R Christopher Vest – Birds

another for the bosque series. these guys have dispersed from their wintering grounds on the rio grande river and have migrated to various points like the niobrara river in nebraska. it's always amazing to see them by dawn's light.

my 100th bird picture on IK. we have resident eagles living near us and they are quite approachable-- still this fellow was a good distance away, i was not disturbing him-- though he shot me a look that might suggest that. for all we know, that's his 'happy face'. and for just an instant i imagined how that look could be one of the last things a rabbit might ever see. ouch.

i was delighted to photograph some snipes right on my own pond last year. they are remarkably camouflaged-- in one series of pictures i thought i was taking of just one, but enlarging the photos on the computer i discovered that two were there. anyway, in this picture-- which seems oddly like a children's book illustration for some reason-- i wanted the bird to be very easy to see.

this is a remake of a previous puffin image. i made it wider to accommodate a pair of murres, plus an iceberg, gull and much grander lighting. these are birds i photographed at mathias seal island in new brunswick, but the background suggests the euro-puffin habitat of perhaps norway.

common but lovable, a little white-breasted nuthatch warms the winter heart with his energy and antics.

a beautiful waterfall crashes down above telluride colorado-- it falls so far it's more mist than torrent by the time it reaches the bottom. it bathes the rocks and hot hikers, it cools the day and cheers the heart-- if you're lucky enough to be in the spray. and so the swallows are indeed.

arriving in northern ohio in mid-may, i'd missed a lot of the migration, missed the parulas and blue-winged warblers, but the native prothonotary warblers were everywhere, gleefully singing and already nesting.

another in the bosque mist series. all of the wildlife and birds at the bosque del apache are magnificent, but i tend to remember most vividly and fondly the foggy mornings along the marsh. in the limited light, the landscape is the most convincingly primeval.

at magee marsh in ohio during the spring migration, the attention is generally focussed on the wealth of colorful warblers. but more subtle and common year-round birds are there as well, including this gray catbird, massively fluffing his feathers to preen in the morning light.

Late in the autumn thousands of waterfowl congregate along an area of the Rio Grande in New Mexico where the river has traditionally flooded providing magnificent cover and browse for birds. Among the enormous flocks are thousands of graceful sandhill cranes. Shown here at dawn, they are moving through the mist seemingly almost in slow motion, and the serenity is breathtaking.

it's a barn just up the road from here, the sun has vanished over there just beyond the utah line. there's a little breeze and it lifts the tail feathers of a pair of magpies. and it's soooo quiet...

seeing this snowy scene of desicated flowers, i thought immediately of the great canadian wildlife artist robert bateman -- stark and abstract driven, the picture is a more a story about the landscape than the subtly depicted goldfinch (although it is seed-rich for foraging).

a dank old fencerow near here. just a a faint warming of light over the sodden autumn weeds, and then appears a couple of cheerful chipping sparrows. they can't sing worth a darn, but neither can i.

my annual fall trip to the Bosque del Apache wildlife refuge yielded a digital heap of photos-- it's a magnificent place to view sandhills and snowgeese and a host of other endemics. one viewing platform is called 'flight deck' because from that spot at the crack of dawn one can behold the simultaneous lift-off of thousands of geese. the sounds, mists and morning light are unforgettable.

i visited mathias seal island in new brunswick a few years ago-- a prime and protected puffin nest site off northern maine. of course there are no jagged snowy peaks visible from there, but i concocted the scene from a seal island foreground and a norwegian fjord background. same bird, different continent.

the lewis is a threatened woodpecker of dry mountainsides out west-- the green is slightly iridescent and typically appears black until the right light causes him to glow like an emerald.

perhaps one reason birders have varying degrees of contempt for european house sparrows is that they (like rock doves) are associated with dwelling among us, in places often not so pretty...

a male yellow rumped warbler makes a brief appearance to whistle a territorial song before plunging again into the anonymity of thick foliage.

native to the west coast of central south america, i got to admire the playful humboldts at columbus zoo. this started out as a bit of an abstract, but i kept painting in more detail.

during migration a sudden storm forced this female rufous hummingbird to seek shelter in a rocky crevice. used to perching, her tail feathers are spread out on the ground. a whisper of a rainbow hints that the weather will soon clear.

woodland birds of central Africa.

a male hairy woodpecker avails himself of the ripened bounty of a mullein stalk: a veritable seed bank of food.

in a sylvan backwater bathed in emerald light, a flamingo preens; it is a moment of tranquility just before darkness descends.

in the stifling heat of summer, birds and butterflies alike bask in the billowing cool mist of a rain forest waterfall.

a gorgeous bird-- like all warblers, so active that they were difficult to photograph. fortunately they were abundant along the shore of lake erie in may.

remembering that john james audubon shot his specimens and strung them into positions as lifelike as he could manage, i decided to mimic that odd and quaint look-- although i didn't have to shoot my specimen-- he was found dead. woodcocks have an amazing nuptial flight that involves launching skyward at sunset and then diving back to earth emitting his beautiful call: a wonderful song of spring.

when in italy i hiked way above lago maggiori through deep and cool emerald woodlands, and finally discovered a gorgeous series of waterfalls. great spot to place a european dipper.

a fair number of trumpeters breed across the midwest. this one pauses in migration to sit out a stiff headwind.

with his golden spectacles and ebony necklace, a canada warbler makes a brief but brilliant flash of color in the shadowed woodland.

here's a winter pic to challenge the oppressive heat of summer. near here is an apple orchard and a derelict fenceline-- perfect spot to place a pair of happy titmouses. or is it titmice?

i love these endless backroads over on the "sill" of the grand staircase escalante. this one heads south toward the mountain ute reservationthrough anasazi bean fields, sunflowers and winter wheat . i painted in some sandhill cranes so it wouldn't seem too lonely.

this ancient arm chair sits out by the barn-- the dogs love to sit there in the sunset. one evening i saw a handsome male house finch availing himself of the stuffing fibers for his nest. glad that we could be of some help.

perched high on a dry century agave plant, a pair of white winged doves bask between a sunset and an approaching squall.

spring rivals, the full bloom of crabapple flowers and the breeding plumage of the male american goldfinch.

out of a foggy marsh a great blue heron takes flight

i tried a chinese feel to this portrait of a pair of african crowned cranes browsing through tall golden sunset grass (apologies for the borrowed red stamp-- i have no idea what it means, hopefully not something bad ;-)

nesting out by the shed, a pair of barn swallows consider the day.

a sketchy rendering of a baby mute swan i saw along an Italian lake-- it may have been Garda. the attentive mother was also quite nearby.

a warbling vireo happened by my backyard and gave a song in exchange for the fine opportunity to glean the vernal greenery.

i lived several months in eilat, israel and loved the wonderful birds there where the ocean meets the desert. invariably my attempts to photograph the bee-eaters resulted in capturing them on barbed wire-- not too surprising it is everywhere along the jordanian border...

amid some ivy near the forest floor, a magnolia warbler feeds a bit and then looking toward the canopy, considers resuming the migration...

there are likely migratory warblers that live their entire lives and never see snow. well, this guy made his flight from the tropics and got an interesting surprise...

a female broad tailed hummingbird on a splendid perch to dry out a bit after a summer shower. she fluffs her feathers out and basks in the warm evening light.

this is a correction of the originally uploaded "delicate perch" which has a fairly conspicuous flaw. i didn't want to immediately delete the original since it has garnered some nice comments, but in the event of a sale, i want this repaired image to be available. cheers, chris

photographed at the bosque del apache, this bird shows us the amazing complex patterns of his back, while hiding the more striking chest. he rests on a scrub of black-eyed susan, a plant that seems to be ever more common in our area.

merlin study

another piece utilizing the fine evening light that fell on a bucket filled with apples sitting on my back porch. lest we think the chickadee is too big, i will point out that the apples are very small ;-).

drawn to all things ruby, a male black-chinned hummingbird pauses in his frantic search for sustenance to consider a bucket of tart apples.

there is a beautiful little lake near the jackson lake lodge where i've seen trumpeters nesting fifty yards from sandhill cranes. it's a gorgeous spot, and it's the inspiration for this family portrait.

of the thrushes, perhaps the least known and appreciated is the townsend's solitaire, but it's a beautiful bird and vivid songster; this one catches a bit of "alpen glow" as the sun goes down.

out birding the marshes, one is bound to occassionally violate the personal space of a nesting bird. here a male redwing shoots across my line of photo-vision letting me know i'm too close to the nest.

our winters in southwest colorado are typically rather mild and the meadowlarks don't go far-- sometimes they even appear walking across the snow. this fellow showed up at our birdfeeder in the dead of winter.

just a wide open depiction of a mature bald eagle against a marvelous blue sky stretching out in full flight.

it's hard to imagine the physiology that would permit one to be as happy upside down as right, but the nuthatch pulls it off, an acrobat of the furrowed bark.

yep-- even vultures yawn. or he's laughing, not sure which...

this is an old out building on my 'farm'. though we're in colorado, i painted in an eastern bluebird. hmm. what was i thinking?

Based on a photo i took on the shores of Lac Leman (Geneva) near Lausanne Switzerland.

i've built a little historic chinese feel into this depiction of sandhill cranes working a flooded pasture in the radiant light of sunset. something has startled them and droplets fly as they assume an alert posture.

at both sunrise and sunset in the bosque del apache there is an enormous and breathtaking movement of thousands of birds, predominately sandhill cranes and snowgeese. the sound, brilliant desert colors and flurry of activity is unforgettable: exhilarating yet tranquil.

i couldn't decide if i like this one better with a modest background or - as in the previous version- a plain wall. feedback would be appreciated.

another amazing specimen rescued by a local rehabilitator. rather than intending to depict him as the fierce predatory warrior, i tried to suggest a bit of sadness and his indignation about the human-caused injury (the right wing shows a red spot near his injury).

along a mountain road near telluride colorado, the distant ridge of a slope across the narrow valley appears astonishingly blue. against the dappled cobalt and yellow a raven chortles.

a rescued ferruginous hawk-- a splendid subject for a portrait with his alabaster smooth "bib" and caramel toned streaks.

out beside my derelict old haybarn is a post with several spools of barbed wire around it creating a kind of abstract series of shapes. i imagined a cute little saw whet posing there briefly.

the woodland is flooded by the rio grande river much of the year-- this creates a fabulous habitat for wintering birds like sandhill cranes and a plethora of waterfowl.

it's a long and sometimes stormy flight back home. a migrating mountain bluebird rests on a post along a remote valley. to retain body heat he fluffs his feathers into a puffy ball. but the clarion summer sun will soon bask him in warmth again.

in southwest colorado, we can only enjoy this graceful bird for a few weeks in the spring as they stop over on their trek to points northward. here a group of five avocets plies the shallow water of a lakeside.

i'm used to looking up at owls, and seeing them obscured deeply in branches or nearly invisible against similarly colored background; therefore i enjoyed depicting one at eye level and with unobstructed clarity to let the glowing eyes shine out.

a male gambel's quail emerges from the safety and obscurity of the underbrush to risk a full view of the valley.

sandhill cranes take flight somewhere south of the bosque del apache...

a pair of tree swallows dart over a willow-draped pond

years ago i was paddling in the oxbow section of the snake river in Grand Teton National Park. i was drawn to a sandbar where at least a dozen pelicans were reclining. the gentle wind blew my boat very gradually straight toward them. the opportunity afforded me some great shots-- too bad they were all spoiled when water got into the film. still, using one of the better of the damaged images, i painted in the details and light as i remember them.

i had to sign 300 of these prints for the magazine so if you want one of those (14 x 9.6"), just email me. i built this image from photos i took in saguaro national park.

a thick blanket of snow covers the western landscape. a juvenile marsh hawk brushes close to an old barn as part of her circuit-- nothing is astir. she flies on.

the endangered palila survives on the slopes of mauna kea on the big island of hawaii.

fall in the forest, filtered light, and a perfect perch.

a western screech owl catches the last dim light of dusk just before a snow squall rolls in.

a fairly old guy that lives in the rehabilitation center in santa fe new mexico. the billows of feathers, especially around his throat, makes him a splendid model.

a western bluebird settles into the leeward side of a aspen tree as an early evening fog turns to light rain.

a beautiful old fence line, filigreed with odd twists of wire becomes the focal point of this painterly depiction of a jay against a bleary sunset.

the magnificent old mission at laguna new mexico is shown by moonlight through the bare branches of ancient cottonwood trees. in a very tranquil moment, i imagined a roadrunner taking a brief pause atop the outer adobe wall.

a busy little nuthatch probes a labyrinth of driftwood along a colorado lakeside.

a colorado crabapple tree in late bloom is visited by a male hummingbird.

a pair of seed searching siskins perches on an old farm gate

a clever little downy woodpecker contemplates a "menu spread across a shaggy trunk of juniper. a light snow begins to fall as evening approaches.

photographed near telluride colorado in autumn, the water was shimmering with bright rocks and leaves, and the busy dipper was good enough to pause and "smile" for me.

a study of a trumpeter swan

an oregon junco perches on a frozen wine of virginia creeper as the snow swirls around.

a bristly mature raven chortles above his mountain domain.

looking down on the colorado river near moab, utah, we see a heron taking flight in the amber glow of canyon sunset.

a slightly impressionistic look at a heron gently descending on a foggy marsh.

before the snowfall a dense fog blew in-- along with a handsome redtail hawk.

a yellow headed blackbird in a light fog surveys a pond edge among dense bullrushes.

a harris hawk suddenly catches the movement of potential prey.

fully fledged, a young says phoebe waits patiently for his parents to both feed him and show him the "ropes".

i've seen many shrikes but i've never observed their famous penchant for skewering prey-- so this piece is a slightly macabre indulgence of my imagination.

a male western bluebird in the last flush of autumn's color.

with the old barn door gone, the rusty hinge makes a perfect perch for a female cardinal.

a bluebird finds a fine perch on an old dilapidated fence row among the blooming rabbitbrush.

a eagle surveys a meadow between the mountains and the desert.