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming, USA. Image: 19745   Species: Cervus canadensis Location: Mammoth Hot Springs, Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming, USA