This is a developing love story project. When I joined the Carolina Nature Photographers Association some 15 years ago, I quickly discovered there was a subset of nature photographers devoted to bird pics. Basically that is all they took. Little ones, big ones, white ones...... well you get the picture. And they talked their own language. The subject just held no interest for color deficient me (red-brown). Couldn't see the little guys or didn't have the lens if I did. Then I found Huntington State Park and coastal birds: egrets, herons, ibises; birds i could see, birds that posed, birds you could easily catch eating. So we started taking bird pics and found technically that it was a challenge. That caught my attention. Not a devoted bird photographer, but do search out what I consider coastal.
TROLLING
A group of Ibis and one Great White Egret searching for food! These four marched in lockstep down a hundred or so feet of tidal creek picking 2-3" fish deftly out of the flow.
FLIGHT
After taking hundreds and hundreds of birds standing in the tidal mud flats of Huntinton State Park I wanted action. After taking hundreds and hundreds of birds in flight, I finally got one that was neither a pimple in the sky nor a feathered blur.
CLEANING
CONCENTRATION
Standing on an embankment watching a spoonbill wade through tidal mud, when fellow photographers shouted "he's going to land". Glanced up an saw this spoonbill in final crash mode. When shooting birds and handholding, I shoot in continuous mode. Raised camera and as soon as it was pointing in the direcion of the spoonbill, pressed the shutter. This was a shot taken before eye and eyepiece met. Luck, yes, but thanks to sports photography, reflexes took over.
GOTCHA
This fellow was so intent on getting the pin feather out that he permitted me to scoot up close to get detail and blurry background. One of about 20 shots; others did not capture the struggle as well.
TWO WEEKS
The rookery at the Alligator Farm in St Augustine Fl in June is filled with nests of newly hatched fleglings. The photo gods however do not make it too easy for photographers. This was taken with camera held blindly overhead.
MY ROOST
NO LOVE
The fourth day of shooting at Huntington State Park changed my bird shooting forever. For the first three days I shot static birds, so still they could have been mounted. The fourth day caught the tide going out and feeding time or otherwise known as 'action jackson' time. Now unless the light on a standing bird is irresistable, I generally pass on the shot. This is my best shot from that days shoot.
OH MY!
On my first visit to the Alligator Farm/Rookery in St. Augustine Fl, when I walked into the rookery area, at the far end was this tree, and I said words similar to 'oh my'. Took hundreds of shots but this is a favorite.
TWO WEEKS
No matter which way I looked at the Alligator Farm rookery, I saw nesting chicks. The photo gods liked me this day. To a point that is. Did not find a single nest that had a clear shot. Always a stick here, or there, or ........ Or the nest was just high enough that no shot was possible. This shot was taken with my camera held overhead, on continuous sequence shooting, Next year I'll have a ladder with me and a longer lens.
WHERE'S THE BEEF?
