Two days ago before I found my lifer Rusty Blackbird I mentioned that I was photographing Hooded Mergansers. Today I want to share some photos of the Hooded Mergansers including images of a first winter drake. I’d never seen a first winter drake Hooded Merganser before so I did some research on them and found this information on BirdsoftheWorld.org:
Formative Plumage
(Nov-Jun). Male as in Juvenile Plumage but gradually attains some blackish and or white in head, back and breast and rufous in flanks of Definitive Basic Plumage in male; usually does not attain full breeding aspect of adults.
Adult males are usually in their breeding plumage by October so the young male I saw confused me for a bit. When I write about the birds I see I typically like to draw from my own knowledge and experiences but in this case I needed to go online to get the information I needed about this interesting first winter drake Hoodie.
All three of the Hooded Mergansers were close to me because there was a shelf of ice that prevented them from swimming out into the middle of the pond. Nighttime temps have been dropping into the teens here so open water is becoming more and more scarce.
There were times I was tempted to remove my teleconverter so I could get all three Hooded Mergansers in one photo but in hindsight I am glad I didn’t remove it or my photos of the Rusty Blackbird wouldn’t have been as frame-filling as they were.
The images in the Hooded Merganser gallery above are some that I picked after quickly reviewing them. Some I picked because I liked the poses of the mergansers. Just click the first image to see them in a slide show or to scroll through them larger one by one.
Life is good.
Mia
Click here to see more of my Hooded Merganser photos plus facts and information about this species.
All of the photos were taken using my Nikon D500 with my Nikkor 500mm VR lens and 1.4x TC attached. Most were taken using f9 as my aperture, a few were taken using f7.1. My shutter speed varied between 1/500 and 1/1600. My ISO was set at 500 for all of the images.
eye color helps separate them.
Many thanks for these images! I have been birding for 72 years and this is the first picture of a first winter drake that I have seen. Wonderful series!!
The preening female is top shelf!
Terrific group of pics. I love the Merganser reflections and the movement of water you captured. Thanks Mia.
EC and I are on the same page, as per usual. “Delightful” was the word that popped into my head as well. 🙂
What a delightful series. Thank you.
A great series of photos. I can see the difference between the female and the first-winter male Hooded Mergansers. I think I should go back through my photos of females to see if have some first-winter males in the lot.
Very nice photos, mergansers are a favorite of mine.