Acorn Woodpecker visiting his granery

[Craig Markham]

MK3L0793.CR2 Acorn Woodpecker (Melanerpes formicivorous)
01/21/10 27:09 PM
Dundee, Oregon
Canon EOS-1D Mark III
EF500mm f/4L IS USM +2.0x+1.4x
1/125, f/8.0, ISO 800
Manual Exposure
Image Size 3888x2592
External E-TTL, -1/3
Speedlite 580xII w flash extender
Wimberley II on Gitzo 3541LS tripod
Cropped to 70% of original frame

I was thrilled to find a pair of Acorn Woodpeckers in what's left of an oak grove, and we had a nice sun break yesterday -- much needed when using stacked TC's. These are among the coolest birds around here! Near dusk, they were joined by two other pairs. They stayed high in the 80-ft oaks, so I was shooting at a 45-60-degree vertical angle most of the time in a half squat under the tripod for about 3 hours. My chiropracter awaits! They did their best to drive me nuts, jumping from snag to snag, dodging behind sticks. At this distance (100-200 ft) there were also many small twigs to work through, and messy background to avoid. They kept me doing the Texas two-step with my rig for the whole session.

Tragically, we are rapidly losing the magnificent oaks to urbanization, senescence, winds, and ignorant woodcutting for firewood. These birds depend on this habitat, including the large rotting staubs in which they store their acorns. There are efforts being made by conservation organizations to preserve and restore remaining oak savannas in the Willamette Valley. Hopefully these remarkable birds and their compatriots will find enough remaining habitat to carry on (White-breasted nuthatches and a Kestrel visited the grove while I was there).

This is one of my favorite images of the day; love the moss, fungus and alga-covered snag with stored acorns packed in.

-- Craig

[Randy Stout]

Craig:

A very effective natural history image, with appreciated info to go along. It is very cool to see the acorns tucked away.

The image quality is suffering from the stacked multipliers and perhaps from the slow shutter speed.
Shooting angle mentioned in your description, can't do much about that. In your dancing to catch these guys, a step or two to the left would have been nice here, to remove the merge of the trunk in the background.

I appreciate the story behind the image.

Cheers

Randy

[Axel Hildebrandt]

Nice find and good-looking specimen. I would sharpen the bird more although it does not look too bad considering the stacked converters and wish the angle were less steep. The trunk in the BG is a bit distracting.