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Limpkin (Aramus guarauna) - Ritch Grissom Memorial Wetlands (a.k.a. Viera Wetlands), Melbourne, Florida
These guys are supposedly rare, but not at Viera or the Orlando Wetalnds, where they seem to have no trouble gorging themselves on Apple Snails¹.
Guess I'm just lucky to be in a Limpkin "sweet spot".
¹ Apple Snails are one of the Limpkin's favorite foods.
One of the reasons for that (and perhaps the reason for it) is the Limpkin's off-set beak (crossed-bill if you like). The offset allows limpkins to poke their upper mandible past the snails protective plate into the opening, and then when they clamp down on the snail with their lower mandible that causes the upper mandible to scrape along the inside of the snail shell thus dislodging the snail from it's shell (much in the same way that White-winged and Red Crossbills extract pine seeds from pine cones.
Notes:
A word about this capture and processing techniques.
I wanted a short DOF to separate the Limpkin from its surroundings as much as possible, so I captured this image at F4 (wide open for the "three"). However, since I wanted both the head and wing to be in sharp focus, I took 2 pics¹ with one focused on the head and the other on the wing. I then cloned the IF wing into the head shot to have both (head & wing) in focus in the final processed image.
¹ In this case, since I was using center spot AF and the wing was going to be under the center spot for the ideal composition, so I put the center spot on the Limpkin's head, locked in the focus in "One Shot" mode, recomposed the frame so the center spot was on the wing, and then pressed the shutter button the other half of the way down. Making the second capture was then simply a matter of fully releasing the shutter button and pressing it all the way down to AF on the wing and make the second capture before the bird had a chance to move.
Easy-peazy!
Or as Ansel Adams would say (to paraphrase his approach to B&W film photography), "Know your objective, know your gear, know your processing, before you open the shutter!!!
Yeah, yeah that was a long time ago that we "opened" shutters, but when it comes to artistic photography some things are absolute!
1983 Ford Cortina 1.6 Crusader.
Supplied by Hartford Motors of Grimsby (Ford).
Last MoT test expired in October 2011.
lol kyum... OOPS kyun
i really like agustin's new hair. it was perfect for kyun's makeova. first hair retexture too. i fail XD MEW GIVE ME YOUR SKILLS PLEASE.
Here am I in the Texas Rangers gift store at Ranger Stadium, 10 gallon hat and all trying to make sense of being a pretty decent part time girl / Woman and having enormous fun whilst doing it too I might add!