Working with Ducks

[Shortsighted]

 Working with ducks and their brethren can be engaging to the point of amusement but usually it borders on frustration because ducks loath to follow my directions, they hang around in cliques far off-shore without even having the likes of TikTok to talk about, or they wander off the stage to search for grub. That they fail to share the same vision as me is understandable because most people don’t even get me; so that expecting a duck to swim onto the set in tune with the music in my head is like a film director supervising the prevailing weather ...3, 2, 1, action!  There are tricks somewhere within the toolbox for photographing ducks but these few tools have very limited utility and who really wants to spend precious time reading the instructions.


Instead of imagining giving a duck directives to help realize your greater vision it is best to take a cue from their rote behaviour and work with that knowledge. Rafts of ducks located far off-shore remain unflappable and present an opportunity for a tally, if you’re so inclined, or bestow a chance for a group photo even though some of the ducks are looking away or are having a siesta. Besides, you could scrutinize the photo afterwards in search of suspicious duck behaviour and then report it to the overseers for interpretation, much like online activities are managed by algorithmic cookies, ascribing meaning to ostensibly meaningless interludes.
 
 
The most profitable duck behaviour for purposes of photography happens when they cruise back and forth close to shore, preoccupied with relatively deep-water surveillance as part of the ritual of looking for grub. Deep water shorelines within parks are often embellished with large boulders decoratively placed aux nuevo-sauvage by obscenely well-paid landscape developers with a pair of large rocks. While not installed for my convenience, these boulders offer many nooks and crannies. I gravitate toward the nooks because the crannies make me nervous. I can shape-shift to fit into nooks and hunker down close to the water. Sometimes these rocks even shelter me from the breeze and airborne insults, well ... they bounce right off. I’m sure that you can visualize it. Rocks to the left of me, rocks to the right of me, and I’m stuck in the middle looking out onto a narrow field of view of water. A modest-sized camo cloth even keeps me warm.
 
 
 That’s pretty much it. Just sit on a foam backing and wait for passing water fowl. The hardest part is to remain vigilant because a subject can quickly appear from either side in an instant. I pre-focus as much as possible to best distance and obtain a trial exposure in advance. There is no other way to get this close without the help of Klingon technology. I also now have a 2X TC but its use requires me to focus manually, at least until I get an R-series Canon camera. I can pretend.
 
 
 Another tip: many times you can see a disturbance in the water before the duck appears, as either a bow wavefront if the duck is swimming quickly, or bubbles if a duck is about to resurface after a completing a dive.




Male Bufflehead


Female Common Merganser


Male Red-breasted Merganser


Juggernaut

[Shortsighted]

It's so nice to have plenty of bright light, which is a condition that I've always associated with winter. I just recently bought some paint identified as 'Winter sky grey' so I suppose that whomever must have named it doesn't share my view of winter. Must be from the west coast. A black duck, such as a White-winged scoter is as difficult a subject as a white duck, such as a Longtail when trying to get a balanced exposure.

[Bird Brain]

What is being eaten in photo #3? (above) 

[Shortsighted]

Many diving ducks are attracted to Lake Ontario because of the abundance of zebra mussels, a much sought after food source for water fowl and an invasive pest for marine biologists allergic to shellfish. Scoters are well-equipped to handle cemented clusters of zebra mussel because of their large mouth and strong serrated bills. I've seen Scaup swallow clusters of mussels too. I'm not sure how warmer lake waters through climate change will affect the mussel population and the number of winter water fowl the lake will host in subsequent years.