Great Blue Heron - Nest Building

It's been a few months since I've posted anything here, but lately I have gathered some new material so finally I have some images to share.  I recently treated myself to a new camera, and the images in this post were gathered while trying it out for the first time at a couple of my favorite venues for bird photography.  

Male heron handing a twig to the female
1/3200 @f10, iso 3200, 700mm

The camera is a Canon 1Dx and I so far am very pleased with it. I was shooting a Canon 1D Mark 4 prior to this and now that camera will serve as a very capable backup.  The 1Dx is absolutely the fastest, most responsive camera I have ever held in my hands.  The speed and accuracy of focus acquisition is simply amazing, even compared to the Mark 4.  I am confident that this camera will serve me well on my coming trip to Kenya.  

 

1DX_0687 Male heron gatering sticks
1/320 @f7.1, iso 800, 700mm

 

 

Last week I tried out the camera at Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge, and Viera Wetlands, about 30 miles further south. There was not much bird activity at Merritt Island the first day but a trip down the road to Viera proved to be very productive. There were several pairs of great blue herons building nests, and as you have probably already realized, they are the subject of this post.                            

 

1Dx_0669  Male flying back to the nest
1/640 @f7.1, iso800, 700mm 

 

 

 I had observed great blue herons nest building on prior occasions, and discovered that their behavior is very predicatable. The male repeatedly flies to and from the nest, gathering twigs and handing them off to the female. The female then places each twig exactly where she wants it in the nest. This process repeats itself over and over so it is not too difficult to get in a good position to photograph it.

 

1Dx_0733 Male heron flying back to the nest
1/5000 @f10, iso 1600, 700mm

 

About every 5 minutes or so, the male would leave the nest and fly off to find aother twig.   It would only take about a minute for him to find one and then fly back to the nest. 

 

1Dx_0672  Male heron landing in the nest
1/1250 @f7.1, iso 800, 700mm

 

1Dx_ 0680   Male heron preparing to hand the twig to the female
1/1250 @f7.1, iso 800, 700mm

 

Typically in just a few minutes, the male is flying away again to gather more nesting material. 

 

1Dx_0725  Male heron headed out to find nesting material
1/4000 @f10, iso 1600, 700mm

 

 



Photographing Alligators (or not)

During my various travels photographing birds, I have for the most part ignored alligators when I've seen them.  This is mainly because they are about as plentiful as mosquitoes here in Florida and I feel that if you've seen one, you've pretty much seen them all.  Up until a few years ago, we had a few gators in the pond that borders our back yard, so I hardly get excited when I see one. 

On many occasions where I've been visiting a wildlife sanctuary to photograph birds, invariably someone approaches me when they notice one of my rather large white lenses, to tell me they see an alligator that I should go photograph.  This always puts me in the rather awkward position of figuring out a polite way to tell them that I couldn't care less about photographing an alligator.  But keeping that thought to myself, I always thank them and tell them that perhaps I'll check it out when I'm finished with what I'm working on now.  I'm guessing that most of these folks are probably northern visitors.  I guess if I were in Maine and saw a whale, I'd get excited too.

Every now and then while photographing birds, I have also photographed the occasional alligator.  When I've done so, I did it with the thought that if I ever decided to take a closer look at gators I would have a few images to work with.  But unlike birds, gators all look the same to me with the exception of differences in size.  What sometimes sets them apart are different surroundings and/or colorful reflections in the water from trees or other foliage on the bank of the pond.

This past week at Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge, I saw many gators, but two in particular that were close together that finally caught my interest.  They were facing opposite directions and the soft early morning light made them interesting, so I decided to snap a few shots.  One was a little larger than the other (probably about 8 or 9 feet in length) and was facing to the left,while the smaller one was facing the right.


#N_112154  - Shot settings: 1/1250 @f6/3, iso 400 at 500mm, hand held

When I later took a closer look at these images on the computer, I liked what I saw so I figured it was finally time to post a few gator photos.  These first two images show the same gator.  The image below is a close up cropped from the one above.
[click on any image for a larger view]


#N_112154c (cropped from the photo above)

The soft light and a bit of fill flash reveal some detail in the head shot, and that's what I liked about this particular image. 

The next image is the smaller gator that was facing the right.  If you are thinking this is just your typical average boring alligator photo, I pretty much agree.  This is why I seldom bother to even take pictures of them.


#N_112142 (1/1000 @ f6.3, iso 400, at 500mm.)

Although gators all look about the same to me, sometimes different surroundings make the shot more interesting than the gator itself.  I particularly like colorful reflections, as shown in the next few images. 

Thinking back, I knew I had some images with reflections from the Everglades National Park, so I dug them out to add them to this post.  The same gator is pictured in both images below; the first a little further away and the second as it approached me a little closer.



#N_80810 (1/500 @f5.6, iso 400 at 420mm)



#N_80811 (1/500 @ f5.6, iso 400 at 420mm) 


This last image may be my favorite of the few I have shot over the last few years.  I like the open  mouth, and the way we can see the roof of the gator's mouth in the reflection in the water.

#N_63432 (1/200 @ f5.6, iso 800 at 400mm)