neilpa

That's what I figured. The dark mantle and primaries in the first pic, even in bright sun, got me hopeful it might go for a "pure" Western. We're in prime hybrid territory so I wasn't sure and Western would be considered rare. I may still update it on eBird and see what the reviewer says but want to get some more opinions here first.

Wondering if there's enough here to ID this gull I saw flyover outside of Seattle yesterday afternoon.

Couple other things worth considering that haven’t been mentioned so far Check with your local camera shops to see if you can rent the lens you’re interested in. Nothing beats testing it out in the field to be sure it’ll work for your style. The bigger zoom lenses have a large minimum focus distance. The 150-600mm lenses are about 8.5 feet. If you also do macro (flowers, bugs, etc) with your P&S while birding you’ll lose out on that ability. Although a phone camera can often fill this gap.

Love the composition and alignment of birds in that first pic

I still shoot my DSLR in auto (no flash) mode a lot. When I'm just walking around birding I'll leave it in auto since the light conditions vary so much. I don't want to think about it if I pull up my camera for a quick shot. Only if there's a cooperative bird that's close and in decent light do I switch over to manual and dial in the settings. The one trick for this working well is having a minimum shutter speed setup when you're in auto, at least 1/500. You can do this all the way down to the entry level Nikons and I assume the same is true for the Canon. Part of me wishes I woul

Thanks for the very detailed response @DLecy. Lots of good points that I need to consider. The first thing I need to do is nail down where I want to go. I've got a bunch of options on the table and looking at these tours keeps giving me more ideas. This is what started me down the rabbit hole. I stumbled on their Bhutan tour when searching west coast pelagics. Glad to hear they're recommended since this is one near the top of my list.

https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/347295331

Looks like he's sporting sunglasses and a white mustache. Kinda gives me motorcycle cop vibes 😆

Has anyone here ever done an all-inclusive birding tour? I've been scouting some vacations for next year and this is one of the options, but they're quite expensive. I'm curious how these compare to figuring out your own accommodations and hiring a local guide. Is the premium worth it? I'd guess for some of the more remote/less popular locations the answer is yes. I've found a few different companies that offer a wide range of destinations https://wingsbirds.com/ https://fieldguides.com/ https://www.rockjumperbirding.com/ Thanks!

You can figure out just how close (or far) here https://www.onezoom.org/life/@Pandion_haliaetus=509837

The story behind that 1200mm lens https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/find/newsLetter/Canon-EF-1200mm.jsp

Looks like that's just the bug it's eating.

588. Brandt's Cormorant

587. Black Oystercatcher