Photo of the month 

February 2004 

REDDISH EGRET - B021

(Egretta rufescens)

Ding Darling Wildlife Refuge, Sanibel, Florida, USA - January

4/500 mm – ISO 400

Digital Capture

[1]

A bird motionless in the water or on a perch, this is the usual image we know of a hunting heron. For a nature photographer this means waiting, waiting and waiting until the bird eventually does some action.

There is one exception to this: it's the Reddish Egret. This species is famous for the "drunk dance" hunting technique, during which it runs all over the water trying to scare fishes and make them swim to open areas. This is real action photography! 

A relatively high ISO setting helped me to achieve fast shutter speeds (1/500) at small aperture to obtain frozen motion and keep enough depth of field.

Once the egret has scared the fishes, it spreads its wings both to reduce bright reflexes from the sky and to create shade which attracts the disoriented fishes.