July 2003

NORTHERN FLICKER - B018

(Colaptes auratus)

Oakland County, Michigan, USA - June

4/500mm  – ISO 200

Digital Capture 

[1]

" I'm hungry!!! " the young northern flicker is loudly calling while he's waiting for his mother bringing tasty ant larva.

I planned to take this picture back in the winter, when I saw this old tree with a woodpecker hole in a secluded pond in Oakland County.

This happened late in the afternoon (4 pm roughly) when the light gray color of the wood was lit by the wonderful evening sun reflecting the last rays in the pond.

During all the springtime I strongly hoped that a woodpecker pair will choose this as a nesting site and I also checked the bank of the pond for a nice site to put my blind in case the destiny would have been generous with me. Everything was prepared, or .....at least I thought it was!

Months later (in May) I was super happy one day discovering that a pair of northern flickers were breeding in that hole!

I waited some weeks to let the birds progress with their nesting activities without any disturbance from my side until mid of June the young birds where grown enough to begin my photo sessions.

Full of hope and excitation I went one afternoon to the spot and put myself under a camo net. Soon I noticed that the best evening light would have never hit the hole as I expected in January. The sun's position was completely different than in the winter (how obvious, right?). Even mid afternoon light pictures were almost impossible because of a very unpleasant side light.

After the first five minutes of bad disenchantment I found the solution: photographing woodpeckers from a completely different angle. 

From the water! (see below)

Although unexpected, it was really funny to wade chest-deep under a camo net and watching woodpeckers. After just one day the strange shape rising from the water was so accepted by the bird community in the pond, that I could even take shots of Canada Geese, Mallards and Wood Ducks swimmimg a couple meters far from me.