My wife and I recently moved to Maryland, U.S.A., a long, long way from my native New Zealand. After settling into our new home I was surprised by the amount of wildlife in the backyard and started documenting it.
This gallery is simply me exploring techniques and recording our wild neighbours in my free time. There’s only one rule, all animals are filmed or photographed within a 100 meter radius of our backdoor.
Hairy Woodpecker
Leuconotopicus villosus
400mm
natural light
remote trigger
reflector
Fall Leaves
It’s autumn (fall) here in Maryland and leaves of every colour raining down outside the kitchen window. It’s an incredible spectacle and so unlike autumn in evergreen New Zealand.
24-70mm
extension tube
strobe
remote trigger
acyrilic
Eastern black swallowtail pupa
Papilio polyxenes asterius
Melinda found a fat caterpillar eating the parsley and brought it inside for a closer look. Before I could photograph it, it climbed into the curtains and begun to pupate. It’s now happily over wintering in our living room. With a bit of luck I’ll get to photograph it as it emerges in the spring.
24-70mm
extension tube
strobe
remote trigger
acyrilic
Eastern gray squirrel
Sciurus carolinensis
Adaptable and fast breeding, eastern gray squirrels are considered invasive in the many parts of the world that they’ve been introduced to (Britain, Ireland, Italy, South Africa, Australia and western North America.) In Britain and Ireland, they out-compete and displace native Red Squirrels.
Here in our backyard, they thrive, mostly by stealing from the bird feeder.
200mm
natural light
remote trigger
reflector