Breakfast fights back.

Gallery: AvianPosted December 27, 2011360 views11 comments

Towards the end of my morning shoot at San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary I notice this Pied-billed Grebe acting up. As I approached it seemed to notice me and started to move away. I did not want to disturb the grebe so I set up and saw what was occurring. It had caught this crayfish and was tossing it about. It was a great behavior to witness.

The grebe would grab the crayfish by a leg, one at a time, and shake till the leg came off. The grebe got every leg and claw off the crayfish and then ate it which I thought was impossible. My card filled up and I missed capturing the consuming of the crayfish but I did witness it through the lens. Even with the antenna still on the grebe swallowed it. The grebe did have a great look on its face as the crayfish went down. A fun experience to witness.

Image is cropped quite a bit because I did not approach to close.

Canon 7D with 500mm
Tripod
1/1000 at f / 5.6
ISO = 200
EV + 1/3

Comments

11 comments

Comment posted by John Robinson on December 27, 2011 at 9:44 AM

Great action here !
Strange - the Great crested grebes ove here at one lake I visit- fed their chicks on nothing else but crayfish !
very appetising if you can get them down I reckon !
JohnR

Registered on March 2, 2008, 535 Posts, 2453 Comments

Comment posted by Patrick O'Healy on December 27, 2011 at 9:49 AM

Wonderful action shot.

Registered on March 13, 2011, 326 Posts, 1679 Comments

Comment posted by Gary Gulash on December 27, 2011 at 11:28 AM

Great action Harry. You exposed this one at the perfect moment, showing a nice profile of the grebe and at the same time revealing the crayfish out of the water with a good splash. I like the composition. My only nit is that the image appears perhaps slightly over sharpened on my monitor.

Registered on January 28, 2005, 879 Posts, 12098 Comments

Comment posted by Neal Cooper on December 27, 2011 at 11:30 AM

Interesting interaction captured Harry. Well done even if cropped a bit.

Registered on June 3, 2009, 144 Posts, 306 Comments

Comment posted by Robert Bunch on December 27, 2011 at 1:27 PM

Nice action and behavior shot. It looks a little contrasty on my screen. I am curious as to what % of full frame this crop is.

Registered on May 18, 2004, 124 Posts, 2503 Comments

Comment posted by Harry Harris on December 27, 2011 at 4:25 PM

Robert, the original frame was 5184 x 3456 and I cropped to 1954 x 1028 which I think is 11% of the original image. Also I have started trying to sharpen in CS5 and I may have over done it a bit as I agree that now that I look at it, it looks over sharpened. I have to work on my sharpening a lot. Prior I just sharpened in LR3 only.

Registered on August 2, 2010, 169 Posts, 741 Comments

Comment posted by Suzanne Huot on December 27, 2011 at 6:37 PM

No mistaking what lunch is going to be for this Grebe.Great capture and view of both subjects.

Registered on December 28, 2010, 32 Posts, 240 Comments

Comment posted by Charlie VanTassel on December 28, 2011 at 12:12 AM

I agree, a bit oversharpened and lighting a little harsh. Still, some great action and the overall composition is fine.

Registered on October 18, 2006, 644 Posts, 4801 Comments

Comment posted by Kurt Bowman on December 28, 2011 at 9:49 AM

Agree with the previous comments about the sharpening, but the action is perfect! Nice work capturing the right moment Harry.

Registered on June 19, 2008, 1005 Posts, 8028 Comments

Comment posted by Ron Dudley on December 28, 2011 at 7:35 PM

Great timing and action. I think the very large crop and oversharpening have extracted their dues on the image. I've seen this species do the same thing to frogs - completely dismember them in a furious and incredibly fast display before eating them.

Registered on March 30, 2007, 437 Posts, 10915 Comments

Comment posted by David Haynes on December 29, 2011 at 2:01 AM

Harry,
Very nice action shot. Nits already noted but a perfect profile of both the grebe and the crayfish. Good of you not to spook the grebe forcing it to drop his prey. You have always been very considerate to the wild life during the chase. Your actions should be noted and commended. Happy shooting Skip!!!

Registered on February 20, 2010, 110 Posts, 1511 Comments