Spinebills and rainfall make achievements.

Late this afternoon I achieved breakthroughs with both spinebill photography and rainfall recording.  (A couple of later images are at the end of this post.)

I actually managed to get a half-reasonable shot of a spinebill.  Given that it was taken through a window and some 8m from the bird I reckon this is not too disgusting (others may disagree).
It was just about the 1:30 ratio of fair:garbage photos referred to by Denis Wilson when commenting on an earlier post accessible through this one.  I did aso manage to get the bill in focus in this "hover-shot".
 
That is quite enough about Eastern Spinebills.  At least for this year.  The flowers are penstemons and salvias.

The reference to rainfall in the title of this post is to flag that having recorded about 7mm so far today, we have gone over 1000mm this year.  I think that is the first time that has happened since we moved to this region in 1983 (although I didn't really start recording rain until about 2000 and haven't got my records prior to 2007). 

The following image shows our 2010 value attached to the Annual Totals for the Canberra Airport Comparison site from the Bureau of Meteorology.  While this is not a technically sound comparison, it does illustrate a broad - or perhaps deep - point. (Click image for more detail.)  I hope we don't break the record of 1062mm set in 1950, since that would need another 60mm in 11 days.

The next two photos come from 8 January 2011 but I decided to put them here s they were linked to a spinebill title!

Both of these images are of adult birds.  As daylight faded a juvenile (basically light brown all the way up the breast and throat) arrived but I couldn't get a decent shot of it.


Comments

Mary Chamie said…
The two photos together are wonderful. I wish I had the ability to shoot close ups the way that you do. The first one is remarkably clear given that it was taken through a window. And the second shot is full of action and shows a lot about the character of the bird. As for the rainfall, sorry that you reached that breakthrough.
21 December 2010 at 11:19:00 GMT+11
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