Mating Royal Terns

[Mike Poole]

Managed a few hours at Fort Desoto over Easter during the family holiday. I was surprised at what I thought were fairly low numbers of birds around the lagoon area of North Beach (maybe my expectations were too high?) so I too a walk south a few hundred yards and found a colony of Terns and Skimmers. There was plenty of courting action going on, then as this pair started mating they were both face on to me, and as I wanted the sun behind I was reluctant to move. Fortunately they then did a little shuffle round and a bit of a wing flap later I got this result.

Edges of a couple of stray birds cloned out along with some specular highlights in the water. Catchlight on the male enhanced.

Canon 1dx
500mm f4is
ISO 1600
1/3200th f8

Mike

[annmpacheco]

Really nice image Mike, exposure, seeing both eyes and both birds in focus, wow, great wing details too. You did very well, dof really worked its magic!

[Marina Scarr]

Lovely action/behavior captured here. Nice seeing catchlight in both eyes and such a great low angle with wings extended.

The action on North Beach has not been the same since a spoil island developed NW of there where many of the birds are congragating now instead. :( Glad you were able to find all the terns and skimmers.

[William Dickson]

Very nice Mike and good control of the black/whites. Lovely feather detail, BG and POV.

Will

[Bill Dix]

Great action, perfect wing flap and nice angle on the birds. Worth waiting for them to shuffle. Excellent whites, and nice BG. Well done all around.

[Alex Becker]

Hi Mike, I can only echo everyone else so far -- really nice frame, interaction, catchlights, whites and blacks. It could just be my eyes but does the frame need a very slight CW rotation? TFS

[Glenn Conlan]

Action is great, like the way the image is framed