Cormorant Nesting Season at Lake Merritt

The double-crested cormorants have begun their nesting season at Lake Merritt in Oakland, California. The cormorants nest in several trees that are on small islands near the edge of the lake.

The male cormorants are busy finding nesting materials and trying to attract mates. Each time a male finds a good nest-building twig, the event is celebrated by a showy victory lap around the colony's nesting trees before presenting the twig to its mate, or potential mate.

During this season, breeding-age cormorants' of both sexes sport large, greyish plumes above their eyes. These plumes give them the "double-crested" part of their name, and also give them the appearance of being shaggy-eyebrowed old men. Obviously, different species have very different ideas about what is sexy.

Manzanar - National Historic Site

Manzanar Monument and Star Trails

One of my favorite roadtrips to take is a run down Interstate 395 along the Eastern Sierra. Mono Lake, Galen Rowell's Mountain Light Gallery in Bishop, Death Valley and the former Manzanar Internment Camp (now a National Historic Site administered by the National Park Service) are all requisite stops. As a Japanese-American whose father spent several years of his childhood in the Poston internment camp, the Manzanar site has special meaning to me. In the days before the Park Service took it over, sleeping overnight at Manzanar near the monument was a ritual for me that had personal meaning.

Dirt and Sun

Manzanar is, on the one hand, a melancholy and barren place, but it is also set in a beautiful location - at least if you are not forced to live there through the dust, the heat and the cold in a tar paper shack. Those nights spent photographing star trails and sleeping alone by the monument always made me feel close to my father. I will never fully understand what it was like for him growing up behind barbed wire in the desert, but my Manzanar ritual was at least a way of connecting to the past, and to family history.

Reconstructed Guard Tower

As a child, I visited Poston a few times with my father, and while there wasn't too much to see, there used to be much more than there is now. When I was about 11 years old, I visited Poston with my father one the last time. I was shocked to see that Poston was little more than an antique generator shed slowly rotting and rusting in the middle of endless farm land. My father said that it was perhaps for the best, but I still fought back tears at the sense of loss. All of that history seemed to have disappeared forever. The idea that nobody remembered the injustice and hardships that were suffered by thousands of people, including my family, was intolerable. No one knew. No one cared. It seemed to be one final injustice.

Child's Grave - Manzanar Graveyard

There is even less left of Poston today, although a historical marker has at least been placed to inform those who stop about the history of the area. All of this makes me appreciate the efforts of the National Park Service to preserve Manzanar. They have restored or rebuilt several of the buildings, and have created a top-notch interpretive center in one of them. The staff members at the interpretive center have an impressive knowledge about the history of the site, and they do a great job of answering questions asked by visitors.

Manzanar Interpretive Center

The fact that at least one of the Japanese-American internment camps is being preserved is meaningful to people whose family members were stripped of their rights; who lost their homes, posessions and businesses; and who experienced this dark period of American history from inside of a barbed-wire enclosure. Their lives and their struggles have not been forgotten.

If you are interested in visiting or learning more about Manzanar, you can visit the official National Park Service site: http://www.nps.gov/manz/

The Versatile 500mm Lens

I knew that a 500mm lens would be great for photographing birds and other wildlife, but after owning one for only a couple of weeks, I've been surprised just how many new types of photographs I've been making. Part of this comes from often carrying just the one big lens, and being forced to see everything its way. Part of it is the incredible image quality the lens delivers, and part is the lovely quality of the out of focus portions of the image or "bokeh."

To my surprise, I've found that this big, heavy lens, which cannot focus closer than about 14 feet without extension tubes, is excellent for shooting flowers and foliage. The narrow depth of field is wonderful for isolating subjects, and by pointing the lens at a cluster of flowers and turning the focusing ring, an assortment of possible photographs appear as different elements move in and out of focus. I've also become fond of shooting through foreground foliage with this lens to create a beautiful, soft surrounding for small subjects.


Working with just one extreme focal length is limiting in some ways, but it can have its advantages. Last week while I was photographing birds, I saw the beginnings of a beautiful sunset behind me. If I had another lens with me, I would have probably made a less original image than I did. Since this lens takes in about 4 degrees or less of the surroundings, the best possibility that I saw was to silhouette a small portion of a distant tree against the colorful sky. I didn't think too much about this image at the time, since I was trying to keep an eye on the activity of the birds, but when reviewing the night's images, I found that this image really jumped out at me.


While I sometimes carry a second lens with me, such as a 24-105mm zoom, I have realized that even the one long lens offers me plenty of options, as long as I keep my eyes for compositions that take in a very narrow viewing angle. I can't say that I would ever want to use one focal length exclusively, but I have come to enjoy the challenge, and do not fret when I leave the house with only the one lens. I miss some shots that I would like to make, but I also make other images that I wouldn't have otherwise.


As a side note, I've found that a big wildlife lens, camera and tripod carried "half-nelson" over your shoulders is quite a conversation starter on the trail. After hiking past a couple, I overheard the woman say, "I thought he had bagpipes!" Only an hour earlier, a woman walking toward me stopped and said, "Oh! I thought you were carrying a dog!" I see all this as another perk. I meet a lot of people, it amuses passersby, and in turn, they keep me amused.

Peregrine Falcon at Nest

The peregrine falcons I photographed in 2005 are nesting again on Mount Diablo. While I couldn't see into the nest, the fact that the falcons took turns watching the nest and hunting indicates that there is probably a clutch of eggs to protect and keep warm.

Peregrine falcons, which can exceed 200 miles per hour in a dive, are a thrill to watch, but are very difficult to photograph in flight. The highlight of the day was watching one of the falcons chase away a red-tailed hawk that got too close to the nest. Though much larger, the poor red-tail had no chance, and could only try to take evasive maneuvers as the falcon used its speed to repeatedly make diving passes and zoom back up for another.

Some of the photos from 2005 can be seen on my website: www.tadashifinephoto.com

Technical notes: Canon 20D with Canon 500mm f/4 lens. Wimberly sidekick gimbal head. ISO 200. Full-frame image.