The year has barely started and already I am clocking up a bunch of ‘firsts’. One of this week’s highlights is a secretive little bird that I have never seen before other than in photographs. The spotless crake is much smaller than I expected , and indeed much smaller than it looks in these images. I am very thankful to the fellow photog who introduced me to this little bird.
So far this year has given me so many new opportunities. The terns and the black-billed gulls started me off, followed by some NZ dotterels and oystercatchers yet to be posted. I have so many images still to process from the first few days of January. Today’s impromptu shoot has only added to the backlog.
We only spent a short time with the spotless crake, not wanting to outstay our welcome with these shy little birds. We live in an area where there is a huge number of nature photographers and we all want to photograph each new bird we find. We have to be careful not to scare off the birds by intruding into their space too much. I would like to think that we will all protect these birds so they keep returning year after year.
You can find more information about the spotless crake here on the NZBirdsOnline site.