Photography Location: Bodie Island, North Carolina
by Chris Nicholson

Best wildlife photo opportunities are birds, especially during the spring and fall migration seasons. Species include rails, various songbirds, Pine and Prairie Warblers, hawks, owls, snow geese, Glossy Ibis, herons, egrets, ducks and swans. Can be photographed from island marshes, beaches and the nature trail next to lighthouse.

Other wildlife includes yellow-bellied sliders, fox, deer and rabbits.

The Bodie Island Lighthouse is a 156-foot popular tourist destination. The grounds are open to the public, and the public will be there in droves at midday. If you want people in your images, then be there any time you want; if you don't, then the best times to shoot are morning and late afternoon/early evening. Sunlight will hit the sea side of the lighthouse in morning, and will hit the front of the grounds before sunset. Be aware, however, that a grove of pines will block the light before the sun sets. Lots of room to work.

Both sides of the island have beach-front, the east side with surf. There's very little land access to the west side (try at the lighthouse, but I didn't check to see if the road was publicly accessible). Two piers on the east side (Outer Banks Fishing Pier and Jeanettes Pier) can provide foreground subjects for sunrise photos.

Other than that, there's honestly not much else of interest. Sunrises and sunsets with silhouetted reeds, etc.

Weather will be hot, often unbearably, in summer. Winter can get cool, but it will rarely snow. Autumn and spring are the most comfortable, and provide the best wildlife photo opportunities. Hurricanes can fall between midsummer and early autumn.