Hands down my favorite bird species to photograph. There is something about being on the water pre sunrise hearing the call of the Loon and the excitement I feel when we are able to "work with" the Minnesota's state bird. The lake I frequent has many nesting Loons and since its a lake that is fished and has boat traffic, they are very tolerant of me making images. :) Spring is around the corner and I started thinking about them today, so here is one I just processed from June 14th of last year. They were pretty comfortable with us as you can see.
P.S. Minnesota holds the largest concentration of Loons in the "continental" US.... at around 12,000... a population second only to Alaska overall. Wisconsin, I believe is under 4,000. In Michigan they are a threatened species and have fewer than 500 nesting pairs of Loons.
Nikon D200 ~ Nikkor 300mm F/2.8 with Nikon 1.4x TC ISO 400 ~ F/7.1 ~ 1/800 sec ~ - 2/3 EV
I share your love of loons. We have a cottage on a northern lake in the lower peninsula. Quite a bit of loon activity, but not nesting. It is a very open lake, not their preferred quiet coves and inlets. Pretty light traffic, but just not enough cover for them to nest, I would guess.
The picture is lovely, with nice head angles, great water. Exposure looks good. I am almost always shooting minus EV or manual on these birds to prevent blowing the whites.
Keep them coming, it gets me fired up for the summer!
Agree with Axel but what a sweet image !!! Love it Mike !!! Must have had soft light to have detail through out !!! Big Congrats !!! .... btw could only wish the other chick was looking our way !!! :)
This one's a winner, Mike. Love the soft light and the sharpness. These guys look pretty big to still be riders. Yup, spring is coming and in only another 2 months :( we might have open water up here.
Beautiful image, Mike, and very nice detail in the whites. We live on a small lake in the north metro and are fortunate to see a pair of loons each summer that nest on a smaller largely undeveloped adjacent lake. Have to make some images this spring/summer.
Lovely family portrait, great exposure, colors and detail, I agree about croping a bit from the bottom, but tha´s preety much it for me :)
Congratulaitons!
Oh Mike this is where I suffer a little no a lot of envy. Really am fascinated with them and their incredible beauty. To capture one with the baby is the ultimate. Congratulations on a fine image with outstanding composition and exposure. The detail is wonderful I guess by now you can tell I love it.
Family solitude
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