Winter's Simple Pleasures

Despite the aggrevation of snow and ice, especially the ice part, winter's bleak neutrals can produce incredibly beautiful backdrops for wintering birds.These Dark-eyed Juncos (also known as "slate-colored juncos") with their snowy white belly feathers puffed up for warmth, are one example of how all those elements come together to create breath-taking beauty. Quiet, simple, beauty.

The kind that requires being still to enjoy. The kind that makes winter magical.I recall thinking last year, I'll never get a good photo of a Dark-eyed Junco. They forage in groups and fly at the least provocation. But this winter has been different (and maybe I'm different, too.) Rather than being covered with an influx of finches, my feeder area is frequented by small, quiet, wintering flocks of juncos and white-throated sparrows, giving me the fun opportunity to observe different birds and their behavior at close range.
On several very cold, snow-covered days last week, I enjoyed these shy, ground-foraging birds, their beauty and softness lighting up the bare winter grays. If I stood very still, they seemed to forget I was there, landing nearby, kicking up snow, pausing to break open sunflower shells. Likewise, I forgot about the cold.

Winter's simple pleasures.

Linked to Bird Photography Weekly #73 at Birdfreak.com to promote the conservation of our world's birds.