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Mandarin Duck
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Mandarin Duck

by Patrick O'Healy

Gallery: AvianPosted March 9, 2012143 views3 comments
March 4, 2012 Irvine Regional Park

Nikon D300 Nikkor 200-400mm 1.4TC f/7.1 1/320 ISO-800
550 mm 15 meters distance Aperture Priority Auto White Balance

The photo has been cropped about 35% and cleaned up in CS5

This is the same bird Skip Harris posted on 3/6. This is the first Mandarin I have seen, as well as photographed. His behavior was very aggressive as he had selected a female Wood Duck and was protecting her from any other duck coming near. We had many opportunities to shoot attacking behavior, but all of that took place in shadow where good photos were not possible. This past weekend there were many Wood Ducks and this one Mandarin in the two ponds at this park.

comments welcome

Comments

3 comments
Comment posted by Harry Harris on March 9, 2012 at 11:37 AM
Nice image. I like this over mine, because it is not so harsh. He was a feisty little guy wasn't he. I was glad to share the experience with you.
Registered on August 2, 2010, 169 Posts, 741 Comments
Comment posted by Peter Cross on March 9, 2012 at 10:45 PM
Beautiful bird. Hard to believe the colors he's sporting. That's quite a bow wave he's pushing out ahead so it does seem like he's on patrol. Nice detail, although it seems like some is missing. Perhaps from the sharpening process? Regardless, this is a nice image and well captured.
Registered on April 3, 2010, 271 Posts, 1342 Comments
Comment posted by Angela McCain on March 10, 2012 at 2:20 PM
Amazing colors in this duck. Nice handling of all of them. Interesting to hear about the behavior. I think it needs just a bit of CCW rotation.
Registered on April 19, 2009, 367 Posts, 3589 Comments