More Shorebirds and a Damselfly at Morris Arboretum

Semi-palmated Plover, Solitary Sandpiper, Least Sandpiper. Field Sketch by Ken Januski.

I checked out Morris Arboretum for shorebirds again today and found a new one: Semi-palmated Plover. It is not a rare bird but it is one that I've never seen at Morris before. Hopefully this influx of shorebirds will continue. The Semi-palmated Sandpiper was missing today but Solitary, Spotted and Least Sandpipers remained.

It may be hard to believe that the sketch above, on Stillman and Birn Delta sketchbook paper, is a field sketch like the others I've shown recently. Why does this one seem so more developed? There are a number of reasons. One, I planned it that way, assuming that the shorebirds would cooperate and two, and far more important, I was sitting down supporting my drawing pad on my knees.

Normally, even when I'm using a scope, I draw with my right hand, while standing and holding a small sketchbook in my left hand. This results in a very unstable drawing surface. My hand is not as solid as my knee, firmly planted on the ground.

Today I staked out what looked like a good area for viewing shorebirds, lowered my tripod to about 2 feet tall and put up a small, portable 3-legged stool to sit on. All and all it's a vast improvement over my usual method. But it only works if I'm pretty sure that birds will appear and stay in the location in front of my stool and scope. If we were talking about warblers it would be silly to set up the stool and scope since there's no way in the world that warblers would stay in the same place.

In any case it was a great pleasure to be sitting, drawing against a sturdy surface and having the birds be somewhat cooperative. Everything here is something I saw. I didn't finish off the legs on the Semi-palmated Plover or the flight feathers and scapulars on the Solitary Sandpiper because I never got a chance to focus on them.

Also these birds were never all together like this. I started with the Semi-palmated Plover then added the Solitary Sandpiper when the Plover left. The Least Sandpiper was a last minute addition when one appeared in front of me.

Working like this it's easy to get the birds out of scale in relation to one another since I never saw them all together. But I think the scale is pretty accurate nonetheless, with the possible exception of the Least Sandpiper being just a wee bit big. Many bird artists do developed field sketches like this. For me it's a very rare treat to be able to do so.



Female Eastern Forktail Damselfly. Photo by Ken Januski.

Both I and Jerene were at one point totally flummoxed by shorebirds, especially since we saw so few in Philadelphia where we live. But over time, especially with trips to the Cape May area we've gotten more familiar. But it's back to square one with damselflies and to a lesser extent dragonflies. Today I saw my first damselfly at Morris.

I took the photo above thinking that I'd be able to identify the damselfly. But no such luck on a first perusal of my two guidebooks. So it's time to start studying damselflies again, just as we did with shorebirds, starting 5-10 years ago. Either way it's a great pleasure to be seeing them again.

(A few hours later after a thorough perusal of Dennis Paulson's Dragonflies and Damselflies of the East and I'm pretty certain of the id: a female Eastern Forktail. The violet cast  to the damselfly is due to pruinosity.

We saw our first dragonfly of the year last weekend doing the PA Migratory Count at Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education. But we were birding, and talking, and all we noticed was a large, blue/green dragonfly. A wildly speculative guess says Eastern Pondhawk but it was there and gone and we'll never know for sure.

Dragonfly Distractions

Dragonfly Swarm at Dusk. Charcoal by Ken Januski.

We went to a meeting of the Delaware Valley Ornithological Club last week to hear a talk on Is There Life After Birding? We knew the answer since we spend a lot of our time outside looking at things other than birds. Nonetheless it was interesting to see the speaker as well as a number of the audience indicate similar interests.

A few days later we were birding Houston Meadows and I had to recall the talk. We were seeing not only interesting birds and dragonflies, but also butterflies and wasps. I believe it was that same night, almost at dark, when Jerene saw huge dragonflies swarming about our backyard. That's what is illustrated at top. Between the dark and the mosquitoes we didn't stay out long. I'd just told someone how rare dragonflies were in our backyard then this to disprove what I'd just said!

I still haven't identified these large dragonflies. Based strictly on shape I might guess Common Green Darner. But there is the oddity of the night flight. I don't think they're known as a night flyer. Is it a crepuscular species, one that flies mainly at dusk? We saw a couple more last night but couldn't stay out. Tonight or tomorrow we'll try to be better prepared and see if we can identify them, assuming that they're still here. 

Female Blue Dasher. Watercolor Sketch by Ken Januski

The day after the night flight we were of  course keeping our eyes open for large dragonflies. We saw none but we did see this small beauty. I was able to get within a few inches to photograph it ( I've learned with dragonflies to shoot a picture first then try to sketch because they rarely sit still). Of course this one sat there for at least 15 minutes, then returned that same evening. What a beauty it was and obviously one we'd never seen before. Or so I thought. As I neared the end of Dragonflies and Damselflies of the East I finally found it, a female Blue Dasher. The shape of the abdomen should have given me a clue. It's a distinctive shape as far as I can tell. But the colors were all wrong. As with birds the males and females of the same species sometimes differ greatly in appearance.

As I read about it I read that it is called a Dasher because of its quick movements. So what explains the fact that it sat in one place for at least 15 minutes? Does the dashing refer to quickness of movement not frequency of movment? Only more study will tell.

In any case this seems to have been the week of dragonflies. Every day it seems we've seen new ones or seen old ones anew. It's amazing to me how exciting this can be. And then of course there is the thrill of trying to portray them in art. The watercolor above is just a quick study in the wonderful Stillman and Birn Gamma sketchbook. As usual I'm amazed at how well I can draw, and erase, in these books. The paper is a bit thin for a finished watercolor, at least if you keep working on it as I do, but it's perfect for studies. As I've said before I think they are a great addition to the artist's toolkit. With my recent printmaking I've not used them. But it was nice to pull them out for all the sketches on this page. I'm sure you'll eventually seem some prints featuring dragonflies.

Piping Plover. Watercolor Sketch by Ken Januski.

I'm very happy with my recent Sapsucker print and I think that a large reason for that is the underlying sketch. I think it does really capture some of the poses of Sapsuckers. With that in mind I've looked through all of my photos recently, trying to find one where I might do a charcoal or pencil sketch that really captures the sense of a bird and its movements. That was my attempt here with the Piping Plover. I don't think it's successful enough to form the basis for a new print. But I thought it worth showing just as an indication of where my prints might be going............

And finally a belated birthday to one of the greatest draftsmen ever, Rembrandt van Rijn. Thanks to Google for pointing out that yesterday was his 407th birthday. I recently read a book on Ukiyo-e prints that suggested that Rembrandt and Hokusai were probably the two best draftsmen in all history. I suspect that the author is correct.

First Dragonfly of 2013

Common Whitetail Dragonfly. Pen and watercolor by Ken Januski.

Well, first identified dragonfly I should say. We saw one very briefly about two weeks ago, but only long enough to see that it was a dragonfly. We couldn't begin to make a guess as to its identification.

This one presented a similar but different problem. We could see it, in fact long enough to look in binoculars and take some photos. It only flew when I moved to try to get a different angle for a photo.

On first glance neither I nor Jerene found it to be familiar. All the spots on the lower side of abdomen made us think it was one we'd never seen before, perhaps a particularly early flyer. But when I got home and looked at the photos I didn't really notice the pattern. Instead I noticed the thick, short abdomen.

I imagine this is similar to books on birding that show birds of a similar color along with birds of similar species taxonomically. Often two birds will have a similar shape and they in fact are similar in terms of species, unlike birds of similar colors which may have little relation to one another.

When I saw the abdomen I thought immediately of one of the few species I'm somewhat familiar with, about 10 species I might add. Common Whitetail. But where was the white tail? Some guides showed that the female or immature whitetail can have markings on the abdomen similar to this and don't in fact have a white tail. However they all showed strong markings on the wings, much like the adult male.

These had no markings. So back to flipping through the guide books, all without success. Finally I read about the species in Dennis Paulson's Dragonflies and Damselflies of the East. There I read that newly emerged dragonflies often lack wing markings! For me that more or less seals it. But there was one more thing. The photos showed a laterally striped head  of ochre and brown. Sure enough that's what the photo in the Paulson book shows.

So I decided it might make a good subject for my last new work before my Stillman and Birn sketchbook demo on Saturday. I've only done one work in the Epsilon sketchbook, which is specially designed for ink work. This is ballpoint pen with watercolor wash on a 7x10 page. As usual the pen worked fine. My excessive washes always buckle the paper a bit. But it will eventually dry flat. As I said I don't normally work in ink and watercolor. But I think the Epsilon sketchbook might work very well for those times when you want a detailed pen drawing with just a hint of color.

For anyone who is interested in seeing the demo this Saturday there is also a discount on both Stillman and Birn sketchbooks and Caran d'Ache Neocolor II watersoluble crayons. See the notice on Stillman and Birn Facebook page.