Thank you berry much

A few weeks back I had the pleasure of meeting another fellow birder, Karl Woods, for a day of birding. We decided to go find the large group of waxwings seen in Carrigtwohill. Upon arrival the waxwings seemed to have gathered at the top of a distant tree well out of camera view and I feared that the dull weather might keep me from getting any shots at all.

Luckily the waxwings had other plans and descended on the berry shrubs right next to us. As you can imagine this drastically improved my odds of getting a good shot. They also seemed less shy then the Finbarr’s waxwings (strength in numbers?). One thing I continuously find with waxwings is that when they are close, the weather is bad and when the weather is good the waxwings are always distant. Hence, I never quite get the shot I am after. This is my fifth waxwing shoot this winter, and yet I don’t feel I have done this stunning little bird justice!

I might have considered blurring out the window in the background to emphasize the foreground, but I rather like the landing waxwing in the shot.

Nice to see so many waxwings gathered together.

Finding a cedar waxwing on Cedar road, would have been poetic, don't you think ;)

We finished off the day at Atlantic pond where we saw a ring billed gull, if I’m not mistaking the same one that I had seen earlier at the Gate cinema. Unfortunately I didn’t manage to photograph him (this time). All in all a great day!