"A real slow drag", or "The busy lives of r.n. grebes"

[Jack Breakfast]

Folks, this particular red-necked grebe emerged quite suddenly, and I was NOT ready for this shot. I would have liked to include more of the dragged-along vegetation on the left, but instead we have this...
Taken with the Canon 7D and 70-300L at 300mm. iso400, 1/1000, 5.6. This is approximately 85% of the original...
Many thanks for your input...
117726

[Robert Holguin]

Very nice shot. Great behavirol shot. I agree with on the vegetation, but I would love to have a shot like this in my files.
Well done.

[Satish Ranadive]

Magnificent image of greb with vegetation.Lovely composition.Love the blue water ripples around greb and green water giving 3D effect.
As usual nice details and sharpness.

Regards,
Satish.

[christopher galeski]

nice shot,agre on more veg in the shot,love the color of the water.thanks.

[Ofer Levy]

Very good behaviour shot! As with all your recent shots of this sepcies - shooting angle is a bit high but the behaviour and techs in here are awesome.

[Jack Breakfast]

Thanks folks. The two other grebe shots I posted recently where from a different locale. In that case, getting lower would have been impossible. In this case, however, I could have gotten a little lower. Forsooth, I would have preferred it, but the grebe emerged from the water just as I was arriving at the grebesite. I only had a few seconds to react, to go snap-snap-snap! I did manage this image, luckily. And indeed I do have some lower-angle shots, but they aren't as behaviorally exciting. To conclude: I have learned from this forum (thank you!) that an eye-level shot is usually the better shot. Not always, but usually. Moreover: if you have a good and willing subject, try ALL the angles. Yes yes, bird photography 101, I suppose...

[Randy Stout]

Jack:

NIce colors, action, vegetation. Yes, more on left would be nice, but you did exactly the right thing, push the button. Because of his head angle, I think you could crop in from the right a bit as well as up from the bottom.

Cheers

Randy

[Karl Egressy]

Nice behaviour shot, Jack.

[Melissa Groo]

Really neat shot, Jack, I like it a lot. The tense line of the vegetation, the look towards you, your exposure and sharpness, all make for a winning image.

[Michael Zajac]

Nice behavior shot.

[Daniel Cadieux]

Very cool! I like this alot. Sharpness, exposure, comp...all look good to me. Too bad the light didn't come form the left instead of the right, but I still like the overall effect you got here. Pushing the shutter button as you did was the right thing to do. Are these guys pretty tolerant of human presence?

[Jack Breakfast]

Thanks Daniel...this was my first shot of the session, and probably the best. The other shots, although taken at a lower angle and more thoughtfully composed, lacked a certain va-va-voom! I've been mixing my grebe shots on the old forum, which is to say that I photographed grebes at 3 different locales this season. I regret any confusion this may have caused! As for this picture, yes indeed, this grebe is one-half of a grebe couple who were more than tolerant. For reasons known only to the grebes, this particular couple built their nest at close proximity to a pedestrian bridge in a fairly busy public park. They made 3 different attempts. There was courting and nestbuilding and mating and hunting and gathering and egglaying and egg adjustment galore. Alas; in the end the eggs went unhatched, no zebra babies were born, and the grebes moved on with their lives...

[Stu Bowie]

Hi Jack, you have nailed the sharpness and detail in this, and another well captured behavioural shot. I like the texture of the water, and wish you had more space on the left. :w3

[Andrew Merwin]

Well done Jack. I like it. I also agree with the above comments. I think it needs CW rotation.

[Kaustubh Deshpande]

Jack, lots of good advice above. light was not your side but well done in the conditions. Excellent moment and a beautiful bird.

[laurie golden]

Jack,

Just wanted to add my very very nice photo to all of the above comments. Is this another nest?

[Cheryl Arena Molennor]

Cool behavior shot. So cool to watch too

[Jack Breakfast]

Obviously I would like to offer my sincere thanks to you fine folks for your comments and suggestions...
Laurie, this was another nest that didn't produce any hatchlings, I'm afraid.

[arash_hazeghi]

great I like how he is pulling the nesting material!