Yesterday, I attended a Dragonfly walk at Gilbert Riparian Institute but because it was still too cool for the Dragonflies, we decided to check out the multiple ponds and ended up doing some bird watching. There was some excitement at a blind where multiple photographers were lined up all pointing their humongous lenses out into the reeds. “We’re waiting for the Bittern to show up”, they said. Even though I had no idea what a Bittern was, I pointed my puny 300mm lens in the same direction and figured I’d get a shot too 🙂

“There he is!” someone yelled. I saw movement and only took one shot. Only one because my main camera is in for service so all I had was my Infrared and my Canon SX1. My little Canon wouldn’t focus, so I shot with the Infrared but figured the image wouldn’t show much. I almost didn’t shoot but I’m happy I did! Here’s what I got:

American Bittern

Then someone else pointed out that there were Common Moorhens with chicks. It turns out there were 5 babies. My SX 1 did a little better focusing. Here are some tight crops.

Common Moorhen and chicks

A couple of hours later, it warmed up enough to bring out the Dragonflies and Damselflies. Here’s an infrared shot of a Blue Dasher. I’ll be ready for some color shots on the next walk.

This riparian park is well worth a day trip if you’ve never been!