Midland | Change Is Hard

Wednesday I suddenly found myself with a few hours free in the afternoon. And we had sun with the rest of the week predicted to be cold and rainy. What should I do?

What would you do?

*On the road looking for interesting barns.*

I decided I should head out in search of a few photogenic barns. I wasn’t sure where I’d be going, but just going in search of barns felt great. I told myself it didn’t matter if I found any. I had a full tank of gas and nowhere I had to be.

*The barn’s kind of boring, but the tree is nice.*

But after a couple of hours I wasn’t thrilled with what I’d found. I seemed to be in familiar territory and hadn’t seen anything new. Then I turned one more corner and found this one. It was perfect.

*This was exactly the kind of barn I’d been looking for.*

Maybe I wasn’t going to find any more great barns, but it was still early, going on 3:30. I knew I wasn’t far from Overlook Park in Midland, where another photographer had seen pelicans this winter. I’d been there twice before, searching for the pelicans, but hadn’t seen anything more interesting than geese and ducks.

But she’d told me, just recently, that it was always dusk when she saw the pelicans. Would it be worth it to hang out there until the sun went down? I decided to go see.

*Can’t get too close, but it was fun to watch the ducks.*

Overlook Park, located in Midland, Michigan, is basically a parking lot perched on a hill looking out over the retention ponds of DOW Chemical. I’ve seen eagles and hawks and geese and ducks and deer there. But never pelicans.

*Most of the action was happening way over there.*

When I first arrived there was one other car parked there, somebody with binoculars scanning the ponds. I pulled in and immediately saw something big headed our way. It landed in a tree on the outer edges of the park, not so far from the parking lot. I thought maybe it was a juvenile eagle. But I was wrong.

*Do you see it in the top of the tree on the right?*

It’s a hawk, I think, though I’m no expert on differentiating between hawks. As soon as I got out of the car he (or she) spotted me and I knew right away it was going to take flight. I wasn’t wrong about that!

I tried to keep it in the frame, but that was just about impossible.

It flew off to my right, into the woods where it could have some privacy. I sighed and returned to my search of the water, looking for pelicans.

I wondered if the pelicans were way over on the other side of the pond, with the hundreds of geese and ducks over there. If they were, there wasn’t a chance I’d ever see them. Even as I considered what else I could shoot, hundreds of geese lifted up, at once, in groups of a dozen or two and flew overhead.

*I’m always fascinated by how nature just settles right in next to industry.*

The noise was amazing. I don’t know if they were headed to their night roosts, or just stirring up trouble because they could. After they moved on I hunkered down to wait some more. The sun was going down and it was getting colder.

*A steady parade of deer headed out to the end of a peninsula and settled down for the night.*

I wondered if I’d be lucky. I had no idea from which direction the pelicans would come or where they’d land. So much of the water was far away from where I waited. I reminded myself this wasn’t Disney World, the pelicans weren’t on the clock. There were no guarantees they’d show up at all.

Meanwhile I was entertained by some adorable diving ducks. You’d see them swimming…

…and then suddenly they’d disappear, leaving only a ring of ripples to show they had ever been there.

Then they’d pop back up again somewhere else. It was so fun to watch.

Still…I was there for pelicans. Would they come in as the sun went down or arrive under the cover of darkness? Would it be at the other end of the pond? Had they migrated on to somewhere warmer? Were they even still in the state?

Would they show up at all? How long should I wait?

How long would you wait?

After seeing several photographs of eagles and pelicans on Facebook I decided to head up to Midland and see this park for myself.

I could tell from many of the photos that this was not a conventional park filled with hiking trails and wide swaths of woods for wandering.

But I was still surprised to find that it consisted of a parking lot on top of a high hill overlooking ponds which are part of the Dow Chemical complex.

As I drove up the hill I could see an eagle sitting in a tree.

The light wasn’t good, a bank of clouds was encroaching on the sunshine I’d left at home, two hours to the south. Still, on occassion when I first arrived, the sun broke through the clouds.

And it was windy! Between trying to focus on the eagle who flew out over the water as soon as I arrived, and trying to keep my hair out of the frame, I almost missed the pelicans swimming very close to the edge of the pond, behind the chain link fence.

*It was hard shooting through the chain link fence.*

While I was trying to catch an image of them, shooting through the fence, I lost track of the eagle until I heard a whole lot of eagle type noises coming from the trees.

*Look closely, there are three juviniles here, all landing in a tree.*

Turns out there were three juviniles, all landing close together. I’m pretty sure one of them had a fish.

*This little diving duck was surprised when he came up right in front of the pelican!*

Pretty much the whole time I was there I was pointing the camera either at the water following the pelicans, or the sky trying to get a sharp image of the eagles.

*The light felt like it was evening, but it was 9:30 in the morning.*

I was facinated how these beautiful wild birds coexisted so well with industry.

*Such an unusual place to witness an eagle in flight.*

I was unsure if the eagles coexist with each other quite as well.

*Looks like the adult has something to say.*

Mostly the eagles soared round and round, higher and higher. I never saw any of them dive into the water, though when they were flying closer to the ponds the ducks seemed to scatter.

*The sky was interesting, but made shooting the birds so difficult.*

It was hard to keep track of the big birds, they were really very far away. Sometimes the only way I knew where they were was their noisy discussion amongst themselves.

*The light caught his head and the lead edge of his wing.*

When the sun slid out for a moment it was easier to find the adult, with his bright white head…

…and tail.

The whole time I was there, sitting in the car until an eagle took off from a tree, then popping out to try to get an image, I didn’t think I got anything worth looking at.

I was shooting pretty much into the light, what light there was. And the birds were so darn far away. These were all shot with my longest lens, and they are still cropped a whole lot. Hence the painterly looking images.

I think I’ll go back some day when the sun is shining brighter, and perhaps later in the day to get the sun behind me rather than shining in my eyes.

*The best part of the day was just sitting and watching them fly.*

I felt lucky today that they were so active. I didn’t get the perfect eagle (or pelican for that matter) shot, but I got to see them flying, so much more fun than watching them watch me while they sit still on a branch.

*Landing gear down, more pelicans arrive.*

None of these images are great, but I had fun, and I figured you’d have fun looking at them too.

If you’re a birder, this would be a fun place to visit with powerful binoculars. You can sit in the car and watch some amazing birds. Can’t beat it! (You might want to look at these pictures on something bigger than your phone!)

Change Is Hard

…but change is certain.

Tag Archives: Midland

Searching for a barn-ican

Whiting Overlook Park