Seattle Day Trip: To Reifel Migratory Bird Sanctuary
March 6, 2015
Last week I accompanied my friend Bonnie and her husband on a day trip to the George C. Reifel Bird Sanctuary in British Columbia. This was my first trip to this refuge, and it was a spectacular place for walking groomed trails and watching birds. They do allow visitors to feed the birds (they sell birdseed), so many birds seem accustomed to people and you can get very close. This was wonderful for making photographs. I find it very difficult to take pictures of birds because they move so quickly and it is hard to anticipate their moves. Too often my photos look like this:
Here are some of my better photographs of the wild birds and views within the sanctuary:
We were very lucky because a vagrant Great Gray Owl had made a temporary stop at the sanctuary. The owl had settled in a non-public area, but the staff took people back in small groups to see it — a rare sighting of this wild bird.
March 6, 2015 at 6:18 pm
Beautiful bird sketches, Rosemary! You always manage to capture so much personality in your wildlife paintings. It is a pleasure to see these.
March 7, 2015 at 10:03 am
Thanks, Lynne!
March 7, 2015 at 6:33 am
The owl is a show-stopper. How lucky you were to be able to see it. And I agree about your sketches. The frontal view of the wood duck and both female mallard sketches are dead-on. Ducks have a way of giving us an obviously appraising look, and you’ve captured it well.
March 7, 2015 at 6:42 am
This was exciting! Especially the owl!