'Alae 'Ula

The Hawaiian race of the Common Moorhen or Common Gallinule.  Numbers are thought to be in the lower hundreds on Kauai, but we saw them in several places ranging from the headquarters parking lot of the National Tropical Botanical Garden, to a creek entering the ocean, to pretty large numbers of them at the Taro Ponds at Hanalei NWR where this image was taken.  The image might look crooked, but the bird was making it's way down a slope toward a pond.

Several people commented on the low angle of my last posting.  The ponds at Hanalei are surrounded by raised berms including one along the edge of the road.  In the case of the Plover, it was working its way along the top of the berm and all I had to do was kneel down at the edge as it came toward and past me.

7Dii, Sigma 150-600 C @ 600 mm, hand held, f/8/ 1/320, iso 1250, aperture priority, pattern metering, -1/3 EV (I didn't want to blow out the white tail feathers).  Processed in LR5 & CS6.  Cropped to a 12 MP 4x5 before resizing.  Taken January 29th at 8:03 AM.

Comments and criticisms are very much appreciated.

Thanks,