Tag Archives: Terry Sohl

New – Bird Quizzes

Posted on February 15, 2013 by Terry| Leave a comment
Bird Quizzes

Check out the new bird quizzes, testing your knowledge of bird identification, geographic range, or scientific names.

It’s been a very long time since I’ve updated some of the content on my main website. One feature I have had on my site are bird identification quizzes, which hadn’t been updated in about 6 years.  I took the old quizzes down and have been putting up brand new, improved quizzes.

Bird Quizzes – South Dakota Birds and Birding

I’m up to 10 different quizzes and will continually be adding more, including several more in the next few days.  Each quiz is 20 questions, multiple choice, with 6 possible answers for you to choose from.  Unlike the previous quizzes, which were all photo quizzes, I have three different quiz categories:

1 – Photo identification – 20 bird photographs that you have to identify, under varying degrees of difficulty.

2 – Range maps – 20 maps showing the geographic and seasonal range for species.  With just the range map and one text clue, you need to guess the depicted species.

3 – Scientific names – For the real hardcore bird nut, these are 20 questions, where you’re provided the scientific name and one clue, and you must guess the species.

As I said, I’ll be adding more quizzes shortly.  If you have any quiz ideas you’d like to see, either a category for an existing photo, range map, or scientific name quiz, or even a completely new type of quiz, drop me a line and I’ll see if I can get a new custom quiz created.

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A New Lifer, from the comfort of my sunroom – Hoary Redpoll

Posted on January 12, 2013 by Terry| 1 Comment
Hoary vs. Common Redpoll

Both a Hoary and a Common Redpoll at my feeders. Note the Hoary (upper left) is paler overall, has an even stubbier little bill than the Common Redpoll, and lacks the stripes/barring that the Common Redpoll has on its sides and underparts.

In a little over a week, I’ve now had three new “yard” birds.  10 days ago, I had Common Redpolls and a Sharp-shinned Hawk for the first time. Today, my son and I were downstairs, came up and looked out the sunroom window, and there were several Redpolls at the feeders again.  However this time…one was obviously “different”…so much so, my son said “what’s the white one”?  It was obviously paler than the other Redpolls, and didn’t have the barring on the sides and underparts. 

A Hoary Redpoll!  A dang rare bird in the lower 48 states, and here it was sitting at my feeders!  It’s not often you can sit in your sunroom on a bitterly cold winter’s day and pick up a new “life” bird, not just a new “yard” bird. 

WONDERFUL surprise today.  I’m hoping he sticks around.  He was around the feeders almost continuously for an hour and a half today.

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2013 Big Year Underway! Kind of…

Posted on January 2, 2013 by Terry| Leave a comment
Snowy Owl

A nice start to a "Photo Big Year", getting a Snowy Owl on January 1st! Click for a larger view.

I’ve never been a “lister”.  I’ve never been one of those birders whose obsession is their life list, their state list, their yard list, etc.  If you tell me a bird species, I can tell you whether I’ve seen it before, if I’ve photographed it, and where.  But I have no idea what my species “count” is, either for sight or photographs.

For background…in 2012, I did much less birding than I’ve done since I started birding in 2000.  Part of it was time and other issues, but a lot too is that it’s hard to get motivated to go out and take photos of the same species that I already have 100 photos of.  I did miss getting out in 2012 though, so have vowed 2013 would be different.  For motivation?  I am now starting a ‘Big Year’!! 

 For many outside the birding community, the term “Big Year” may likely bring to mind the recent movie with Steve Martin, Jack Black, and Owen Wilson, where 3 obsessed birders try to set the record for most North American bird species seen in one year.  That’s the general idea for me too, but modified significantly!  First of all, I’m calling it a “(Not so) Big Year”.  I’m not going nuts.  I’m not going to travel to all corners of the country, or even in South Dakota.  Secondly, it’s a “Photo” big year.  I simply plan to get out and see how many different bird species I can photograph in South Dakota in 2013, without turning it into an obsessive quest, ala what was seen in The Big Year movie.

I already can see it’s going to be fun!  Instead of watching college football all day on New Year’s, I instead went birding on the grasslands in the central part of the state.  While I normally would ignore most species that I already have plenty of photographs for, I found myself actually CHASING some common birds to try to get a 2013 photo.  Last year, I don’t think I would have thought twice about the scads of Ring-necked Pheasants, Horned Larks, or Lapland Longspurs I came across, but yesterday, it was fun trying to get a documented 2013 photo for even the “common” species.

A good start to the year!  The highlight was coming across a Snowy Owl towards the end of the day, definitely a nice one to get a photo of for a “Photo big year”.  I also managed photos of a Townsend’s Solitaire, a pretty uncommon site around here, and most of the  “winter” raptors that are found in the central part of the state at this time of year.  We’ll see where it takes me, and how many different species I can photograph this year!  Here’s the page where I’ll keep things updated…

The 2013 (Not So) Big (Photo) Year

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Free 2013 Bird Calendar

Posted on November 21, 2012 by Terry| Leave a comment

2013 Bird CalendarAs I do every year, I have made a free, downloadable and printable bird calendar for the coming year.  Each month has a different bird photo, all taken from within the state of South Dakota.  You can download each month individually and print them for your own personal use.  Each is a PDF file that should be set up to print at standard letter size.

Click below to take you to the calendar page.  Have a nice Thanksgiving!!

http://sdakotabirds.com/calendar_main.htm

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Drawing – Spruce Grouse

Posted on November 10, 2012 by Terry| 1 Comment
Spruce Grouse - Drawing by Terry Sohl

Click for a larger view

This is one I started drawing on the evening of the election.  Always a good thing to do to take my mind off things, although I admit I wasn’t very successful doing it that night.  I did get started that night, but especially once it was obvious how well things were going in the election, I backed off the drawing and sat glued to the TV.

I ended up spending a number of evenings this week on this.  It’s always so much easier to do a bird without intricate plumage patterns.  The colors may not be brilliant for a Spruce Grouse, but the feather pattern is awfully complex.  I spent more time on this one than any other drawing I’ve done.  As per usual for me…I end up happy with the bird itself, and then never know what to do to finish it off.  I initially thought of putting this guy on the  bough of a spruce tree and doing a very detailed background and habitat, but I just don’t have the energy to put in the same detail in the background as I do in the bird.

I’ve seen these a few times before, in far northern Minnesota, northern Michigan, and in Maine, but have never gotten a photo.

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Late night drawing – Roseate Spoonbill

Posted on October 20, 2012 by Terry| 1 Comment
Roseate Spoonbill - Drawing by Terry Sohl

Click for a larger view

I started drawing this evening, and just kept going until I got done.  This is a Roseate Spoonbill.  In the United States, you can only find them down by the Gulf Coast.  Weird looking birds, with gorgeous plumage, but very odd colors on the head, and then the unique spoon-shaped bill.

Usually it takes me 2 – 3 hours to do a drawing, but normally I’m drawing something that’s roughly 8″ x 10″.  I decided to use my larger paper for this guy.  It’s a large bird!  And it didn’t seem like I could do it justice on 8×10. It took a lot longer to finish than I thought.

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Drawing – Piping Plover

Posted on October 14, 2012 by Terry| Leave a comment
Piping Plover - Drawing by Terry Sohl

Click for a larger view

It’s been a few weeks since I’ve drawn anything, so I set some time aside this afternoon to draw.  I guess this is a “nemesis” bird for me, one I haven’t seen, even though they’re found in South Dakota.  However, Piping Plovers are considered endangered in many states, and are listed as “threatened” in the U.S. as a whole.  Piping Plovers nest in sandy areas, and in the interior of the U.S., such as in South Dakota, they typically nest on sand bars in rivers.

The only place you can (reliably) see them in South Dakota is along the Missouri River and major tributaries, where large sandbars are available for nesting.  It’s a minimum of a 2 1/2 hour drive to get to the Missouri from where we live, and I just haven’t taken the time yet to do a trip devoted to finding these guys.  Given that I also haven’t seen a Least Tern before, another threatened species found in similar habitat, it’s about time I do so!  Maybe next summer.

But in the meantime, a drawing.  Can’t say as I’ve tried to draw sand before!  Took some experimenting before coming up with something that at least could be interpreted as sand, if you squint your eyes and use your imagination. ;-)

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Drawing – Green-breasted Mango

Posted on September 18, 2012 by Terry| 1 Comment
Green-breasted Mango by Terry Sohl

Click for a larger view

Getting back to reality tomorrow, going back to work after being at home the last couple of days with shingles.  Still hurts, but getting better, and 2 days of sick leave is 2 days more than I think I used over the last year or two.  Time to get back in the swing of things again.

So, to get my butt off the couch and get used to moving around again (it HURTS when I move!!), I got up and drew tonight.  This is a male “Green-breasted Mango”, a really beautiful tropical hummingbird.  They’re just visitors to the U.S., as their normal range is in Mexico and Central America. Curiously though, there have been some sightings FAR from their normal range, including one up in Wisconsin!  So, while my chances of ever actually seeing one “live” are poor…I keep an eye out on my hummingbird feeder, just in case.  ;-)
But until that happens, drawing one is about as close as I’ll get to this species.

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Drawing – Boreal Owl

Posted on September 15, 2012 by Terry| 2 Comments
Boreal Owl - Drawing by Terry Sohl

Click for a larger view

What fun!! Shingles!! Had a bit of a burning in my ribs earlier this week, and one night it turned into a full-blown fire from my back to my chest. Woke up the next morning to find a lovely rash on my chest, and ever since have been fighting some invisible guy who keeps wacking me in the ribs with a sword dipped in lava. Good times!

So, trying to get my mind occupied today, and drew this, a Boreal Owl. These are little owls of the northern forests (or forests of the mountain west). I’ve never seen one, as they are only very rare visitors to Dakota. Beautiful little birds though, and I do enjoy drawing owls.
I spent much more time with this one. Think I need to learn to just slow down and spend more time on all of them I draw. Just sometimes I get antsy and want to finish in one evening!!

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Drawing – Snail Kite

Posted on September 8, 2012 by Terry| 1 Comment
Drawing of a Snail Kite by Terry Sohl

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Another drawing.  This is a bird I’m definitely not going to see up here in South Dakota, as they’re a specialty of the tropics.  They do make it as far north as Florida, however.

Not all bird species are well-named, but Snail Kites definitely are.  They feed very heavily on snails, with their very long, hooked beaks specialized for extracting large snails like Apple Snails from their shells.
Snail Kite, with snail!

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