Nesting birds are interesting to watch and they are one of my favorite subjects to photograph. To see, how much a parent cares for their young, how hard they had to work to keep their young ones fed constantly, how wonderful they are in sharing their love and braver in protecting their young ones from other predators, how intelligent they are in luring their young ones to make their first flight out of their nest by tempting them with food, how skillful they are in teaching the young ones to catch a prey on their own and survive in the wild and above everything how to cope up with humans and the destruction of their habitat caused by them, its just mind blowing to me that an animal of such small size could manage all of this succesfully year after an year on every breeding season.The nesting birds shows that even within an animal kingdom, there can be lots of surprises.
May be that's the secret of all species alive today that have stood the test of time and have survived and evolved, its also how our own species must have survived, but its disheartening to see that sometimes many humans with bigger brains than these birds, are often much worse at doing the same.
This year at radio road in redwood city, the terns feeding their fledglings is a sight not to be missed. I would visit this place on my drive back from work and spend a couple of hours until the sun goes down. During the few hours I spent here, I only witnessed one or two young terns calling (that were close enough to photograph), the parents were not seen anywhere in the vicinity. I continued to go there again hoping this day would be the day, but relentlessly I was proven wrong and the same thing happened for five days in a row. As a bird photographer I knew if there is one thing that I learned from this, its patience. On the sixth day I was able to watch and capture this wonderful moment. As they say, perseverance pays off.
Here is the rest of the story..
A forster's tern fledgling begs for food as one of its parent flies over. The young ones can be very demanding. This little one would stand on the bark waiting patiently for hours for its parent to return. When he sees the parent, he would start calling to them, which is a signal that he is hungry..
Hearing the child cry for food, the parent responds by bringing in a fish caught at a nearby lagoon and heads home.
A home delivery arrives for the fledgling. What a relief!
As the fledgling tries to keep a hold on to that fish that its parent just fed, it lost its balance and fell into the water. But it never lost grip of that fish. It knows, how valuable that food is and how hard it is to get one.
The fledgling swallows the fish, head first. Another good day for the tern! This feeding sequence got passed in less than 4-5 seconds. My fingers had to work as fast as these terns, behind the camera to capture these moments!.
This year at radio road in redwood city, the terns feeding their fledglings is a sight not to be missed. I would visit this place on my drive back from work and spend a couple of hours until the sun goes down. During the few hours I spent here, I only witnessed one or two young terns calling (that were close enough to photograph), the parents were not seen anywhere in the vicinity. I continued to go there again hoping this day would be the day, but relentlessly I was proven wrong and the same thing happened for five days in a row. As a bird photographer I knew if there is one thing that I learned from this, its patience. On the sixth day I was able to watch and capture this wonderful moment. As they say, perseverance pays off.
Here is the rest of the story..
A forster's tern fledgling begs for food as one of its parent flies over. The young ones can be very demanding. This little one would stand on the bark waiting patiently for hours for its parent to return. When he sees the parent, he would start calling to them, which is a signal that he is hungry..
Hearing the child cry for food, the parent responds by bringing in a fish caught at a nearby lagoon and heads home.
A home delivery arrives for the fledgling. What a relief!
As the fledgling tries to keep a hold on to that fish that its parent just fed, it lost its balance and fell into the water. But it never lost grip of that fish. It knows, how valuable that food is and how hard it is to get one.
The fledgling swallows the fish, head first. Another good day for the tern! This feeding sequence got passed in less than 4-5 seconds. My fingers had to work as fast as these terns, behind the camera to capture these moments!.
