Snowy Owl and Black-backed Woodpecker

I haven't been home quite a week yet since my trip to Vietnam and Laos. I'm still messed up from the jet lag (wide awake at 3am most days), but this hasn't stopped me from taking advantage of the great winter conditions in central Ontario! I met up with Len Sylvester a couple days ago to shoot Snowy Owls in the Barrie area. This turned out to be a great afternoon and I ended up bagging a bucket-list shot of an adult male (all white) Snowy Owl against a pure white background of snow. [note, the bird was lured in with food]
If you want to get some incredible photos of these owls, join Len for one of his Snowy Owl workshops: http://www.ttlphoto.com/snowy-owl-photography-workshops-ontario/

Snowy Owl. Canon 1D mk IV, Sigma 300/2.8 lens. 

After visiting my girlfriend yesterday for Valentines Day, I headed north to Algonquin Provincial Park to photograph birds today. Boreal Chickadees are regularly visiting a suet feeder on the Spruce Bog Trail, so I parked myself there for about 5 hours this afternoon. I was ecstatic when a Black-backed Woodpecker landed in a nearby tree and spent about 10 minutes working its way along the trunk 'scaling' the bark in search of insects. I managed to get a few clean shots, my first decent photos of this species. Thank the camera gods for image stabilization, because I was trembling with excitement..... this is a bird I've wanted to photograph for a long time! Two bucket list bird photos in one week makes me a happy photographer!

Black-backed Woodpecker. Canon 1D mk IV, Canon 500/4 IS & 1.4x extender.