Wildlife photography takes patience, the right gear and weatherproof clothing. Add in a “good eye” for stunning shots and you’ve pretty much described Freelance Photographer, Chris Hendra. He was out shooting ducks (with his camera) and also snagged a sandpiper. First in the line-up is a Male Green-winged Teal, one shot in the water and the second one spreading his wings so we get a good look at the green and teal on them. We get these ducks for a short time during migration in the spring and early fall. Absolutely beautiful!

The Female Hooded Meganser is next and this one always makes me smile. It’s like she’s having a bad hair day or maybe she spikes her hair like that on purpose like the young folks do.

The iridescent head on that Male Bufflehead is stunning! Someone wondered how Chris got it to look straight at him for this photo. He replied that there are no tricks to that, it’s just the more time you spend, the luckier you get.

Last, but not least, Chris mentioned that he has been trying to get a decent photo of this Solitary Sandpiper for the past few weekends, but it was always a little too far from his photography blind. There wasn’t enough room to set up his small blind anywhere near where it was feeding, so he finally just sat in the mud and waited. His persistence paid off. He added that this bird migrates from Central and South America. Pretty amazing.
If you’d like to check out more of Chris’ photography, click here: Chris Hendra Photography

Yesterday in our video we had a bit of Spring peepers chirping. Debbie Jarve captured more of those peeper sounds over by the Swedetown ponds in today’s video. Make sure your volume is turned up!

So here is where to vote daily for Lake Superior:

Best Lake
Best Lake for Swimming
Best Lake for Water Sports.

You can vote and do a fun little "I'm not a robot" puzzle for free! Vote for the best lake in the U.S. once per day until polls close on Monday, June 5 at noon ET. No matter the outcome, we want to do our Big Lake proud.

These are fantastic pix! The video is nice too.


News story this morning; The Mark W Barker has run aground at

Belle Isle.

Amazing photos and the singing critters in the video
were all in harmony!!

Wow - thanks for the news Alex!! I know someone on the MWB - and she does wheel! Hope she wasn't at the helm when this happened!

WOWOWOWOWOW....what incredible photos. These are
some of the best I've seen....wowowooww!

I LOVE hearing the peepers...now it's truly Spring!

Thanks for the voting link Mary! We'll get it done!

Back to the birds - amazing pictures! You can see why they are called green winged teal! Mergansers look like they just got up and didn't comb their feathers. My favorite is the sandpiper shot!

Spectacular pictures! And how about those
peaceful sounds by the pond! So beautiful!

They did just show that ship stuck on Belle Isle. A
tug boat tugged it out. Those must be some dandy
lil' vessels..I know nothing~!!

I see lake Superior has dropped a place down
to #3.

My friend just came off the wheel at 7:30am. The power went out just as she got back to her room. Can't blame a woman driver!! Just the computer from China. Figures!

Voted this morning. Looks like Lady Superior is #3 in all categories right now.

I KNOW...we dropped a slot...come on and vote!

Today’s vote cast…Superior is still 3 out of 20.