Solid Start to the Year

One of the very first birds I saw when I “formerly” got into birding decades ago was the Hooded Merganser. I will always remember seeing it in this pond in Los Osos, CA, it was a big deal. The male which you see above is a gorgeous little duck. Oh, I’ve seen them ever since but always at a distance often through bins. Getting one close enough to get glass on one, ya, that has eluded me until now. While barely within range, the three Hoodeds were paddling, slowly, in my direction. They are a flighty bird so I stood still handholding the rig hoping the dog being walked coming my way wouldn’t flush them. The dog walker crosssed the street (the slough is a backwater for the Bitterroot River with some homes nearby). The one male kept coming closer until, click! My first shot ever of this marvelous bird and while it’s marginal at best, it broke the jinx. Even better is when the female went flying by, even though I was shooting through tree limbs I remembered to actually pan and shoot it rather than my normal, watch it to see where it landed and wondering why it flew in the first place. So I broke a jinx and started working on one of my New Year resolutions. A solid start to the year.