First try at some songbirds. Need help on identifying them as well.

[jjparson]

Hey everyone. I finally got around to getting a feeder up and I got home from church today and there were a whole bunch of these little guys. I jumped at the chance to take a few pictures. I am looking for any help on how to focus on these little buggers. They were all over the place. They seem a bit soft to me, but I am not sure why. They were taken at 200 mm ~F5 @1/2500 sec. Also, does anyone know what kind of bird this is?

Thanks for looking.

 

[blitzkrieg69]

Looks as though it's a faded yellow finch.

 

[shmne]

Seeing your shutter speed flying by, I'd suggest dropping that into the 1/500 range and increasing your aperture slightly. This may make it tough if the birds are moving very quickly however with some luck I believe this may solve your soft focus problem.

I'm not a bird photographer, so I'm not sure if dropping your shutter speed that much will be more of a problem.

 

[Craig G]

That's a female American Goldfinch. The male is not too far by. The males will not feed with the females unless there is enough food for all. Look for the male, it has more brilliant color and some black on it's head. Just an FYI, you can walk up to them fairly closely with out spooking them.

 

[blitzkrieg69]

ok that makes sense now, i knew that finchs were bright yellow but its just the males.

 

[flyin-lowe]

Those birds will start to fade in color during the winter and get a brighter yellow in the summer. If you have trouble with sparrows running these guys a from the feeder you can fill it with thistle seed and the other birds will not use it near as much, the finches love it.
PS find a place that sells it buy the pound and it's about half the price as buying bags.