BC Grasslands

A Marsh Wren Builds its Nest

    The grasslands are buzzing at this time of year and I am having a wonderful and challenging time photographing all the action with my new Canon 500mm IS lens. Two weeks ago I positioned myself at the side of a marsh in the Bechers Prairie grasslands, west of Williams Lake. I was trying to photograph an Eared Greebe, but my attention soon switched to a beautiful small Marsh Wren who was building its nest. It would carry reeds from the cattails to build the nest foundation and then gather the soft white fluff from the tops of the cattails to pad the inside of the nest. The nest is the shape of a football and they are extremely well camouflaged. Can you see it? They even build several so as to confuse their predators. These two images are to show the gathering of nest material and how difficult it is to find or even see these beautiful nests. In the Grassland Animals album you’ll see the ever-so-cheerful secretive and tiny Marsh Wren.

Join us in Learning

The Grasslands Awareness Project: This posting is to notify you of three powerful Slide-Sound presentations that are coming up shortly in the BC interior. The Grasslands Conservation Council of BC and I invite you to share images and stories from the Cariboo-Chilcotin Grasslands, the last large pristine inter-mountain grasslands in North America. To be notified of all future events including the unfolding of this project, visit my website and subscribe to the Chris Harris Newsletter.

Please join this exciting journey of discovery. The locations are:

Tuesday, May 10, 7:30 pm
Williams Lake City Council Chambers
Williams Lake, BC

Wednesday, May 18, 7:30pm
Clock Tower Alumni Theatre
Thompson Rivers University,
Kamloops, BC

Thursday, May 19, 7:30pm
Quaaout Resort & Conference Centre
Little Shuswap Lake Road West
Chase, BC

Evening Sunset

I had spent the day hiking and photographing in the open grasslands, and after making a few sunset images, I was heading back to my camper for supper. Thinking that my days work was over, I was unexpectedly surprised when the silhouetted branches in an aspen copse drew my attention to the still remaining colour in the sky. I quickly set up my tripod and grabbing my 14 mm lens, I made this image just before the richness of colour waned into the night. Once again, I felt satisfied with my days work and began taking down my tripod in order to head back to my camper. But wait…visit the landscape photo album to see what happened next!!