Female Belted Kingfisher
Seventeen days. That's what it took for me to get these shots!
For over two weeks I'd been stalking this bird every single day ... under difficult conditions ... one of which has been particularly excrucriating. In that time, I'd gotten lots of images but hadn't uploaded any because they were taken from a distance and the quality was terrible ... you know, like those you see taken by a paparazzi of some celebrity or other from about a half mile away. :-) I even shot her on at least four separate occasions with fish that she caught ... again, taken from a distance and so not uploaded. Persistance finally paid off, though and I managed to get some shots I'm extremely happy with. These are just two of them.
By the way, I was curious to see how many times I've pushed the shutter on my Nikon D300, so I checked this particular shot. There have been quite a few more since, but this one was the 105,004 th. That's since December, 2008, so I suppose that's not too bad ... averages out to almost 77 shots per day. :-) This shot, though, considering the time and difficulty involved in getting it, is perhaps my favourite of the whole bunch ... or, if not, then it's definitely in the top five of those shots.
You'll perhaps notice that sexual dimorphism is reversed with these Kingfishers ... the female is more colorful than the male rather than the other way around.
Please check out the second shot, too, if you have time.
Female Belted Kingfisher
Seventeen days. That's what it took for me to get these shots!
For over two weeks I'd been stalking this bird every single day ... under difficult conditions ... one of which has been particularly excrucriating. In that time, I'd gotten lots of images but hadn't uploaded any because they were taken from a distance and the quality was terrible ... you know, like those you see taken by a paparazzi of some celebrity or other from about a half mile away. :-) I even shot her on at least four separate occasions with fish that she caught ... again, taken from a distance and so not uploaded. Persistance finally paid off, though and I managed to get some shots I'm extremely happy with. These are just two of them.
By the way, I was curious to see how many times I've pushed the shutter on my Nikon D300, so I checked this particular shot. There have been quite a few more since, but this one was the 105,004 th. That's since December, 2008, so I suppose that's not too bad ... averages out to almost 77 shots per day. :-) This shot, though, considering the time and difficulty involved in getting it, is perhaps my favourite of the whole bunch ... or, if not, then it's definitely in the top five of those shots.
You'll perhaps notice that sexual dimorphism is reversed with these Kingfishers ... the female is more colorful than the male rather than the other way around.
Please check out the second shot, too, if you have time.