For The Birds (#77.5)
Another SciArtSeptember is all done and dusted, and here are the results.
If you were following Campfire Notebook last year, or have gone through the archives as a newer subscriber, you’ll have seen the results of my first attempt at #SciArtSeptember - a celebration of science-themed art using daily prompts generated by Glendon Mellows and Liz Butler.
Last year, I created thirty mini-portraits of female scientists, sketching them with pencil before committing them to paper with Sharpie and Midliner highlighter markers.
#26: Thirty
Space: The Final Frontier I’ve always preferred chemistry to physics, so it was fun to learn more about outer space. I read about the first African American woman to receive a PhD in astrophysics at Yale, Dr. Jedidah Isler, and her study of black holes called blazars (
What would 2023 bring?
I had a few ideas kicking around the noodle, spending time in August preparing ideas. I thought of a comic panel per day, as well as little cassette tapes decorated to align with the theme (and linking to a Spotify playlist). I still like that idea, but it wasn’t working. I think that, if I had had 30 physical tapes to alter with paint and pen, I might have continued with this one, but I wasn’t feeling the paper cassette tapes I measured out and prepared for future sketches.
Back to the drawing board.
Then I remembered that art is more than pen, and that I take bird photos all the time. Identifying birds involved learning more their habitats, their behaviours - might I not find ways to link prompts to birds I photographed in 2023?
So that’s where I perched in September.
Below are all thirty photos with the explanation I included over on BlueSky in sharing them. Click on a photo to make it bigger and see the bird in all its’ majesty!
Day 1 (Starry): Aquila - the eagle - can be seen in the northern hemisphere from July to October. The bald eagle is also associated with stars, with our friends to the south.
Day 2 (Battle): Canada Geese are “rabbit from Monty Python and the Holy Grail” levels of nasty. They will battle you for every square inch of park, sidewalk, river bed. They bite and hiss. (Tim the Enchanter: “LOOK AT THE BONES!”)
Day 3 (Favourite): It was hard to share ONE favourite bird. But I have a soft spot for our provincial bird: a sassy, spirited, black-capped chickadee.
Day 4 (Cold-Blooded): I imagine this little guy HAS to have some anti-freeze running through his veins? This snow bunting was making a pit stop in the Maritimes before heading to his Arctic breeding grounds, where he’d pick out a nesting site that he hopes will woo a mate.
Day 5 (Strangling): One of the delights locally is seeing a returning osprey population, especially as they go grocery shopping in the nearby river. Meanwhile, dinner is Strangling in its’ talons.
Day 6 (Understory): This song sparrow paused to eye me up, perhaps worried I wanted to swipe its’ snack.
Day 7 (Indigo): I always thought common grackles were all black - then the sunlight hits them just so.
Day 8 (Simian): Brown creepers climb trees, but that’s where the similarities end - because it is near impossible to sight these little guys in the woods!
Day 9 (Heart): Mourning doves courting in early spring.
Day 10 (Gossamer): I’d never seen a baby robin before, so watching an entire clutch learn to search for worms this spring was a real treat!
Day 11 (Lyrical): Yellow warblers are just a delight to listen to their song. If I had that bounty of blossoms, I’d sing, too.
Day 12 (Overgrowth): Alder flycatchers are my friend, but are hard to see in the Overgrowth.
Day 13 (Carmine): We stumbled upon this Yellow-bellied Sapsucker by chance in the April woods. Look at that head!
Day 14 (Glowing): This female Northern Cardinal is all a-glow in the evening sun.
Day 15 (Bird-like): Kind of weird for me to choose birds knowing this was a theme, but I think great blue herons are more pterodactyl than bird. And cranky AF.
Day 16 (Ochre): House finches are everywhere in an urban setting, adding ochre, sepia, and umber to the palette.
Day 17 (Abstract): As much as I enjoy photographing ducks like this female goldeneye, I love capturing the colourful patterns they leave in the wake of their swim.
Day 18 (Talon): One of those summer days where we slam on the breaks to only reverse slowly on a country road and observe this smooth criminal - I believe a broad-winged hawk - stake out supper in the ditch below.
Day 19 (Charcoal): Some find them haunting but I love the cry of a loon over the water.
Day 20 (Sweet): Hardly saw them all summer, but in the last few weeks of August, a pair of ruby-throated hummingbirds made my feeder a key pit stop before heading south.
Day 21 (Misty): Love it when the foreground frames the subject in a misty sorta way, like with this spotted sandpiper. (It must be young, because it was more curious of me than skittish like they usually are!)
Day 22 (Nocturnal): I haven’t been fortunate to see an owl or nightjar yet, but this grouse settling in to bed was the closest I’d gotten to a nighttime bird friend.
Day 23 (Adornment): I’ve lived here all my life but had never seen a wood duck before until I started birding in earnest. These colourful beauties just live here?!
Day 24 (Metallic): Instead of hearing bugs beneath the bark, this woodpecker was fooled by the buzzing of an electrical box. (Thankfully she didn’t try to find treats inside!)
Day 25 (Alchemical): I love the magical colours of tree swallows, and their nest construction out of ordinary structures kinda feels like alchemy.
Day 26 (Threads): My first pintail! 🥰 Look at the thread-like tail of this beauty.
Day 27 (Amethyst): Purple finches are far more raspberry than amethyst.
Day 28 (Monumental): The sheer amount of time it took me to get a shot of a kinglet was indeed monumental. They are fast little suckers!
Day 29 (Tale): I had never seen a gull dive for fish before, but this night I watched close to 30 stir up a frenzy as they snapped up bait fish in the Marsh Creek.
Day 30 (Rebirth): A relative told me that crows represents souls returning to earth, so it’s what I always think of when I see one in the yard now.
Thanks to Glendon and Liz for another great set of prompts! You can find their work over on BlueSky (at flyingtrilobite.com and at lizlagomorph.bsky.social) as well as their websites:
These are awesome, Bryn! You’re quite talented at capturing nature
Absolutely gorgeous post, Bryn! And a real education - we have very few birds in common with yours over here, and it's been wonderful to explore your beautiful pictures!