birdpix Loc: South East Pennsylvania

I spent most of the morning and into the early afternoon at Montezuma National wildlife Refuge in upstate NY last Friday. The area has been extremely dry and the weather was quite hot. AS I have mentioned in previous posts, these shots were the result of a great deal of watching and waiting based on an understanding of how the birds behave. The Caspian Terns were in a flock and occasionally an adult bird would leave and return with a fish to feed his or her young. I needed to wait for that to happen. I needed to be ready to shoot but the birds themselves were a great alarm system setting up quite a ruckus when a parent would appear in the distance with food in its beak! The Great Blue Heron was just a matter of waiting for it to catch a fish. It was just a matter of finding one that was actively feeding. All were shot with the Canon 7d Mk II and the Canon 500 mm lens at ISO 800, f/8 and 1/1500 to 1/2000. The Grebe and Heron were shot from the car with a beanbag on the window sill. The Terns were shot with the camera mounted on a tripod. The camera is set to back button focus, AI-Servo AF, Continuous high speed shooting, AF case 2, center point expansion, manual exposure.

Enjoy!

Juvenile Pied-billed Grebe

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Caspian Tern feeding his/her young

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Caspian Tern

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Caspian Tern

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Caspian Tern

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Caspian Tern

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Great Blue Heron with Catfish

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Nikonian72 Loc: Chico CA

I could never make it as a parent bird! Life would be too demanding.

auntmary Loc: Olathe Kansas

Nicely done! Worth the wait!

Swamp-Cork Loc: Lanexa, Virginia

Your skills and patience are very apparent in these beautiful images! Excellent!!

flyguy Loc: Las Cruces, New Mexico

I think you have some really fantastic images in this series and it was certainly worth your time and patience to get them. Thanks for sharing --- they are very inspirational.

CathyAnn Loc: Apache Junction, AZ

Excellent pics! Waiting to get these was sure worth it.

BamaTexan Loc: Deep in the heart of Texas

Beautiful captures!