Well, this explains my difficulty in deciding whether these birds are rainbow or coconut lorikeets. (Columbus Zoo)
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| Soras swim but don't have webbed feet. (Columbus Zoo) |
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| Maybe the sora's long toes help it swim. The bird is about the size of a robin. |
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| hadada ibises (Columbus Zoo) |
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| dromedary camels (Columbus Zoo) |
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| More of Poor Clyde, an African gray parrot |
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| Amur tigers (Columbus Zoo) |
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| pygmy goats (Columbus Zoo) |
There's something fishy about a wing.
There are two hadada ibises. Here's the next shot I took.
My cousin sent me some pictures of flying birds from a magazine. I laughed to myself and replied that the birds in my photos are perching or standing, and for good reason: They weren't moving! Not long after I acquired a camera I made some attempts to capture a blue-bellied roller. I might be able to do better today, and I have caught a few more birds in flight.
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| Ross, a Lady Ross's turaco (Columbus Zoo) |
Ross lives with the African grey parrots and is usually perched in the shade by the window of the building to which the parrots' aviary is attached, and he is a handsome fellow (click the link). I have some nice close-up head shots but nothing that shows his blue magnificence. I had visited his perching self a bunch of times over a year and was stunned when I saw him fly because the red is not visible when his wings are folded.
The Toledo Zoo has a pair of rhinoceros hornbills. They're active about half the time I see them, hopping from branch to branch. These are large birds and don't have a heckuvalot of space, but one day they were flying back and forth in opposite directions. I took some so-so pictures and then decided to try the camera's burst mode. I forget Nikon's official name for that, but the camera keeps taking pictures as long as the button is pressed. The shots are not great, but I got this sequence:
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| I didn't record whether this bald eagle at the Columbus Zoo had just taken off or was heading for a landing. The latter, I'd say. |
I was walking from one part of the Columbus Zoo to another when I spotted this wild Cooper's (not sure) hawk. I took this picture and then the hawk took flight.
I got two shots, and here's one. (This might have been a good time for burst mode, but I didn't think of it and I would have been too slow to set the camera, anyway.) I suppose that other bird is thinking good riddance!
