Male Wood Ducks

Two male wood ducks foraging for corn on March 17, 2019 at a private location. A friend had messaged me the prior evening asking if I would be interested in shooting wood ducks in the morning at a location he frequents for them. Wood ducks, like many ducks, are very skittish and I do not like to pass up easy opportunities to shoot them. When we arrived at the location, there was a slew of gulls and geese as I expected. I did not see the wood ducks initially until we sat on the grass and my friend started tossing out corn. Only 2 wandered up despite being told there is usually more than that. These particular 2 wood ducks only stayed for a few minutes and waddled back into the stream. We attempted to slowly follow them but they eventually eluded us. They managed to go further downstream and eventually flew off when they were spotted.

I was thrilled when I got home and saw that this shot was in-focus. It was hard to single them out with so many geese and gulls trying for corn as well. I intend to go back to this location in the future and hope the wood ducks will cooperate.

Lens - Tamron 150-600mm F/5-6.3 Di VC USD G2 @ 330mm on Nikon D500