RH Speirs | Photographer - Marshall Springs 36 - Fish Creek Prov. Park

If you've been browsing these galleries of photos on this site recently you will have noticed that the majority of my photos are of wildlife subjects, mostly birds. When I take those photos, one of my biggest challenges is simply getting close enough to the subject that it fills the frame. Sometimes I seem to get lost in fulfilling that challenge and forget about capturing the bigger picture of the overall beauty all around. Well, these next two photos (below) were taken from the two locations I use, pretty much exclusively, to capture the majority of the Red-necked Grebe, and the Black Tern photos you've seen of late (past few weeks). It will just give you a sense of what the environment is like when I take these pictures..this is pretty much what I see before me as I'm shooting. These two photos were each shot at a 35 mm focal length, giving a slightly exaggerated sense of the space around me. If I'm not mistaken the human eye sees closer to the equivalent of a range of 50 mm - 70 mm in reality. So these 35 mm images are exaggerating the space, and the distance of all the things around me slightly. In the first picture you can see the Red-necked Grebe nest a little off center of the frame, to the right. The first picture also shows the the location of where the second picture was taken from..the very left edge of the frame. The second picture shows the Grebe nest just ever so slightly off center, to the left. The location the first picture was taken from would be just off the right edge of the frame in the second picture..can't quite see it. Just thought you might find that interesting, and well, it's just a beautiful place at this time of year to simply take photos of. The close up pictures of the Grebes at the nest are generally taken using a focal range of between 500 mm to 700 mm from these two locations.

Landscape at Sunrise, Marshall Springs ponds, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - June 25th

Mallard (female), Marshall Springs ponds, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - June 25th

Mallard (female) close-up, Marshall Springs ponds, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - June 25th

So nice to see this cute little fawn (below), but unfortunately they were very far away and I had to crop these images quite heavily. The quality is low..fine for on screen viewing like this, but they wouldn't hold up being printed.

White-tailed Deer with fawn, Marshall Springs ponds, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - June 25th

White-tailed Deer fawn, Marshall Springs ponds, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - June 25th

Black Tern (in flight), Marshall Springs ponds, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - June 25th

Common Mergansers, Marshall Springs ponds, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - June 25th

Common Merganser (immature), Marshall Springs ponds, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - June 25th

Black Tern (in flight), Marshall Springs ponds, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - June 27th

Red-necked Grebe, Marshall Springs ponds, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - June 27th

It just never ceases to amaze me how fast these young goslings (ducklings and chicks too) grow, develop, and mature. It's almost like they're just reincarnated from a previous version. They hatch, and they seem to instantly know exactly what to do, but they're just so small that they're very vulnerable, and of course they lack the size and strength to do everything for themselves. Even from the day they hatch, it seems, they sure can scoot across the water quickly when they need to. Just a few short weeks ago you could have held these immature Geese in the palm of you hand.

There are two young families of Canada Geese at the Marshall Springs ponds this year, that I'm aware of anyway. The pair bringing up the older group have four young, and the pair bringing up the younger ones have only two. Sometimes I see both families hanging around together, and sometimes separately..the latter was the case when these photos (below) were taken.

Canada Goose family, Marshall Springs ponds, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - June 27th

Canada Goose (immature) close-up, Marshall Springs ponds, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - June 27th

Canada Goose family, Marshall Springs ponds, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - June 27th

Canada Goose (immature) close-up, Marshall Springs ponds, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - June 27th

Marshall Springs 36 - Fish Creek Prov. Park - Calgary

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