Mid Air Snail Exchange

[Jim Neiger]

I have been photographing Snail Kites (North America's rarest bird of prey) regularly for about 5 years now, and I have seen and photographed pretty much all of their many interesting behaviors. I have tens of thousands of keeper Snail Kite images. Today I photographed a rare behavior for the first time. I have seen this behavior a couple of times, but not close enough to photograph it. During the Snail Kites courtship prior to nesting, the male will sometimes remove a snail from it's shell and then give the snail to the female. I have seen this when the male is perched and the female comes to him and gets the snail and I have also seen the male bring the snail to the perched female. Today I photographed a mid air presentation of the snail. The male did a courtship flight with the snail in his bill and then the female flew up to him and he presented the snail to her in mid air. This behavior is very rare and almost never witnessed. As far as I know, this is the only occurance that has been photographed. I hope you like it. It made my day. :) Thanks for looking.


Osceola County, FL - 1D Mark IV, 500mm+1.4xTC, hand held from boat, 1/2000, F6.3, ISO 640, manual exposure

[Jeff Parker]

That's one of those things that are awesome just to see, never mind capturing a good image of.

[Justin Reznick]

Amazing capture! Such a wonder to see such incredible action. Looking at the image without gawking at the capture, it would be great to have the bottom bird sharper, and the background division not cut through the subject. Congrats on an amazing image!

[Jay Gould]

Mate, I am so happy for you; seeing that YOU captured the image/behavior made my day too!

When it comes to your images, the technicals and the fact that it is tack sharp is to be expected, AND again you didn't disappoint.

TFS - best regards :D

[Dan Fleming]

Jim,

Pretty spectacular image Jim. An amazing capture indeed. Look forward to meeting you in person in April.

Dan

[Aiden Blake]

Pretty incredible action shot you've captured there. I can barely get the hang of BIF shots right now, let alone this stuff!

[Jim Neely]

Wonderful capture, Jim. Great action shot.

jn

[Arthur Morris]

Your heart must have been pounding. My favorite part of the image is the male's talon holding here wing. Is that a young male. Congrats!

[Jim Neiger]

Your heart must have been pounding. My favorite part of the image is the male's talon holding here wing. Is that a young male. Congrats!

My heart was pounding. It was the last day of a 5 day workshop and I had a full boat. The male is a young male. Sometimes they look alot like the females.

[david cramer]

Congrats on a wonderful capture. Your back story about your work with the birds really helps set the stage for this dramatic image.

[niranjan sant]

MAGNIFICIENT ACTION PACKED IMAGE,THE BIRD RECIEVING THE FEED LOOKS LIKE JUV TO ME.AND THE HOLDING OF WING BY ADULT BIRD IS THE GOLDEN PART OF THE IMAGE

[Markus Jais]

Congratulations. Awesome capture of rare behavior!
It really pays to work long with a single species.

Markus

[Ofer Levy]

The interesting and rare behaviour makes up for the lass than perfect technical quality of this image.

[Kiran Poonacha]

Great action frozen Jim bhai.. nice light too.. TFS

[RakeshDhareshwar]

Love the action and the two toned BG !!

[Keith Bauer]

Wow Jim, this is some incredible action that you were able to capture. The male's talon holding the wing is really something special. Big congrats on this one.

[saleeltambe]

Amazing behaviour captured with all the perfection ! Everything seems to be just ideal !!

[Morkel Erasmus]

all has been said. a heart-stopping image Jim!! huge congrats, patience paid off...

[sandy richards]

Spectacular capture, Jim!
Cheers!
Sandy