RH Speirs | Photographer - Green-winged Teals

Must admit that I was pretty excited during the shooting of these pictures, as I knew they'd be, by far, the best photos of Green-winged Teals I've ever been able to capture/achieve. Was able to move in relatively close to this pair without spooking them, as they just seemed to go on about their business as though I wasn't even there (being within relatively close proximity). I just had to keep my movements to a minimum, and make them in a timely manner. Though very happy with the results here, I'm not quite as thrilled as I thought I'd be. I'm a strong believer that something is only as good as its weakest link, and in this case it's the background. It's simply too close, and ends up being quite busy and distracting. The light was pretty good for these shots, but not great. It was well on into the morning hours (9:27 - 10:09 am) and the sun was, totally unfiltered, and getting up very high in the sky, making for extremely bright highlights and deep dark shadows. I tried to even that issue out as best I could in the post-processing of these photos. The sharpness is there, I got the very low angle of view I like when capturing these type of images..it's just that busy distracting background lol. Oh well, the good news is, if I ever did want to do something further with these images, like taking any of them to print for example..it would just require more detailed editing of the images, more than the relatively simple basic edit I put all these ones through thus far. The background could quite easily be darkened down, and blurred out somewhat, making it less distracting. Anyways, beautiful birds!

Green-winged Teal pair (male left, female right), Marshall Springs, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - May 26th

Green-winged Teal (male), Marshall Springs, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - May 26th

Green-winged Teal pair (male left, female right), Marshall Springs, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - May 26th

Green-winged Teal (male), Marshall Springs, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - May 26th

Green-winged Teal pair (male background, female foreground), Marshall Springs, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - May 26th

Green-winged Teal (male), Marshall Springs, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - May 26th

Green-winged Teal (female), Marshall Springs, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - May 26th

Green-winged Teal (male), Marshall Springs, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - May 26th

Green-winged Teal pair (female right, male left), Marshall Springs, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - May 26th

Green-winged Teal (male), Marshall Springs, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - May 26th

The look to the sky (below) that all bird species at the Marshall Springs ponds do when they hear the alarm system going off, courtesy of the Red-winged Blackbird network.

Green-winged Teal (male), Marshall Springs, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - May 26th

Green-winged Teal pair (male right, female left), Marshall Springs, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - May 26th

Green-winged Teal (female), Marshall Springs, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - May 26th

Green-winged Teal (male), Marshall Springs, Fish Creek Provincial Park, Calgary, AB - May 26th

Green-winged Teals - Calgary, AB

You may also like