Catching up

Well just to catch up just a little.  On Friday last, we hung out around a water treatment plant on the east side of Tucson.  Now those of you who are birders know why we were there.

The area is actually a manmade wetlands and it draws birds.  We had a pretty good day of birding and I took hundreds of photos, but I am only sharing one today.

This little guy is a male Ruby-crowned Kinglet.  He is about 4 1/4" long.  So if you click on the image to see it larger, chances are you are seeing it larger than life sized.  We have seen at least one almost every time we are out birding here.  Now seeing one and getting a picture of one are two very different things.  They do not stay still.  They are in trees looking for insects, which there are very few of around Tucson.  Any way they move just a foot or so at a time but they move constantly.  They are a real challenge to catch up to and lock focus on,  especially with a telephoto lens.  

I should also point out that the red crown on the males is normally hidden, one seldom sees it.  

We spotted the male in the picture and he was showing his crown frequently, I stayed after him for about 15 minutes, getting off several shots, all of which captured where he was just a second before.

Then he paused  for a second or two or I got lucky.  I think I was lucky because I had my camera set to record video but I had forgotten that and I was taking still shots at a very slow shutter speed.  So I am very lucky the picture was as sharp as it is, given it was a 720mm lens handheld with a 125th sec shutter speed.  My shutter speed should have been something like 1000th.  

The picture is below.