Favorite Bird Photography Venues?

[Bill Dix]

I haven't seen anyone ask about, or offer, their top five or ten photography venues. It may be that folks are reluctant to disclose their favorite spots. But I would be curious to hear from anyone who chooses to play, and to start things off here is a list of my top five, with ten more below that. It's tough to choose them, or to rank them. I'm defining "favorite" as the places where I feel I'm most likely to come home with the greatest number of keepers of a number of species on any given day. In some cases I've only visited a place once but was so taken by it that I put it on the list and hope to return. To keep things simple for me, I have limited my list to places in North America. Others will have different parts of the world, I'm sure. If I had added Costa Rica, or Iceland, or Botswana, it would have been impossible to make a selection. Anyway, here are my top five, with ten more approximately ranked, below those. I hope others will chime in; I would love to here where you go. Perhaps there is a better forum to post this. If the mods think there is a better forum for this, please move it.



Bunche Beach, Fort Myers, Florida
Nickerson Beach Park, Nassau County, New York
Magee Marsh Wildlife Area, Oak Harbor, Ohio
The Rookery, High Island Sanctuary, Texas
Cape May Point State Park, New Jersey




Fort DeSoto State Park, St. Petersburg, Florida
Merritt Island NWR, Florida
Barnegat Lighthouse State Park, Long Beach Island, New Jersey
Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge (Gateway National Recreation Area), Queens, New York
Sandy Hook (Gateway National Recreation Area), New Jersey
Brigantine Unit, Forsythe NWR, Galloway Twp., New Jersey
Sandy Point State Reservation, Plum Island, Massachusetts
Moss Landing, Monterey Bay, California (incl. Moss Landing State Wildlife Area, Elkhorn Slough Reserve, Moss Landing Beach)
Ocean City Rookery, New Jersey
Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge, Assateague Island, Virginia.

[Daniel Cadieux]

Hmm, that's a toughie as I am not well traveled like some of you, therefore my "repertoire", if you will, is mostly local. Having said this, my number one favorite venue to photograph birds is Fort Desoto, hands down.

1. Fort Desoto, Florida
2. Algonquin Park, Ontario
3. Ottawa's few river beaches, if the water is low enough, during August-October for shorebirds.
4. My parents cottage, just north of Ottawa, on the Quebec side.
5. Petrie Island, Ottawa, Ontario

Hopefully I will be able to add more distance and diversity in my chosen venues in the future, but for now this is it!