a good day fishing!

[annmpacheco]

One of my favorites from my recent Iceland trip. This puffin just landed for a few seconds and flew off again. I like the wetness of the neck and the medusa style fish in the puffins beak, along with a draping fish over its head and the fish planted on its face.
If anyone knows the name of the fish please tell.

1DX
600mm
ISO 1600
6.3
1/2500

[David Salem]

That is a crack up Ann!! I can't believe how many fish these guys can keep catching, even after they have a mouthful. This is a great portrait and the details and colors look fantastic. Not sure of the species but they look to be one of it's favorites. Well done and looking forward to more from your trip.

[Randy Stout]

Ann:

Very fun image, quite a mouthful. I don't know the scientific name for these fish, but in common parlance, I believe it would be safe to call them: Lunch

It would be fascinating to see a video of them underwater harvesting the fish, I am curious if they just swim through a school, or catch them one at a time (which would seem to be a challenge to hold onto the already caught ones.)


Cheers

Randy

[Arthur Morris]

Agree, those prey items are very funky indeed... Sharp with a good EXP.

a

[Arthur Morris]

A follow-up question: why such a high SS/ISO combination?

a

[annmpacheco]

I was aimed and armed for flight shots.

[Marina Scarr]

This is one of the best puffin portraits I have seen. While the bird here is not beautiful per se, it is very unique with the food items wrapped around the beak and the wet feathers. Very impressive. This is a contest image.

[Arthur Morris]

This is the second of two e-mails that I got from my friend David Policansky, AKA, Dr. Fish:

Now I see, Iceland. It's a very nice image! What I was calling eel-blenny is called rock gunnel in the Atlantic but another guess is juvenile wolf-fish or wolf eel, also called catfish sometimes in Iceland and served as a delicious meal in restaurants there. (As is puffin!) Anharhichas lupus. Still a guess, I'm afraid.


​David

And a follow-up e-mail:

Artie: I have been thinking more and exchanging emails with my friend Karsten Hartel, curator of fishes at Harvard's Museum of Comparative Zoology. All the ideas he and I have come up with are fishes in the same group, and now I think the puffin's fish are eelpouts, in the family Zoarcidae. The illustration in Wikipedia looks a lot (but not exactly) like the puffin's fish, but there really isn't anything else that makes sense.

ps: whatever they are, they are surely juveniles.

[Geoffrey Montagu]

Brilliant capture, Ann. Wonderful light, feather detail, soaking wet, and of course those translucent fish wriggling around the beak and face. Did I mention DETAIL?


Geoffrey

[annmpacheco]

This is the second of two e-mails that I got from my friend David Policansky, AKA, Dr. Fish:

Now I see, Iceland. It's a very nice image! What I was calling eel-blenny is called rock gunnel in the Atlantic but another guess is juvenile wolf-fish or wolf eel, also called catfish sometimes in Iceland and served as a delicious meal in restaurants there. (As is puffin!) Anharhichas lupus. Still a guess, I'm afraid.


​David

And a follow-up e-mail:

Artie: I have been thinking more and exchanging emails with my friend Karsten Hartel, curator of fishes at Harvard's Museum of Comparative Zoology. All the ideas he and I have come up with are fishes in the same group, and now I think the puffin's fish are eelpouts, in the family Zoarcidae. The illustration in Wikipedia looks a lot (but not exactly) like the puffin's fish, but there really isn't anything else that makes sense.

ps: whatever they are, they are surely juveniles.

Thank you Artie and to your friend Dr. Fish, very kind of you both to take the time for an identification. I sure know more about eels now since i have tried to identify the prey item. Pretty fascinating...

[Bill Dix]

Fabulous shot of the translucent eels (thanks Artie). And not so bad of the slightly bedraggled Puffin either. Terrific light. Nicely captured, Ann.

[Glenn Conlan]

Fantastic shot those fish make this incredible and your detail and exposure are spot on, you have a winner!

[arash_hazeghi]

excellent shot especially the way the fish are wrapped around the beak!