Yellow-eyed Penguin

Hi all,

Another shot from NZ, this one to me is pretty special. Like Gail's frame / post a bit back, I really wanted to see a Yellow-eyed Penguin, the rarest penguin in the world, in NZ. I spent a decent amount of time checking out spots and just waiting hoping to get lucky. The last day that I was in the area I was just hanging out when this one wandered up to the fence line behind a bush and started calling. This was one of the first frames that I got of this penguin, who was really relaxed and gave me a number of different poses, some that I'll post later as well. Slight crop, NR to BG.

Camera: Nikon D500
Lens: 200-500 f/5.6 at 500mm
Specs: 1/2000 ISO 1600 f/5.6

Thanks for looking and commenting on prior posts!
Alex

The action here is great Alex. Love that calling pose and those spread wings (well flippers I guess). I would try my best to do some work on that background and get rid of the large whitish area to the right of the bird. Must be tough conditions to get these guys with nice backgrounds.

Such a cool looking bird. Love that pose. Nice detail as well here.

Great bird. I would love to photograph it one day. The situation was less than ideal for several reasons, the intruding grasses being first on the list.

with love, artie

Thanks all -- really appreciate it. It was great to see this one. I'll take a look at that white spot and see what I can do. Since the bird was tolerant I had a chance to try for some better backgrounds, although less dynamic poses (will share later). Between the restrictions on these birds, the light, and stray grasses etc, it was certainly not a perfect scenario, but feel so grateful to get the sighting and the chance I did. Thanks again,