{"id":40999,"date":"2016-07-25T05:34:29","date_gmt":"2016-07-25T11:34:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.featheredphotography.com\/blog\/?p=40999"},"modified":"2016-07-25T05:57:47","modified_gmt":"2016-07-25T11:57:47","slug":"belted-kingfisher-revisited","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/2016\/07\/25\/belted-kingfisher-revisited\/","title":{"rendered":"Belted Kingfisher Revisited"},"content":{"rendered":"

Belted Kingfishers have always been one my most difficult avian subjects because they’re so very difficult to approach. But last February I spent several\u00a0afternoons with this adult female at a local pond\u00a0and she was actually cooperative at times.<\/p>\n

I’ve posted images of this bird in the past but these three are new to my blog.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"belted<\/p>\n

1\/2500, f\/6.3, ISO 500, Canon 7D Mark II,<\/em> Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM + 1.4 tc,\u00a0not baited, set up or called in<\/strong><\/p>\n

Here she’s scanning the pond below her for fish. I’m not fond of the vertical shadow on her body but for me it’s not an image-killer because her face and bill are well-lit and\u00a0I was close enough to get good detail. When she was watching for fish her concentration on the pond was about as intense as it can get.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"belted<\/p>\n

1\/3200, f\/6.3, ISO 500, Canon 7D Mark II,<\/em> Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM + 1.4 tc,\u00a0not baited, set up or called in<\/strong><\/p>\n

While I was with her it was always one of my goals to catch her at takeoff as she dove on a fish but when I was close to her she was always too quick for me. I came close a few times but something always went wrong (usually clipped body parts). So I tried it from further away and got this shot where she’s small in the frame but I do like her flight posture. This time she missed the fish but…<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"belted<\/p>\n

1\/1600, f\/7.1, ISO 500, Canon 7D Mark II,<\/em> Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM + 1.4 tc,\u00a0not baited, set up or called in<\/strong><\/p>\n

she was successful several times while I was with her. Here she’s caught an invasive weather loach. The wet spot on the perch is where she was slamming it against the branch to stun it before she gobbled it down.<\/p>\n

In the months\u00a0since these photos were taken I’ve found this bird at the same pond several times but now that the leaves are out she’s always been mostly\u00a0hidden so I’m glad I had this time with her when I did.<\/p>\n

Ron<\/p>\n

Note:\u00a0As of last night the\u00a0Antelope Island wildfire was 80% contained but 14,560 acres of the 28,000+ acre island have been burned. For now only the north part of the island is open to the public<\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Belted Kingfishers have always been one my most difficult avian subjects because they’re so very difficult to approach.<\/p>\n

Continue reading<\/span><\/i><\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":41007,"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":[2853,334,392],"tags":[3023,38,2329,1868,137,146,2330,2738],"class_list":["post-40999","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-belted-kingfishers","category-birds","category-feeding-bird-behaviors","tag-adult-female","tag-avocet-eating-a-fish","tag-belted-kingfisher","tag-discarded-fishing-line","tag-female","tag-flight","tag-megaceryle-alcyon","tag-takeoff"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/belted-kingfisher-2775-ron-dudley.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1zzJh-aFh","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40999","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=40999"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40999\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41007"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40999"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40999"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40999"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}