Fish Tug of War

[Phil Ertel]

This image was captured on November 28th at Pea Island National Wildlife Refuge located on the Outer Banks of North Carolina on an overcast morning at 107AM.

This image came from a small pond that had 16 herons stationed around the edge. There were frequent fights over territory. Also present were two Cormorants. Mostly the Herons and the Cormorants ignored each other. However, after this Heron caught this fish, one of the Cormorants decided they should have it and a discussion ensued. The Heron won. It wasn’t until after I was reviewing the images that I noticed that the Heron had a foreign object stuck through it’s neck. The foreign object did not seem to bother the bird as I saw it catching fish, flying, and preening.

I like the action and environment. I would have liked to have captured an image with both birds presenting an eye. Does the impaled object in the bird neck detract from the picture?


This image was processed in ACR with minor additional tweaks in Photoshop. This image represents approximately 90% of the original (I took a little off the left).

Thanks for looking and of course any critiques.

Regards,

Phil

Camera: 40D
Lens: Canon EF500mm f/4 IS USM plus 1.4x
Exposure: 1/500s at f/5.6
Exposure Program: Manual
Metering Mode: Evaluative
ISO: 800
Flash: No Flash
Tripod

[Fabs Forns]

Terrific action and good reflexes to be able to get it.
I'd still crop a bit off the leeft and the top for web presentation, we seem to want closer in the monitor :) but it may OK for a print. A little more room at the bottom for virtual feet wouldn't have hurt and you may want to increase the midtones a little bit in Levels (the middle slider) to bring out the plumage gray.

Keep them coming!

[Dave Mills]

I agree with the cropping comment. Great action and story!

[Robert Empleton]

Hi,

A very nice action image, well done. Regarding the foreign object, i think it's just some weed being bend by the Heron's neck.

Regards,

Rob

[Phil Ertel]

Thank you all for taking the time to comment. I will play with the cropping some more. I seem to either be too tight or have left too much negative space. Question: With an image such as this, is it ok to have the action centered?

Robert, the object may be a reed. For the bird’s sake I hope so. However, I am sorry to say that it is indeed impaled in the neck of this bird. I have other images with this bird flying and images from different angles and the “reed” is still present. It doesn’t look to be metal or an arrow; so I am hoping it is just a reed that will degrade over time. As I stated before it did not appear to be hindering the bird’s activities. Regardless as this image does not clearly show the state of the object and therefore does not add to the story, I will attempt to remove it.

Thanks agin for your comments and to all for viewing.

Regards,

Phil