Readers’ wildlife photos

Today we have photos sent in by Mark Joseph, all taken by one of his friends and reproduced with permission. Mark’s captions are indented, and you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them.

Here are photos from the fourth and last of my photographing friends in the local Audubon group (previous sets can be found here, here, here, and here. Her name is Connie, and these are pictures from the large city park in Grand Rapids, where the group walks every Thursday morning (and where the birds are considerably less exotic than on the birding trips of my other friends). She tends to be more “artsy” and less “birdy” than the others, and has a good eye:

Droplets on a plant:

Mini-icicle:

Patterns in the water on a pond:

But she also takes very good bird (and other critter) photos:

Brown creeper (Certhia americana):

Mallard (Anas platyrhynchos):

Mute swan (Cygnus olor) close to the classic “heart/boat” configuration:

Song sparrow (Melospiza melodia):

Yellow warbler (Setophaga petechia), a serious candidate for the cutest bird in the world (my vote probably goes to the Piping plover, but this guy might just be a close second):

Rose-breasted grosbeak (Pheucticus ludovicianus), male:

Female, sitting on a nest just off of the path; we’ve seen her each of the last three Thursdays (May 22, 29, June 5); there were chicks in the nest on June 12:

American robin (Turdus migratorius) with berry:

American tree sparrow (Spizelloides arborea):

Brown-lipped snail (Cepaea nemoralis), one of her specialties:

That does it for now, but I will come back to my friends (I have lots of great pictures from them). Next time I’ll (re-)introduce myself, explain why I’m not much of a photographer, and present one nevertheless truly astounding picture.