![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/belted-kingfisher-2456-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"belted-kingfisher-2456-ron-dudley\\"")
<\/p>\nYesterday morning I didn’t expect the male Belted Kingfisher to show up but he surprised me. Then operator error reared its ugly head.<\/p>\n
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1\/4000, f\/6.3, ISO 800, Canon 7D Mark II, Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM + EF 1.4 III Extender, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n Our current drought and incredibly high temperatures have reduced our mountain stream flows by so much I didn’t expect the kingfisher to make an appearance yesterday morning. This particular stream has been reduced to a wet dream of it’s former self. I was attempting to photograph other birds in a different spot when I heard him announce his arrival so I slowly drove my pickup forward and sure enough, there he was on one of the few fishing perches left with slightly deeper water below it.<\/p>\n With this clean background I quickly realized that I had an excellent opportunity for takeoff and diving shots so I waited tensely for what seemed like an eternity for him to dive on a fish. But when he eventually did dive I’d waited for so long I was a little late on the trigger so I instinctively jerked my lens to my left in a misguided attempt to keep him in frame and ruined the diving shots. Operator error strikes again.<\/p>\n On that dive he caught a small fish and landed on a nearby metal fence post to eat it but he gobbled it down so quickly I didn’t get those eating shots either. So my next goal was to get takeoff shots from the fence post, even though it was further away than his previous perch.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n 1\/5000, f\/6.3, ISO 800, Canon 7D Mark II, Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM + EF 1.4 III Extender, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n This time I succeeded.<\/p>\n In the past he’s used this fence post as a fishing perch, sometimes successfully, but with the drought the water was now too far away so in this shot he’s on his way back to his previous perch where he’d caught the small fish. I was excited because I thought I was going to get another chance at the diving shots I’d screwed up earlier. In bird photography do-overs don’t come along every day.<\/p>\n But before I could even get my lens back on the kingfisher a jogger with an unleashed, out of control dog (a Weimaraner I believe) came along. That darn dog splashed through the stream quite close to the kingfisher and chased him off. If you know anything about Weimaraners you know that they don’t do much of anything without rambunctious, unbridled enthusiasm.<\/p>\n If I’d have been the kingfisher I’d have vamoosed too. I wasn’t but I did anyway.<\/p>\n Ron<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Yesterday morning I didn’t expect the male Belted Kingfisher to show up but he surprised me. Then operator error reared its ugly head.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/belted-kingfisher-2502-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"belted-kingfisher-2502-ron-dudley\\"")
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