I did not spend enough time admiring and photographing the Reddish Egrets while I visiting the Aransas National Wildlife refuge last month. I spotted this pair of Reddish Egrets fighting and chasing each other right in front of me and I should have captured more photos of the pair in action. Instead, I was attracted to the slightly larger Great Blue Herons and their nestbuilding activities. You’ve seen many a few of those photos in my recent posts.
But why is one of the Reddish Egrets white? Well, apparently, Reddish Egrets come in two color morphs, the dark morph (slate and reddish-brown color) and the scarcer white morph. Unlike some other species, Reddish Egrets are either dark or white for life, including during their downy beginning. The mated pairs can be of the same or different color morphs. Broods can also be either color. The dominant color of the species is the darker color morph.
This image was taken with my Sony A7R V using a Sony 600mm f/4 lens I rented from Lens Rentals. The camera was set on Manual mode with the aperture set at f/8, shutter speed at 1/1600th of a second, and the ISO set at 500. I used a tripod for stability. This is a single image processed in Lightroom and completed in Photoshop using Topaz AI to reduce the noise and Nik Color Efex 7.
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T. Kahler Photography
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Nice capture.
Thanks, Rick!