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Ruby-throated

I think spring has finally arrived so it’s time for birds and flowers for a few days. I made a trip yesterday to Pedernales Falls State Park, one of my favorite places to photograph birds and flowers. When I arrived at the bird blind I noticed that they had the hummingbird feeders up. I doubt there is a more difficult bird to photograph than a Hummingbird. Their wings flap at an amazing 50+ beats per second. In photography terms, that’s really fast! So, I started photographing them when they were sitting still. That’s the maximum possible sharpness. Since I had never photographed hummingbirds before, I figured that was a good starting point.  Then, there is the identification process. Fortunately, we only have a couple of species that reside in this area but there are over 300 species of hummingbirds. This one is a Ruby-throated Hummingbird.

You are probably curious why this hummingbird does not have a ruby-colored throat. Well, that’s because she’s a female.  See my post from the other day regarding bird colors titled “Mrs. Cardinalis Cardinalis“. The extremely short legs of the Ruby-throated Hummingbird prevent it from walking or hopping. The best it can do is shuffle along a perch. Nevertheless, it scratches its head and neck by raising its foot up and over its wing. They also prefer to feed on red or orange flowers. Like many birds, hummingbirds have good color vision and can see into the ultraviolet spectrum, which humans can’t see.

Ruby-throated Hummingbird
Ruby-throated Hummingbird

This image was taken with my Canon EOS 7D Mark II using my Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6 II Lens set on 400 mm. The camera was set on Aperture priority mode with the aperture set at f/7.1, shutter speed at 1/400th of a second and the ISO set at 1600. This is a single image processed in Lightroom.

You can view my Birds of Texas collection by clicking here. Please use the section below to post your comments, questions, or suggestions.

T. Kahler Photography
© 2016 T. Kahler Photography

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