I glimpsed this beautiful Northern Flicker while walking in the forest in the New York Botanical Gardens basking in the sun on an exposed limb. He kindly remained there while I was able to get this shot.
The picture of these Fiery Skippers was taken with the CANON EOS20D and the CANON 100 macro lens and the CANON MR-14EX Marcro Ring Lite.
I watched these Skippers chase eachother for around twenty minutes taking lots of pictures of their courtship.
If you have ever wondered as I have about the small feathers around the eye of a bird, here is an explanation that I gleaned from a really good description of bird feathers from Wikipedia – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feather
Bristles are stiff, tapering feathers with a large rachis (main shaft of a feather) but few barbs (branches from main shaft). Rictal bristles are bristles found around the eyes and bill. They may serve a similar purpose to eyelashes in mammals. It has been suggested that they may aid insectivorous birds in prey capture or that it may have sensory functions.
Skippers (family Hesperidae) make up roughly one third of all the butterfly species in North America. Sometimes regarded as distinct from true butterflies, they differ in having the club of the antenna bent, with a narrow extension (apiculus) in most species and in details of the wing veins. Most skippers have stout bodies, wide heads, and relatively small wings, and many of them are very fast flyers.
