(Limited) Results from 2nd bird outing

[FlyingSquirrel]

Braved the rain today to see what I could capture in the wetland (I have a raincover for my camera). The birds at this location are not as accustomed to humans as the ones where I had my first bird shoot at, nor is there a railing to brace against, so it was much more challenging. As if that and the rain weren't enough, the light was terrible, to boot. This time I kept the rig attached to my tripod, with the ballhead loose during shooting.

Since nobody was around most of the time, I thought I'd hop off the boardwalk and trudge through the reeds (where there was no water) to sneak up on some wildlife. No such luck, lol. When that failed, I took the standard path on the boardwalk.

There were about a million of these little beauties all over the place, and they were not too concerned by my presence. At times they approached me, to within about 6 feet, at which point I couldn't focus on them with my 400mm. They were extremely active, just about 99.9% of the time they had something in their mouth. They are probably plain-jane to the experienced birders, but I quite like them and was happy to take some portraits.

Canon 7D
Canon 400mm f5.6L
All shots:
ISO 1,000
f5.6
2 of the shots are at 1/180s and 1 is at 1/125s

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[pnodrog]

Under the conditions you did well. Plain but delicate feather pattern - a less adventurous person may have stayed home in the dry watching TV.

[Bobobird]

Paul, that would be me (this winter).

One of the things about birds - one has no idea what the day will bring especially in unknown territory. Even when you know what is around, there will always be the unexpected.

The shots are more then decent imho.

[Otavio]

Matt, another great series! I would say the background on #1 is not helping (too busy), but considering the conditions you were in, it is also great. Thanks for sharing! Regards...

[gregj1763]

Hi Matt,
The last one is my pick. You did a good job to isolate the subject from a busy background with great use of dof.
Well done
,

[FlyingSquirrel]

Under the conditions you did well. Plain but delicate feather pattern - a less adventurous person may have stayed home in the dry watching TV.

Thank you for the encouragement. It was a bit of a challenge but I had great fun and got good experience. Regarding TV, I don't own one, and even if I did, I would not use it - in fact, I sold mine to buy camera gear Also, just about 6 months ago, I was nothing near adventurous. I was not shooting pictures at all and was playing video games in all of my free time. I'm glad I put the controller down and decided to do something with my life (no offense to anyone that plays video games, of course)

Paul, that would be me (this winter).

One of the things about birds - one has no idea what the day will bring especially in unknown territory. Even when you know what is around, there will always be the unexpected.

The shots are more then decent imho.

Thank you Bobo. The "unexpected" factor of wildlife photography is just one of many things that I already am loving about it. On another note, some time sooner than later I am going to have to get over my fear of bears if I am going to head out to remote locations (it's a long story)

Matt, another great series! I would say the background on #1 is not helping (too busy), but considering the conditions you were in, it is also great. Thanks for sharing! Regards...

I agree about the background. I wish the background could always be clean, but I will take what I can get Thank you for your comments and feedback, as always

Hi Matt,
The last one is my pick. You did a good job to isolate the subject from a busy background with great use of dof.
Well done
,

Thank you! The subject happened to be standing in the right place at the right time

[FlyingSquirrel]

Does anyone know what species the bird is? Thanks