{"id":106097,"date":"2022-01-13T06:12:31","date_gmt":"2022-01-13T13:12:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.featheredphotography.com\/blog\/?p=106097"},"modified":"2022-01-13T06:49:56","modified_gmt":"2022-01-13T13:49:56","slug":"just-redheads-making-a-living","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/2022\/01\/13\/just-redheads-making-a-living\/","title":{"rendered":"Just Redheads Making A Living"},"content":{"rendered":"

Redheads of the duck kind of course.<\/p>\n

The first birds I photographed on a cold morning three days ago was a small group of unusually cooperative Redheads. I don’t often get such good opportunities with Redheads so I probably took more photos of them than I should have (500+). Below is a sampling of some of my favorites.<\/p>\n

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With their gleaming cinnamon head setting off a body marked in black and business gray I think drake Redheads are unusually handsome ducks. This guy was looking particularly dapper in the morning light, despite the cockeyed reflection of his head and bill that seemed to throw some confusion into the mix about what he actually looked like.<\/p>\n

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There were three Redheads close to the shore, and to me, and they were feeding on the pondweed in the shallow water. Here the two males were doing their best imitation of Frick and Frack as they stuck close to each other for a few moments in poses that were near mirror images of each other.<\/p>\n

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The lone female was a little more standoffish, with the two males and with me, but she was always hanging around nearby.<\/p>\n

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The two males put away an amazing amount of pondweed.<\/p>\n

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One of the males seemed to have some difficulty swallowing (possibly an incorrect interpretation on my part). Whenever he tried to swallow he would repeatedly point his bill upward and pump his neck up and down before the mouthful disappeared down his throat. I don’t recall this being a typical behavior of the species and the other male didn’t do it so I’m not sure what was really going on.<\/p>\n

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At least one of the ubiquitous coots was usually trailing immediately behind the male Redheads looking for leftovers. I never saw a coot challenge one of the larger ducks for its meal but they weren’t shy about making a nuisance of themselves. The Redheads seemed to take it all in stride.<\/p>\n

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One of my goals that morning was to catch a Redhead in a dive at the exact moment when its eye was just above the water’s surface.<\/p>\n

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I tried again and again but…<\/p>\n

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never succeeded with a photo that didn’t have something else wrong with it, such as a poor light angle. I think these three photos are interesting but I’d have preferred to get the eye just above the water.<\/p>\n

But the timing of these three photos, and others like them, suggests something to me about the predictability of the speed of my reflexes. Usually when I saw one of the ducks begin to dive the second photo in my burst, which all three of these photos are, caught the duck in almost exactly the same stage of the dive – with the eye just below the water’s surface.<\/p>\n

That suggests to me that the speed of the duck’s dive, and the speed of my reflexes, are both very nearly a constant. I guess it doesn’t surprise me but I thought it interesting to have it confirmed.<\/p>\n

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One of the males gave me a brief look at rhynchokinesis, the ability of many birds to flex or bend their upper bill. I had my lens on this guy as I was waiting for him to dive in another of my attempts to catch him with his eye just above the water. His bent bill almost makes it look like he was sneering at me and my feeble attempts.<\/p>\n

I wouldn’t be surprised.<\/p>\n

Ron<\/p>\n

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Notes: <\/em><\/p>\n