We have an outdoor Christmas Tree for the first time this
year. It's on the deck behind the house
next to the bird feeders.
The tree is decorated with strings of Cranberries and fruit
loops. It also has pine cones filled
with peanut butter and dusted with bird seed.
What more could the birds want?
The birds ignored the tree for a week. Perhaps it frightened them when it was blown
over by strong gusts of wind. We tied it
down better. A raccoon stopped by at
night and nibbled on a couple of pine cones.
Too much fiber - he moved on to the next house.
Last night we had 8 inches of snow. This morning Starlings and House Sparrows
flocked to the Christmas tree like there is not tomorrow. Actually tomorrow 12/21/2012 is the day the
Mayan calendar says the world ends, so today may be the day to Eat, Drink and
be Merry.
I used a Canon 5D Mark II with a 400mm lens for these
photos. I shot them at 1/125 of a second
with the lens set to f4. Even though it was mid morning, it was a challenge to use natural light. I had to set the ISO to 640. Post processing was done in Lightroom. Every image required noise reduction and
cropping.
