Just one duckling left

[Steve Foss]

Mom mallard was pretty darn wary today. I lay in the muck at the edge of a cattail marsh through the late afternoon and evening and these were the only ones who would pose for me. She's down to just one left in the brood, so it's little wonder she was careful.

Nothing special about this one. Just a decent capture in nice evening light. I posted it because of all you duck hunters hanging around waiting for fall.

Canon 1DMk2n, Canon 600 f4L IS, iso400, 1/1600 at f4.5

[The_Duckslayer]

Quote:

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Mom mallard was pretty darn wary today. I lay in the muck at the edge of a cattail marsh through the late afternoon and evening ...

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And that would be why you are a "Photographer" and I am a "picture taker". Thanks for all your patience and for posting the results of that here on the web. Still come here first to look at all the pictures that all of you have posted. Have a good one and N Joy the Hunt././Jimbo

[Steve Foss]

Thanks, Jimbo. Figured you'd for sure find this. Any time I take a duck picture and post it here, I know you will like it.

[WCS]

Very nice Steve. Looks like you had some great light to work with. I don't think I could bring myself to lay in the muck with a Canon 1DMk2n and a Canon 600 f4L IS in my hands. How long do you get to use that set up? You must be having a blast with it.

[Steve Foss]

I've got it through Monday before I have to gulp and cough up the $150 or more to ship it back second-day air insured to CPS. Free? Yeah, sort of.

I am having a great time. Using it (or the 400 f2.8 or 500 f4, which I've used before) is a bit like bowhunting. You have to pick a good spot and set up and wait for subjects to come to you, because the whole thing is too heavy to just walk around in the woods on the trails with. So there have been hours at a stretch so far where I'm laying/sitting/standing behind this setup with no subject to photograph, and then one might come into view for only a few seconds, and then it's like getting off a quick shot with your bow at a deer. Which means that, after being out with it for significant portions of four different days, on one of those days I've come back with no images, and on two of the remaining three with no especially fine images. It's just a waiting game. Hmmm, wonder where I'll set up later this afternoon?

June would have been a much better time to have it, with eagles and ospreys still on nests and the ducks all over the place in the wetlands and loons coming off nests and such, but I was too busy in June to take it for 10 days.

And laying in the muck means I get all mucky, not the gear. I've got it resting on a flat rock about five inches above the water with a small camo foam pad on the rock, and I shroud the big white lens itself in camo fabric, which adds a bit more protection.

I suppose I should have Mrs. Catfish shoot some pictures of me and the lens while I've got it. You know, images that make me look like Big Time Photographer Dude and such, eh?

[dukhnt]

Sweet picture. Hunting season is just around the corner. But as I just started wildlife photography this year, I find it more satisfying to get that one sweet pic over shooting the animal.