Evening Grosbeak captured by Z 9 / Z600f4TC @840mm
The flocks of Evening Grosbeaks hit our gardens typically in early May. This year they were late and their numbers weren’t the same as in past years. The Evening Grosbeak population has seen a severe drop in the past year for no known reason so we were very anxious for their visit. I love photographing this large, loud species as they have lots of character. I only had a few opportunities with the big numbers in our feeder, this photo is from one of those days. I wanted to get shots this day of them deeper in the tree rather than out on the edge. They spend a lot of time in the interior and I didn’t have those shots. The problem is the light, it often doesn’t reach inside to the birds so I use flash. I was short of time so just went for the shots without flash. I kept asking the birds to move left, right, up or down to get in the light. My requests went unanswered until this male heard me. There was a soft drop of light just in front of him so I whispered, please step forward.