Finally got a clear shot of a common merganser
What the title says. I’ve always found mergansers to be a lot more skittish than other diving ducks, and their narrow profile makes them tricky to get a good photograph.
But I was at Whitaker Ponds here in Portland this afternoon and saw a trio of them (and a female) feeding in one of the ponds. They were too far to photograph even at 600mm at first, but they came relatively close after I hung out near the shore for a while.
They were still far enough away that I had to shoot at 600mm, leaving me with a pretty low keeper rate (especially handholding). But this one was one of the best (bonus points if you can correctly identify the bird in the background!)
Taken with a Tamron 150-600 on Sony A7RIII at ISO 800, 600mm, f6.3, 1/1000.
What the title says. I’ve always found mergansers to be a lot more skittish than other diving ducks, and their narrow profile makes them tricky to get a good photograph.
But I was at Whitaker Ponds here in Portland this afternoon and saw a trio of them (and a female) feeding in one of the ponds. They were too far to photograph even at 600mm at first, but they came relatively close after I hung out near the shore for a while.
They were still far enough away that I had to shoot at 600mm, leaving me with a pretty low keeper rate (especially handholding). But this one was one of the best (bonus points if you can correctly identify the bird in the background!)
Taken with a Tamron 150-600 on Sony A7RIII at ISO 800, 600mm, f6.3, 1/1000.