White plus Black and Grey

LITTLE EGRETS & JACKDAWS AT SLIMBRIDGE

1st May 2013

Rather later than intended, here are the photos I took at Slimbridge before Monty the crane appeared.

I had excellent views of little egrets hunting in front of the Martin Smith and Robbie Garnett hides. It was not so long ago that seeing a little egret in full breeding plumage would have sent any British birder into paroxysms of joy. It is too easy to become dismissive about these beautiful birds now that they have become so familiar. They are very elegant all the year round, but in spring their plumes or aigrettes add an extra dimension.

As I have written  before, water bird shots look good when there is a reflection to offer a double view of the subject and this also shows the quality of the water surface; the photo below demonstrates the energetic way that egrets shuffle their feet to disturb their prey, even when the water is deeper than their ideal. With pure white birds, you get a marvellous bonus when ripples are reflected from their breasts.

The birds in front of the Robbie Garnett hide were so close that I couldn't include the main reflection - although of course I was using the 700mm combination. I think there are three different egrets in these photos, they don't seem to take much notice of each other when they are foraging. Watching through the viewfinder I thought the bird below was warning off another, but when I looked around there was no other bird nearby.

You certainly don't have to watch a hungry egret for too long before you see it make a catch; they are remarkably efficient hunters of small fishes. These birds were catching sticklebacks. You can see the stickleback's spines in the photo below, but they didn't save the fish from the egret.

The traditional problem with shooting white birds in bright sunlight is overexposure, resulting in loosing highlight detail ('blowing the highlights' in photographic jargon). The conditions for these shots were a stiff test, but I think I have avoided this problem: I always set my D300s to underexpose by 2/3 stop compared to the factory setting, which usually avoids the problem, particularly as I always try to use the minimum ISO setting (200) - but a couple of test shots and a histogram check are still advisable. I also shoot 14-bit NEF (Nikon Raw) images, so that I have a little extra safety margin available when I am processing a 12-bit image. I use Capture NX2 because it is matched to NEF images and I like to set white and black control points on my images to get a full tonal range.

I'm quite sure that jackdaws recognise that inside the boundaries of Slimbridge, people are no threat, so they are very relaxed when close to the hides. Jackdaws are favourites of mine: adaptable, agile, intelligent, sociable and wonderful fliers. This bird was having a rest after raiding the feeders opposite the Robbie Garnett hide, I think (s)he felt that the seed mix was too good for the goldfinches and great tits.

This bird was hunting insects in the grass right in front of the Martin Smith hide.The problem with these photos is that there is no true white point in them (even the highlight in the eye of the bird below is distinctly blue). I find it much harder to process these shots by setting a black point and finding a true neutral grey point and adjusting its brightness.