Special Project - Birds of Delmarva
Welcome to the first blog post of 2023! It’s refreshing taking time to write instead of constantly taking photos - it’s a different outlet, but one that I enjoy in addition to photography.
For this blog post, I wanted to share with everyone a special project I will be working on over the course of 2023, and it is one that I took on back in 2019 as well. This project is to photograph as many different species of birds as I can from the Delmarva Peninsula over the course of the calendar year!
In 2019, photography was still relatively new to me. It was a hobby more than a side hustle or career, and though I really enjoyed it, admittedly I didn’t really know what I was doing like I do now. Over the course of 2018, I saw a photographer on Instagram, Louis Mason, work on a project to capture 100 different bird species in the state of Delaware. This served as the inspriation for me in 2019, as seeing him get out as frequently as he did drove me to do the same. I don’t know precisely how many different species I ended up capturing in 2019, but it was exciting to work on nonetheless!
Since it has been a few years, I decided now was the time to bring this project back and give it another go. Not only do I feel I have become a better photographer since 2019, but my equipment has changed as well. Back then, I was shooting on my Canon EOS Rebel T6 (great introductory DSLR camera, but more on that another time), and a kit 100 - 200 mm lens. The lens worked well, but it had limitations as I couldn’t zoom in tight on subjects further away - that was, to me, the biggest issue. Today, I shoot on a Canon EOS 90D and have a Sigma 150 - 600 mm telephoto lens - this lens now allows me to zoom super close to subjects that aren’t as close, and get a super crisp, sharp image.
Another aspect I am changing with this project is opening up the range to cover not just Delaware, but all of the Delmarva Peninsula. This will encourage me to get out and explore other places I didn’t back in 2019, and hopefully see some species of birds I didn’t see back then.
The end goal is to capture a minimum of 100 different species of birds. As of writing this, I’ve already started to work on that list and have a few shots in the editing funnel, but am still a long, long way from 100. Photos will be added to a collection in my online print shop as they are finished, and 20% of profits from sales in that collection will be donated to the American Bird Conservancy through the Photographer’s Promise Program.
I can’t wait to see what types of birds I’m able to capture and share with you all over the course of the project, and encourage you all to do the same wherever you are in the world.
If you’d like a few tips on capturing wildlife shots if you’re up to this challenge as well, check out this blog post on using all your senses to locate and photograph animals in the wild.
To view the images from the 2019 edition of this project, head over to the portfolio at this link.
Thanks for reading, and stay tuned to see the photos! See you out there,
Tyler
*Please note, photos in this post are not from 2023 and the birds shown are not applied to the overall goal of 100 birds.
**If you ever see a bird and are unsure of the species or just want to know more about what you’re looking at, use the Merlin App from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology (this is what I use most of the time) OR the Audubon app (good for tracking birds you’ve sighted over the course of the year.