{"id":3740,"date":"2016-05-18T11:43:49","date_gmt":"2016-05-18T16:43:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/?p=3740"},"modified":"2016-05-18T13:04:39","modified_gmt":"2016-05-18T18:04:39","slug":"hummingbirds-in-the-desert","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/2016\/05\/18\/hummingbirds-in-the-desert\/","title":{"rendered":"Hummingbirds in the Desert"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last week I had the pleasure of photographing for a few hours at the Christmas Mountains Oasis south of Alpine, Texas.\u00a0 It’s a long way from “Nowhere”, but it is\u00a0heaven for the birds.\u00a0\u00a0Rare and beautiful\u00a0Lucifer hummingbirds nest on the property and spend much of their time at the Oasis feeders.<\/p>\n

A visit to the Oasis is by invitation only, so if you want to have a chance at Lucifer hummingbirds and many other species, sign up for my August 17-18 hummingbird photography workshop.\u00a0 I’ll be posting the particulars on my website under the\u00a0Photo Tours heading\u00a0in the next day or two.\u00a0 Eight slots were available and two are already taken.<\/p>\n

Here are some images of the oasis and Lucifer hummingbirds:<\/p>\n

Click on a photo to enlarge and sharpen it for better viewing.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Lucifer<\/a>
Lucifer Hummingbird male landing at feeder, west Texas, USA<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Lucifer<\/a>
Lucifer Hummingbird female hovering in flight.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

These birds have long, curved beaks and, of course, the males have that incredible purple\/pink\/lavender…throat.\u00a0 The above shots are in natural light and photographed with the Canon 7D mark II and 500 mm lens with Wimberly head and Feisol tripod.<\/p>\n

\"Christmas<\/a>
Christmas Mountains Oasis bird habitat after sunset, s. of Alpine, Texas<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Christmas<\/a>
Christmas Mountains, west Texas.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Lucifer hummingbirds nest in cholla cactus\u00a0near the top\u00a0of this mountain.\u00a0 Amazing!!<\/p>\n

\"Lucifer<\/a>
Lucifer Hummingbird male hovering in flight, west Texas, USA.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Lucifer<\/a>
Lucifer Hummingbird male displaying gorget, w. Texas<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Lucifer<\/a>
Lucifer Hummingbird male perched.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Lucifer<\/a>
Lucifer Hummingbird male feeding, w. Texas.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The last shot was done with the aid of multiple flashes and artificial background.\u00a0 If you like stop-action hummingbird shots, you can appreciate this image made at about 1\/12,000 of a second.\u00a0 I’ll have the setup available at the Christmas Mountains Oasis Hummingbird Photography Workshop in August.\u00a0 To register, contact the folks\u00a0in charge of the Fort Davis Hummingbird Celebration at Fort Davis\u00a0(info@fortdavis.com) or contact me by email at lditto@larryditto.com and I’ll get you hooked up.<\/p>\n

Larry<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

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 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last week I had the pleasure of photographing for a few hours at the Christmas Mountains Oasis south of Alpine, Texas.\u00a0 It’s a long way from “Nowhere”, but it is\u00a0heaven for the birds.\u00a0\u00a0Rare and beautiful\u00a0Lucifer hummingbirds nest on the property and spend much of their time at the Oasis feeders. A visit to the Oasis … Continue reading Hummingbirds in the Desert<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3740","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-newsletter"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3740","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3740"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3740\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3751,"href":"https:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3740\/revisions\/3751"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3740"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3740"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larryditto.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3740"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}