Tag: Ring-billed Gulls

A Bit of Batting Practice

birds, WGNSS Field Trips, wildlife, wildlife photography

For the WGNSS Nature Photography Group’s January outing we headed to Carlyle Lake in Illinois. Our primary target was the dam’s spillway. I have had a lot of fun at this location photographing Bonaparte’s Gulls and American White Pelicans during past winters and these species are what we were hoping for on this trip.

Being a spillway with the dam and infrastructure surrounding it, the backgrounds are definitely challenging; however, it is not impossible to handle. The images below showcase one method we could use to handle this situation. With the rising sun at our backs, I noticed the light was hitting these mostly white birds perfectly. By exposing precisely for the whites and a little exposure manipulation in post-processing, it was possible to turn the darker concrete walls of this section of the spillway nearly black, which allows the birds to pop off this background as seen in the images below.

Predicting the movement of birds in a typical winter is difficult and this winter, where seasons have been changing on a daily basis, is pretty much impossible. On top of that, water levels in the lake and spillway channel were a couple feet below normal. The spillway gates were releasing just enough water, which I believe limited the numbers and size of fish falling through. So, it wasn’t surprising that we found almost nothing but Ringed-bill Gulls (RBGU) fishing in the spillway.

Ring-billed Gulls are considered 3-year gulls, meaning that they have a plumage transition for the first three years of their lives before they develop into the typical adult plumage. In addition, there is considerable variation within these years, e.g. a 2 year old gull may look different from a 2.5 year gull. Given I am no expert, I have made some captions with my best guesses on the ages of some of these birds.

Another method of dealing with ugly backgrounds at this location is to focus on the fishing activities or other opportunities where the water will be the background of the image.

Many nature photographers would consider this a bust of a day and would perhaps head back home to watch a meaningless football game. However, I like to look at this as both an opportunity for practice and to potentially learn something new about a species taken for granted and usually ignored. I liken opportunities such as this to batting practice in three ways: 1) It gives you a chance to hone your skills – this is high-speed action photography with challenging backgrounds and dynamic lighting. If you haven’t mastered your camera’s exposure and autofocus settings, you will likely struggle getting the images you envision, 2) It’s a lot of fun! Whatever species you find in a spillway like this, there will likely by plenty of birds fishing, giving plenty of opportunities to capture those fleeting moments, and 3) with a species like the RBGU, you won’t likely come away with anything to brag about. These aren’t eagles or owls or some rare species that will be all the talk on social media.

I really enjoyed watching the gulls catch and position their fish in flight for the head-first swallow. I was fortunate enough to catch this in action in several of my photos – they literally give them a little toss and catch them again so that the head is facing towards their mouth. It was also interesting to watch a few who knew the fish was too large to ingest and subsequently released back to the water.

As I alluded to above, I had a lot of fun shooting these gulls. The feeding opportunities were not as plentiful as I usually find at this location, but by staying alert and ready I came home with some photos that I really like.

Ring-billed Gulls were not the sole fishers we found. We also had several first-year Herring Gulls shown below. Unfortunately these birds did none of their own fishing, but seemed content in attempting to steal the catch from the RBGU.

Thanks for visiting!

-OZB

What a Difference a Week Makes – Photographing Ferocious Hunters at Carlyle Lake Spillway

birds, wildlife, wildlife photography

On a couple of successive Saturdays in mid-February, I had the pleasure to find myself at an old favorite spot to practice my high-speed action photography on some of the cutest little predators that I can imagine. In a spot more popular with fisher folk, I setup immediately behind the spillway of the Carlyle Lake damn with high hopes of shooting the Bonaparte’s Gulls that winter in this area.

Faster than greased lighting
Looking for shad
Bonnies everywhere!
Adjusting for an easier swallow

On my first Saturday visit, these cute little “Bonnies” represented at least 75% of the gull species taking advantage of the stunned gizzard and threadfin shad that come pouring through the spillway. This was great! Although photographing Ring-billed Gulls is always good for practice, they don’t excite me very much at all. What wasn’t great on this first day was the light, which I would describe as something like the sloppy end of a morning’s constitutional. Thank goodness for modern cameras with much improved high ISO performance and autofocus systems!

Photographing Bonnies while hunting like this is a real test of a photographer’s skills and their photographic gear. These guys are faster than a prairie fire with a tailwind. They have to be with the ever present Ring-billed Gulls nearby waiting to steal an easy meal.

A Ring-Billed Gull attempting to take the Bonaparte’s Gull’s fish. Typically the Ring-billed are much too slow once the Bonnie has their catch.

The photos I’ve shared so far all showed adult winter-plumaged Bonaparte’s Gulls. First-year winter birds are east to distinguish from the adults with their black tail bands and “M”-shaped black markings on their wing tops. These first year birds are every bit the skilled fishers that the adults are as you can see below.

On my next visit a week later, the skies were clear and I was now challenged with a pretty strong mid-day light coming into the spillway. I felt that this still should afford more speed and a bit better image quality than I had on my previous visit. Unfortunately, the Bonnies must have moved elsewhere. Most of the gulls present were Ring-billed and I only counted four Bonnies during the hour or so I was there.

Wildlife photographers looking for a fun and fast-paced challenge that has no chance of interfering with their photographic subjects should really consider visiting this location.

-OZB