The Feathered Brush

Painting and Birding 'round the Long Island Sound

Welcome to my blog! I am a landscape and bird painter residing in southwestern Connecticut. My "day job" is as a museum "preparator", that is I put together exhibits at a museum. Squeezing out time during the remainder of my waking hours to paint, bird, or combine the two (not to mention spending time with my family!) can be quite an adventure, which I hope to chronicle here. My museum experience will be another subject for my musings, as I am fortunate to have inherited a vast store of collective experience as a diorama artist at the American Museum of Natural History. Please come back and feel free to comment!

Laruphilia*

by Sean Murtha on 4/6/2012 6:56:49 PMComment on this

(*Laruphilia-Love of Gulls) Many people appreciate birds; even non-birders will gasp at a particularly colorful or unusual bird. But they will hardly notice a common bird such as a "seagull"; they may even dismiss a gull as vermin with feathers. Even some birders will shrug them off as too common to be interesting. But take a closer look- as ordinary as they may seem, gulls are remarkably diverse, and display more intelligence and personality than many household pets. They go through a complicated series of moults depending on age and season, and there are several rare species that present challenging ID puzzles. [...]

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