Photos - Purplebear's Photography

Warblers Calendar

Our Warblers Calendar is our most recent calendar available for you. I know in our part of the world warblers are very popular amongst people who like birds. They are certainly some of our favorites. I think one reason has to be the variety of colors you see in these small birds. We’ve chosen a variety of Warblers that we’ve been fortunate to see in our part of the country while on our walks. Our Warblers calendar can be purchased as a wall calendar or a desk calendar.

Below is the Warblers Calendar in the wall calendar version from Zazzle. The Warblers Calendar below the wall calendar is the desk calendar version from Create Photo Calendars:

Warblers Wall Calendar

by Purplebearspics

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Eastern Bluebirds photo

This Eastern Bluebirds photo is one of our first ever Eastern Bluebird photos. These male and female Eastern Bluebirds are checking out a nesting box to raise this year’s family. We thought this photo was unique in the way the male Eastern Bluebird is checking out the nesting box. They also both went inside to check it out.

If you might like to have this photo, it is for sale at our Pictorem store.

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Painted Bunting photos

Here are a couple Painted Bunting photos that we have recently taken at a public garden in Southwest Philadelphia. These photos were taken in the second week of January of a bird a long way from home. Those of you who live in the southern part of our country have probably seen these songbirds quite often. The birds spend a good part of their non-breeding time in Central America. These unusually colorful birds migrate and breed in the Southeast and in the south-central United States. Male Painted Bunting birds are very easy to spot since their colors are blue, green, red and yellow. The female birds are just bright green in color.

Even though the birds are a long way from home in Philadelphia, this is the third consecutive year that one has been spotted at this location. We felt fortunate to have been able to take some photos of this Painted Bunting. We hadn’t visited this garden before, and it was our first time seeing one of those very colorful birds. Painted Buntings are medium-sized birds similar in size to finches. They’re a very colorful species in the Cardinal family, along with other Buntings, Grosbeaks and Tanagers.

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Leucistic American Robin photo

Here’s a Leucistic American Robin photo we took fairly recently. It’s possible you may have seen one of these birds, but it was a first for us at the time. I definitely am not a bird or genetics expert, but according to a variety of online sources, leucism describes defects in pigment cells caused during a bird’s development, which prevents pigments from reaching some or sometimes all of a bird’s feathers. The degree of leucism varies with a bird’s genetic makeup. The skin and eyes remain their normal pigment and color. You will see white splotches on its head or back.

We also have a photo of a Canadian goose that appears to be leucistic. We saw both of these at separate times while on our photo walks at a local wildlife refuge.

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Butterflies Wall Calendar

Here’s our newest Butterflies Wall Calendar. The calendar consists of photographs of different types of colorful butterflies. You’ll be able to enjoy seeing the Monarch, Swallowtail, Red Admiral, Eastern tailed-blue, Common Buckeye, Cabbage White and other beautiful butterflies all year in their natural settings. It is also available as a butterflies’ desk calendar. Either makes a great gift idea for the butterfly enthusiast or anyone who loves nature.

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American Bittern Photo

This American Bittern photo was taken at the John Heinz Wildlife Refuge. This is the first photo we’ve taken of an American Bittern and also the first we’ve ever seen. We learned to get a photo of this particular bird is not an easy thing to do. They could be standing right in front of you and you might not see them.

They are a species of wading bird in the heron family. They’re well camouflaged and blend in with their surroundings. As you can see from the photo, when you first see an American Bittern, what stands out immediately is its thick neck and long, pointed bill.

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Red-shouldered Hawk photo

This Red-shouldered hawk photo was taken at the John Heinz Wildlife Refuge located near the Philadelphia International airport. We often see many different birds of prey at this refuge. The Red-shouldered Hawk has great colors, especially when its wings are fully extended.

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Pollinators Calendar

This pollinators calendar is our most recent addition to our nature calendars collection at Purplebearspics our Zazzle store. The calendar is made up of photographs of bees, butterflies and hummingbirds.

Pollinators Calendar
by Purplebearspics

Most of these photographs are taken in our garden or on our walks in the John Heinz Wildlife Refuge. We have other products at our Zazzle store relating to pollinators, such as other calendars, garden flags, home decor, jigsaw puzzles, mouse pads, mugs, ornaments, photographs, postcards and other products.

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Belted Kingfisher photo

After many attempts, we finally have a half decent Belted Kingfisher photo. This Kingfisher was perched on an old concrete pier overlooking a marshy area of the wildlife refuge we visit often.

Belted Kingfishers, from what we have noticed, are one of the few birds where the female is more colorful than the male. We couldn’t get a good look at the front of this one to see if it was a male or female. Another thing we’ve noticed about these birds is that, for such a small bird, they have a pretty big wingspan. That kind of surprises you when they take off.

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Ruby-throated hummingbird feeding on Jewelweed photo

This ruby-throated hummingbird feeding on Jewelweed photo is one of our first hummingbird photos taken in the wild, not in our garden. This photo was taken at a local wildlife refuge and it seems that the Jewelweed is one of their favorite food sources in this area. There are plenty of flowers in the refuge but most if not all of our sitings are on the Jewelweed.

We have been taking pictures for years of the hummingbirds feeding on the potted plants on our deck and the flowers in our garden. If you are interested, you can see some of those pictures on our hummingbird blog Taking hummingbird pictures in the wild just adds a new challenge to our photography.

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