Fieldcraft
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Soft landing

Red-breasted Nuthatch (Sitta canadensis), Hibbing, Minnesota, September 19, 2009, at 2:31 pm, by Gerry Sibell
Published: October 22, 2010
Red-breasted Nuthatch
Red-breasted Nuthatch (Sitta canadensis), by Gerry Sibell
Subscriber Gerry Sibell is a do-it-yourself guy. In 1978 he and his wife built their house in Hibbing, Minnesota, and planted trees to line the perimeter of their backyard. The trees now provide ample cover for many birds, which enjoy Sibell’s currant bushes, a large flower garden, a small pond, and feeders and birdhouses.

Having constructed an ideal environment to attract birds, Sibell devised an ideal setup to photograph them. First, he placed a photo blind a short distance from his suet feeder. Then he arranged six flashes: two in the trees, three spread out in front of the blind, and one near the suet feeder. Finally, inside the blind, he mounted his camera with remote trigger on a tripod and aimed it at a shady spot about 40 inches from the feeder.

Sibell waited. Six to eight hours later, the Red-breasted Nuthatch shown above swooped in. Sibell took about 200 photos, but this shot sure takes the suet cake!
Equipment used
Camera: Canon EOS 50D, with Phototrap remote trigger
Lens: Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L USM
Tripod: Bogen 3221
Blind: Ameristep Doghouse
Settings: ISO 250, 1/320, f/22, manual mode, evaluative metering, single-frame shooting, manual focus
Light: Shade with six Canon Speedlite 430EX II flashes
Format: RAW converted to JPG
Adjustments: File conversion with Breeze­Browser Pro. Hue saturation, sharpening, removal of dust spots, and half inch of canvas added to top of photo with Photoshop CS2.
Gerry Sibell
Meet the photographer
DIY PHOTOGRAPHER: Gerry Sibell loves to photo­graph birds in flight in his backyard. Both he and his wife are retired schoolteachers who enjoy wildlife and take frequent trips to Yellowstone National Park. Sibell’s side hobby is making motion- and heat-activated camera setups and placing them along trails. After leaving a camera out for several months, he says that he feels like a kid on Christmas Eve when he brings it in to find what photos he has.
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