andy and peg: progress of the bird and monkey blinds...
so, i got the first blind done....all it's missing is some camo material to hang on the front and sides so that the birds can't see in...at some point, i'm hoping the birds (assuming they come to the perch, which you can see about 3 or 4 meters in front of the blind) will eventually feel comfortable with people in the blind and we can roll the camo cloth up most of the time. i'm working on filling in the terraces and the sloped areas between with gingers, heliconias, bananas, papaya trees and showy flowering plants.
here is the view of the perch from inside the blind....i did test shots and on a full frame camera, a 300mm lens will give you more than enough reach (and probably 200-250mm will make more sense) for larger birds like toucans, aracaris, currasows, etc, and shot at apertures from wide open up to f/11, the background was still nicely blurred. this means that on an APS-C camera, a 70-200mm f/2.8 will be perfect and on a M43 camera any zoom or prime that reaches 100 to 150mm will be sufficient. for small birds, like tanagers, etc....reach up to 500mm on a full frame would be appropriate. there is a "feeder" between the perch and the blind where i'm putting cut papayas and i'm also hanging bananas on the ends of the perch as well...i'll let you know if and when birds start coming regularly.
two terraces down, the monkey blind is on its way to being finished...it just needs walls....i'll have a nice perch just a few meters in front where i can hang bananas and i'll have a monkey ladder on each side of the perch going up into the trees on either side of the terraces so that they will have easy access. probably will need lenses with even less reach than will be needed from the bird blind since the perch will be a little closer and the monkeys are generally bigger (but not always) than the birds. preliminary tests showed plenty of bokeh on the background, even at f/7.1 and higher:
here are test shots from the bird blind, focused on the perch with the 300mm lens so that you can see the background blur (exif info on the screen shots):
here is a shot with a 500mm lens:
here are a couple shots from the monkey blind, focused to where the perch will be, with the 300mm lens (exif info is on the screen shots):
= new reply since forum marked as read
Your work is shaping up very nicely and it looks accessible and right where it should be.
I'm excited to be there!
Thanks for all the info and of course, for all the photos.
It reminds me of sitting down to a potter's wheel with a lump of clay... someone asks, "What are you making?" Response: "An ash tray."
Confused they ask, "really?" Response: "Sure. If it turns out to be something nicer, cool. Otherwise, it'll be an ash tray."
Looks like it will serve the intended purpose. 
