![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/black-necked-stilt-2608b-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"black-necked-stilt-2608b-ron-dudley\\"")
<\/p>\nPink stilts at that.<\/p>\n
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1\/2000, f\/6.3, ISO 400, Canon 7D, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS USM + 1.4 tc, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n These are older photos of a Black-necked Stilt at Bear River MBR. ‘She’ was foraging for food in fairly deep water when she took a short break to stretch her right leg. The behavior seemed kind of out of context, even impulsive, for what she’d been doing previously so it makes me think of myself at 3:47 AM this morning when I got a killer charley horse in the back of my right leg.<\/p>\n I stopped what I was doing (sleeping soundly), jumped out of bed and stretched my right leg at weird angles until an eternity or two later the cramp went away, with me cussing a blue streak for the duration. Anyway, that’s where my mind goes when I look at these photos this morning. Sorry for going off track.<\/p>\n Black-necked Stilts have the second-longest legs in proportion to their bodies of any bird (only a flamingo’s are longer) so it gets your attention when they do something unusual with them like this leg-stretch.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n 1\/2000, f\/6.3, ISO 400, Canon 7D, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS USM + 1.4 tc, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n She dipped her body downward and raised the leg even further but she never did straighten it out completely so maybe she was stretching her hip more than her leg. Either way, these are poses I’ve only captured this one time in this species.<\/p>\n So, why haven’t I posted these older photos before? If I know my blog followers I suspect some of you have already spotted the reason – there’s no catch light in the stilt’s eye in either photo. That drives me more than a little nuts but in the end I decided the unusual poses, along with their reflections, outweigh that glaring deficiency. But just barely.<\/p>\n Ron<\/p>\n <\/p>\n PS – For those of my readers who remember falconer and long-time follower of Feathered Photography Laura Culley, late last night she commented on yesterday’s post<\/a><\/span><\/span>. In her comment she included an explanation of her serious health challenges that have prevented her from commenting here for some time. I thought some of you would appreciate knowing how Laura is doing.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Pink stilts at that. (2 photos)<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/black-necked-stilt-2611-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"black-necked-stilt-2611-ron-dudley\\"")
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