{"id":35758,"date":"2015-12-12T06:20:34","date_gmt":"2015-12-12T13:20:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.featheredphotography.com\/blog\/?p=35758"},"modified":"2015-12-12T07:05:09","modified_gmt":"2015-12-12T14:05:09","slug":"a-sora-actually-out-in-the-open","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/2015\/12\/12\/a-sora-actually-out-in-the-open\/","title":{"rendered":"A Sora Actually Out In The Open"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I thought this Sora was interesting for three reasons.<\/p>\n<p>But let me say from the get-go that\u00a0this image isn&#8217;t my best technically. The light was harsh, the image has been cropped significantly and the setting is full of clutter.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"35760\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/2015\/12\/12\/a-sora-actually-out-in-the-open\/sora-8619-ron-dudley\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/sora-8619-ron-dudley.jpg\" data-orig-size=\"900,643\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;6.3&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;Ron Dudley&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;Canon EOS 7D Mark II&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;1441637360&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;700&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;400&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0.0004&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;1&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"sora 8619 ron dudley\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/sora-8619-ron-dudley.jpg\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-35760\" src=\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/sora-8619-ron-dudley.jpg\" alt=\"sora 8619 ron dudley\" width=\"900\" height=\"643\" srcset=\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/sora-8619-ron-dudley.jpg 900w, https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/sora-8619-ron-dudley-300x214.jpg 300w, https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/sora-8619-ron-dudley-150x107.jpg 150w, https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/sora-8619-ron-dudley-400x286.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 900px) 100vw, 900px\" \/><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><em><strong>1\/2500, f\/6.3, ISO 400, Canon 7D Mark II,<\/strong> <strong>Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM + 1.4 tc, not baited, set up or called in<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">I found this\u00a0Sora mid-afternoon\u00a0three months ago on a small private\u00a0pond along a\u00a0gravel road\u00a0in Montana&#8217;s Centennial Valley.\u00a0The bird wasn&#8217;t particularly close but I took a bunch of shots of it anyway and I&#8217;m posting this one because:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"text-align: left;\">Soras have been a nemesis species for me for a good long time. Though they&#8217;re widely distributed and even\u00a0abundant in some areas they&#8217;re also very shy and secretive\u00a0and they&#8217;re much more often heard than seen. I occasionally get glances\u00a0of them through thick vegetation\u00a0but\u00a0this was one of the very few times I&#8217;ve found one completely out in the open.<\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: left;\">I believe this is the first time I&#8217;ve ever seen one swimming. Though a little research tells me that they &#8220;readily swim and dive&#8221; and &#8220;occasionally\u00a0feed in open water like a coot&#8221; (as this one is doing)\u00a0it&#8217;s a behavior that was new to this bird photographer.<\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: left;\">Soras feed primarily on the seeds of wetland plants and aquatic invertebrates so the big mouthful that this bird was taking in intrigued me enough to&#8230;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"35764\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/2015\/12\/12\/a-sora-actually-out-in-the-open\/sora-8619-big-crop-ron-dudley\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/sora-8619-big-crop-ron-dudley.jpg\" data-orig-size=\"900,643\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;6.3&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;Ron Dudley&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;Canon EOS 7D Mark II&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;1441637360&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;700&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;400&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0.0004&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;1&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"sora 8619 big crop ron dudley\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/sora-8619-big-crop-ron-dudley.jpg\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-35764\" src=\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/sora-8619-big-crop-ron-dudley.jpg\" alt=\"sora 8619 big crop ron dudley\" width=\"900\" height=\"643\" srcset=\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/sora-8619-big-crop-ron-dudley.jpg 900w, https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/sora-8619-big-crop-ron-dudley-300x214.jpg 300w, https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/sora-8619-big-crop-ron-dudley-150x107.jpg 150w, https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/sora-8619-big-crop-ron-dudley-400x286.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 900px) 100vw, 900px\" \/><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">crop tightly on the food item to see if I could tell for sure what it is. I can&#8217;t, but I strongly suspect it to be a tuber of some sort (though to my eye\u00a0some of those projections at the rear do somewhat\u00a0resemble the legs of a weird-looking aquatic invertebrate).<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">The &#8220;whinny call&#8221; of a Sora is one of the most distinctive calls of any marsh bird and since they&#8217;re much more often heard than seen I thought some of my readers\u00a0might be interested in hearing it. It&#8217;s my bet that some who have never\u00a0or seldom\u00a0seen the bird will instantly recognize the call, which can be heard <a href=\"https:\/\/www.allaboutbirds.org\/guide\/Sora\/sounds\" target=\"_blank\">here<\/a>\u00a0(be sure to scroll down to the &#8220;whinny call&#8221;).<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">Ron<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I thought this Sora was interesting for three reasons.<\/p>\n<p> <a class=\"continue-reading-link\" href=\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/2015\/12\/12\/a-sora-actually-out-in-the-open\/\"><span>Continue reading<\/span><i class=\"crycon-right-dir\"><\/i><\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":35760,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[334,392,2763],"tags":[555,136,709,220,2705,2704,1266,2762],"class_list":["post-35758","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-birds","category-feeding-bird-behaviors","category-soras","tag-centennial-valley","tag-feeding","tag-food","tag-montana-2","tag-porzana-carolina","tag-sora","tag-sounds","tag-whinny-call"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/sora-8619-ron-dudley.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1zzJh-9iK","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35758","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35758"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35758\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35760"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35758"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35758"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35758"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}