With plenty of species on the North Olympic Peninsula to observe, the key is to find where they are located and then to stay still long enough to catch them on camera, said wildlife photographer Kerry Tremain.

“It is a hunt,” Tremain says. “Unfortunately, I have scared a lot of birds.”

Tremain has been photographing birds, mostly in the wilds around Port Townsend, for the past year and a half.

Tremain’s photographs, generally shot in the early hours of the day, will be on display at 7 p.m. June 26 during the Art Salon presented by Northwind Arts Center and Port Townsend School of the Arts at 701 Water St. in Port Townsend.

“Kerry brings a passion and dedication to his bird photography, so evident from the early mornings and hours he spends in nature, waiting and watching for those special moments,” said Michael D’Alessandro, Northwind Arts Center executive director.

During the salon, Tremain will discuss his experiences photographing birds, as well as announcing and inviting participation by artists and naturalists in a new project entitled, “The League of Extraordinary Observers.”

“The stories of how Kerry gets the remarkable images he gets are as interesting as the images themselves,” said Julie Christine, PTSA program manager.

Portions of the photo display were taken on trips – to Kauai in February, the Vancouver, British Columbia area in April, and Grays Harbor to photograph the shorebird migration in early May. These pictures will be included in a new book, “Birds x Two,” to be released later thisyear.

This follows Tremain’s 2018 book, “Year of the Birds,” which featured photographs and insights from his first year as a bird photographer.

He is also currently showing selected works at Sunrise Coffee in the Boat Haven.

In Kauai, Tremain enlisted a naturalist who had spent 25 years collecting bird songs in the area. Together, they went on rugged roads to the high-elevation Alakai Wilderness, where at least five nearly extinct species survive.

He also spent time at the Kilauea National Wildlife Refuge, a headland that is a huge nesting site for Red-footed Boobies and Laysan Albatross, and frequented by many other pelagic birds.

In British Columbia, Tremain photographed eagles hovering over a Great Blue Heron rookery near the ferry dock; a juvenile Sandhill Crane at the George C. Reifel Migratory Bird Sanctuary; and a pair of Ospreys mating at Pitt Lake, in the countryside near Vancouver, among numerous water and other birds.

Tremain’s Grays Harbor spring excursion included highlights of photographing a flock of Marbled Godwits at sunset, and discovering a pair of Red-necked Phalaropes in a lagoon near Ocean Shores.

A passion for birding

Tremain moved from Berkeley, California to Port Townsend in 2015. It was the large presence of birds during much of the year that inspired Tremain to get out his camera and begin documenting them, he said.

“Around here we are so blessed because we are surrounded by these wild and wildish places where you can do that. I can go ten minutes from here and have a good place to sit and oftentimes birds will show up.”

About 90% of Tremain’s photos are shot within 50 miles of Port Townsend, he said.

“I have been photographing birds for a little over a year and a half and really focusing on that. So now, after hanging out with my fellow bird nuts, I’ve started to get much more of a sense of seasonality, what to look for and even where particular birds are going to hang out.”

Sharing space and time with the birds in their natural habitat is the best part of the photography process, Tremain said.

“That is the cake and ice cream. That is the dessert.”

The summer is when birding tends to slow down, Tremain said.

“In the late spring a lot of the water birds go inland to breed, even shore birds are not there. If you go out to the Chinese Gardens right now, they are vacant. That is not true a good part of the year.”

During spring and autumn, many birds pass through the area on their regular migratory routes, Tremain said.

“Birds migrating north or south will often stop either on the Whidbey side or the Port Townsend side of the strait because that is the narrower part. This year we had a lot of warblers.”

Although Tremain is familiar with the species of birds that frequent certain locations, he said he is often surprised by the presence of rare birds.

“It always feels like a gift to me. That does require a certain amount of stillness and paying attention.”

Tremain said he enjoys the primordial connection birds offer to our ancient past.

“Birds are way older than us. They are literally dinosaurs, which is a cool thing to me. That is part of the wildness of it. You are seeing back in time through these creatures. They are very much not like us, which I really like. I cannot possibly understand their experience. I can only observe it.”