A Day at the Beach

Today was one of those stunning winter days that Wellington is so good at. Next to no wind and a perfect day to photograph kingfishers diving for their dinner. On arrival at the beach I found more photographers than kingfishers!  Someone forgot to send the memo to the birds and we all sat and waited for the kingfishers that chose not to play the game.

One by one the other photographers left and as each one left a kingfisher would arrive and perch in the trees.  I was packing the car to leave myself when they started diving which left me with a problem.  If I went back I would have scared them off and they might not have returned, if I shot from where I could get to, I would have the sun in the wrong place and the images might not work. I chose the latter but gave up pretty quickly because it just wasn’t working.

Before the kingfishers had me second guessing myself, I was sitting watching a seagull doing exactly what I was hoping to capture with the kingfishers.  It was diving in the shallow water for crabs and with great success.  Unlike the kingfishers, the gull would down the entire crab, legs and all.  So it would dive, catch, swallow in quick succession and then dive again.

I will go back to the kingfishers at the next opportunity I have as I am yet to get the image I want with the new camera – I have to learn how to capture them all over again  and I know that the more I practice the better I get, so practice I will!

 

 

 

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