This male curlew was an ardent suitor indeed.
1/3200, f/7.1, ISO 640, Canon 7D Mark II, Canon EF 500mm f/4L IS II USM + 1.4 tc, not baited, set up or called in
I photographed this pair of Long-billed Curlews yesterday morning on Antelope Island. The darker, smaller male invested considerable time and effort in getting the female “in the mood” but with only limited success. He spent about six minutes performing various breeding behaviors while the female mostly watched and seemed to bask in all the attention. Both his patience and his enthusiasm seemed limitless but the female seemed mostly interested in how skillfully he performed his rituals. It all culminated in this attempt at mounting her.
As is often the case there was considerable luck involved with this image. I happened to catch both birds in profile, there’s excellent separation between them, both birds are sharp, the positions of the male’s wings and feet are interesting and help to tell the story and the intentions of the male are fairly obvious.
I’m only presenting this single image this morning because I took over 1100 images yesterday, most of them of curlews, and my review and image culling process is still far from complete. Sometime soon I’ll be posting images of the fascinating courtship displays of this pair of curlews and there’s likely to be a lot of them.
But I thought I’d post this image today as a teaser.
Ron
this image literally took my breath away! thank you
I’m glad you liked it, Gillian. I kind of like it myself… Thank you.
Reading the comments she was teasing him, and now you are returning the favour. With yet another stunning shot.
One good tease deserves another, EC…
1100 shots, I find that daunting. That has been a difficult part of using my new camera, coming home and going through all the photos to find the best. Like the camera I have to do it in bursts my buffer fills quickly. I am looking forward to the rest of the curlew series.
April, I find image culling to be the most painful part of bird photography. I took another 1250 images just this morning and I dread culling them. Heck, I’m not caught up on yesterday’s images.
Your camera will write to your memory card significantly more quickly if you’re using a fast card. The speed of the card I’m using now is 160 MB/sec and I believe they have even faster cards now. Whenever I use one of my older, slower cards it really slows my camera down.
Yeah, teasing us again with another spectacular shot! LOL! I love watching males in their courting behavior. As is so often the case, human males could take a few lessons from their avian counterparts, despite that our stuck-to-the-ground gravitational issues remain problematic. 🙂
“human males could take a few lessons from their avian counterparts”
No doubt that’s true, Laura.
No pun intended, of course.
Of course…
Brautiful shot Ron. I am interested to know if you primarily shoot birds using a tripod with gimbal head or if you also handhold your 500m at times? Thanks.
Judy, I have a Gitzo tripod with Wimberly (gimbal) head but I don’t use it very often. Roughly 95% of my images are taken from my pickup.
OK! Be thar way! This is definitely a “teaser”, but a very interesting one, anyway….great, crisp detail…especially like the male’s wings and look of determination…and hers of seeming indifference…
She was hard for the male to figure out, Patty. Occasionally she would flash him a display (fanned tail, etc) that was apparently meant to encourage him and then she wouldn’t cooperate.
Cool! The Curlew’s are fascinating to me and we don’t see them any more so the behavioral shots (or any shots) are welcome. 🙂
More behaviors to come soon, Judy.
It’s qa sensational image Ron! Thanks for sharing!
Charlotte
Thanks, Charlotte.
Hormone Rush! Interesting beginning!
Great shot Ron.
Thank you, Dick.