sunilsphotos

Sunil's Bird Photography

Birds

Pelicans of Kerkini

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My travels earlier this year took me to the astonishingly beautiful Lake Kerkini in Greece. It was winter, the snow capped mountains of Kerkini are visible in the distance and form a dramatic backdrop for one of the most important wetlands in this part of Europe. For those interested in birds, this area has a special claim to fame – this is where you can best approach, observe and photograph the threatened Dalmatian Pelicans.

So after a long drive from Sofia in neighboring Bulgaria, I reached here late at night. I got the distinct feeling that US passports aren’t very commonly seen at the over land checkpoint crossing into Greece. But while it was too late to recon the lake, I arrived to a warm welcome and delicious sea food. The next morning I woke before daybreak to a steady drizzle, grey skies and generally miserable conditions. But if you know me, this has never stopped me before. A very kind fisherman welcomed us into his little shed on the shore of the lake and I shot as much as possible in the rain from the shore and on a boat.

The rain seemed to make the birds more approachable, so I took advantage of that to get some tight profile shots.

I was also able to use a slow shutter speed for some creative blurs as the birds flew by.

Here are some other compositions I made in the poor light. It allowed me the freedom to overexpose and play with high-key styles.

And of course – true to my style – I have some head on shots as well. Photographs that highlight the bird instead of just a bird.

The next morning was much better for dramatic skies and backdrops, so my wide-angle lenses were put to good use. Note that one of these pelicans is not like the others – can you find the interloper? I put on my waders and went into the water for these shots. Blend in – I guess.

And the boat trips allowed for some action photography. Some at very close quarters.

I’ll wrap this post up with a gallery of varied shots – conventional flight shots, blur induced by slowing shutter speed down and some portraits of these gorgeous birds.

An awesome trip and very productive couple of days!

Gannets of Shetland

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After a fantastic time with the confiding puffins of Fair Isle, I decided to spend some time photographing Northern Gannets on some of the other Shetland Islands. Northern Gannets are some of the largest seabirds of the North Atlantic. They breed in only a few large colonies and spend most of their time out at sea. Their stunning white plumage is as beautiful to see as its hard to photograph properly.

First stop was Hermaness National Nature Reserve on Unst. Overlooking Muckle Flugga – Britain’s northernmost point, this is a haven for seabirds with the gannets here representing 5% of the entire Western European population. And at the right time of year, it is a busy busy place.

Places like these are where wide angle photography really helps give you a sense of what it’s like. Changing light conditions allowed me to capture a few different views.

But while the pictures above show the sheer vastness and numbers, it’s difficult to capture how busy it is. I tried to come up with a way to capture this very busy colony in still photographs – and this is the result: the photographs capture the gannets as streaks in long exposure. I love spending time at seabird colonies and these are some of my favorite photographs. Imagine sitting at the edge of a cliff with seabirds flying all around – the smells, the sounds cannot be photographed but some of the action can.

I took out my long lens equipment for some tight close-ups as well.

As a bonus, I was also able to spend some time photographing a chick at a nest. They look quite a bit different from a grown adult! This one has quite a bit of growing up to do.

As the sun set in the distance, fog moved in which made for some challenging shooting before I wrapped up for the night. A puffin photographed in the fog here:

Here’s a Great Skua bidding me goodnight.

The other opportunity I had to photograph the gannets was from a very different vantage point. Gannets hunt by diving dramatically into the sea to capture fish. The only way to get up close to the action here is from sea – so I hopped on a small boat loaded up with chum and made my way to Noss National Nature Reserve. Not the largest, but certainly quite dramatic as far as seabird colonies go.

As we approached the tall 180 meter high sea cliffs of Noss NNR from sea, I was able to appreciate the scale of these colonies in a whole new way. There are over 45K nesting guillemots here but they are overshadowed by the noisy 8K gannets.

A little closer approach saw many of these birds going about their daily lives. But the most remarkable parts of these birds were photographed under water. Have you ever wondered what these massive birds look like when they dive after fish in the water? These photographs were made with the camera in a dive housing.

Prehistoric monsters come to mind.

Here the camera is partially submerged showing the cliffs of Noss in the background as this gannet begins it’s dive.

Some other images of underwater gannets here:

I spent hours on the water here and this was some of the most fun time I had getting up close with these birds. Thanks for following along.

Puffins of Fair Isle

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Clowns of the sea – puffins are unique and iconic seabirds.

I’ve had the pleasure of photographing Horned and Tufted Puffins at leisure from various bases in Alaska including the dramatic colonies of St. Paul Island in the Bering Sea. Atlantic Puffins are found on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean and while there are several places to view them, after some research, I settled on the tiny rock called Fair Isle in northern Scotland.

Fair Isle doesn’t seem to get a lot of visitors – relatively speaking – which is a good thing because the infrastructure can only support so much. One of the reasons might be the notoriously poor chances of actually making the journey to the island. There are two ways – by a very rocky four hour ferry ride or a small twin-engine plane from the tiny airport near Sumburgh Head on ‘mainland’ Shetland. Both are regularly canceled due to fog or bad seas. Here is where my luck came through – I was able to make the journey rather uneventfully from the midwestern United States to Glasgow to Sumburgh.

After recovering for a night, I was up before five in the morning – blame jetlag. So I took a quick shower and made the somewhat long but invigorating walk to Sumburgh Head.

The trail took me along the edge of some sheer cliffs – with lots of seabirds – guillemots, murres and fulmars in plenty – but no puffins!

After a brief couple of hours, I doubled back to my hotel and from there went right to the little airport and finally to Fair Isle by small aircraft. Right off the air strip we were whisked off to a reported sighting of a pod of Orca (!). Hours after landing we were greeted by rain – but that only lasted the night. Four glorious days of mostly sunny weather followed.

And the puffins. There were puffins. So. Many. Puffins.

Close enough for headshots.

Sometimes – crazy close. With some patience and disregard for laying in puffin excrement.

But some of those shots stood out – this one I took in pouring rain. One morning, the usual sunny sky clouded over and the skies opened up for a while. This was my opportunity for a little something different. This puffin didn’t stop bringing back food, so I kept shooting with frequent wiping off of my gear with my shirt.

Another opportunity presented itself a different morning. As the sun rose and the light got harsher I was thinking about breakfast. I had been up since 4 am and gotten little sleep thanks to some late night storm petrel banding action. And then there arose a great racket from the other side of the cliffs. Great Skua – but that wasn’t all. It caught breakfast of it’s own – at point blank range.

There were opportunities for backlit puffins as well. With clear skies and sometimes dramatic sunsets reflected in the water below. Can you tell which ones are sky vs water?

The birds were so approachable, that I managed several in ultra-wideangle.

But at the special time known as golden hour, it was time to play with flare and wing flaps.

Flight shots were tricky – these birds are as quick as bullets – but I managed a few of those as well.

And while I’m flirting with puffin overload – here are some other special shots of these beautiful birds to wrap up this post.

And last but not least – my last gorgeous sunset on Fair Isle. I had to catch a ferry at the crack of dawn in about 6 hours (ferry is actually on the right side of this shot), but couldn’t pull myself away from the last sunset of my holiday here.

Much appreciation to the following for their help with logistics, great company and fantastic food:
THE GOOD FOLKS AT NATURE LENS
ACE PHOTOGRAPHER KEVIN MORGANS
FAIR ISLE BIRD OBSERVATORY
SUMBURGH HEAD HOTEL

See an article in National Geographic about some of my puffin photography here:

Sandhill Cranes in the Winter

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I had the opportunity to visit some Sandhill Cranes at a roosting site on the Wisconsin River last month. This was one of the last possible opportunities to photograph them before they migrated south for the winter.

Winter means early sunset and the cranes didn’t arrive till the light was failing. Nevertheless, the vast numbers of cranes arriving together gave me an opportunity to try some long exposures. I particularly like how the cranes in flight look like wraiths in the air.

I also tried some artistic blurs with the cranes when they finally landed close by when it was almost completely dark out.

But blur or not, the sounds of these vast numbers made for a memorable night.

I did manage to get back to this site in a couple of weeks as the river was starting to freeze over. The light was still poor, but I spent some time with them in a virtual blizzard as the snow came down while they came in for the night.

Click below for a number of other images of these cranes in the snow.

Until next year cranes!

Many thanks to the ALDO LEOPOLD FOUNDATION for making these visits possible.

A Journey to the walls of the Smithsonian

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I’m thrilled to have an image selected in the Highly Honored section of the BIRDS category in the very prestigious NATURE’S BEST 2016 WINDLAND SMITH RICE INTERNATIONAL AWARDS COMPETITION. This image of an Indigo Bunting on a freshly opening sunflower was photographed not far from my home at the POPE FARM CONSERVANCY in Wisconsin. It made a short list with some other very talented photographers from over 20,000 images submitted from 51 countries.

The image will be displayed in large format (courtesy Epson America) at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History in Washington DC in an exhibit that opens October 24, 2016.

My original intention in visiting the conservancy that morning was to photograph some of the beautiful sunflower blooms present during their annual ‘Sunflower Days’ event held each year in late summer. I brought my telephoto lens along to be able to isolate distant flowers with short DOF shots. While I was putting together some of those distant shots, I heard the unmistakable song of the Indigo Bunting in the distance. I knew the deep blue colors of the bird might present some fantastic photo opportunities in the sea of yellow sunflowers. Sure enough – after some waiting, the stunning blue male popped out and sang for a while as it worked the field. This image is one of those taken during that time.

The Nature’s Best competition selected it on a short list of ~ 350 semi-finalists along with this other image of mine which shows Ruff displaying on a lek in Northern Finland. After reviewing the original RAW files and subsequent rounds of judging, the image of the Indigo Bunting on a freshly opening sunflower made the final cut and ended up on display on the walls of the Smithsonian.

I had an opportunity to visit the museum this week and took this photograph of it hanging on the wall of the special exhibits section of the Natural History Museum along with SOME OTHER FANTASTIC PHOTOGRAPHS.

Zambia – South Luangwa National Park: Mfuwe

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I had the very cool opportunity to spend part of August this year in Zambia with my family. Naturally, I packed my gear along and there were excellent photography opportunities throughout. Since I photographed prolifically, I’m breaking this into three posts with one each to cover the Mfuwe and Nsefu sectors in South Luangwa National Park as well as the Lower Zambezi areas.

In the Mfuwe sector of South Luangwa, we stayed at the lovely FLATDOGS CAMP right outside the park gate. This sector of the park is known for its unusual abundance of large game including leopards. I naturally had some arrangements made for spending time with the local birdlife as well.

We reached the lodge in the afternoon and set right out for an evening game drive into the park. Here are some images from while it was still light out.

Yellow Baboon – Mother and child

Bird alert – one of the first large birds I saw and photographed was this Saddle-billed Stork. This huge and spectacularly plumaged wading bird was a great start for avian subjects.

There were of course lots of opportunities with the larger animals as well – here’s an abstract of some Plain’s Zebra to show how close we could get.

Crawshay’s Zebra – Abstract

And while I’d have the opportunity to see the Bateleur in all it’s adult glory later on, here’s a juvenile sighted the first evening.

Juvenile Bateleur

As the sun set we went to visit the site of a lion kill from the night before – where I saw my first vultures.

Sunset itself was spent on the banks of the gorgeous Luangwa river. Not bad for our first sunset in Zambia.

Sunset on the Luangwa River

But the fun doesn’t end at sunset. After dark, we keep going with a spotter to look for night life. We immediately saw our first predator.

Followed by ‘Ginger’ the male of the local pride.

Seeing the large game at night is quite the memorable experience. Ginger passed within feet of our safari truck!

Day Two morning began with a bang with this hyena walking across the road with a warthog head – probably from a large predator kill the previous night.

Immediately followed by this Red-billed Oxpecker who posed beautifully on this Impala.

Here are some cute photographs of Yellow Baboons being a family.

Naturally we spent some time on birds this day (and every other). This set includes our first hornbills and the resplendent Hadada Ibis.

Here are some other noteworthy non-avian images of the day.

During a break for lunch and rest in the hot midday African sun, we had some company at the pool.

The evening drive saw more birds and animals including the following.

At sunset we made a stop with some antelope. You’ll sense a theme here – I always try to get some animals in the foreground for sunset.

And like the previous day, we also found some animals after dark – including our first owls.

Day three started off with another lovely African sunrise.

Followed by some birds.

And our first good looks at a leopard in the daytime. It’s quite the experience to have one of these walk within feet of the family.

During a break we stopped by a little water hole with some action. I got some more opportunities with the Saddle-billed Stork.

We also saw a cooperative Pied Kingfisher near the river on our way out of the park. But the light was too harsh, so we decided to try again that evening. As luck would have it, we also saw a Malachite Kingfisher. These birds are small and fast!

On our way out of the lodge, we also ran into a few Ground Hornbills. These massive and prehistoric looking birds were very chill while we held up everyone behind us on the driveway.

Southern ground hornbill

For sunset we decided to visit the local elephant crossing. This was a great experience with the elephants lining up to drop down to water level so they can wade across. This is a centuries old spot for the elephants and I was able to capture some nice interactions.

As a bonus, we found some bee-eaters and other birds near the crossing.

And after dark – this happened. A pair of Pel’s Fishing Owls. A sweet find for my bird list.

That wrapped up a very enjoyable Day Three on a high note.

Here are some miscellaneous images from the morning of Day Four.

The highlight of this morning was this leopard we found with a kill in a tree. We must have spent at least an hour watching it.

Here are some photographs from the rest of the day and the afternoon.

At sunset, we raced to a spot where we could get some wildlife in front of the setting sun.

And finally our last night in this part of the park – we found some interesting things – including our first nightjar.

We spent one last morning here. The highlight was a Crowned Hornbill eating a huge and colorful locust. We also saw some Wild Dogs, but got much better looks later in the trip, so I’ll reserve the photos.

We’ll certainly miss the place, but now we move on to the next phase of our trip. Another four nights spent in the remote and wild Nsefu sector of South Luangwa National Park. Watch out for that post!